While recovering from surgery, breast cancer patient Nancy Wyrick accidentally put her knee down on her drain tubing, inserted into the chest to pull out potentially infectious fluids, and ripped it out.
Her daughter, Leah, saw this incident among many other painful complications following Nancy’s mastectomy and breast reconstruction surgeries after Nancy was diagnosed in 2016. There was one major thing that did not help that should have – the recovery bra.
As a high school senior, Wyrick created the Resilience Bra to better aid patients. Now a senior business student at Wake Forest University, Wyrick and her company, Three Strands Recovery Wear, are focused on providing breast cancer and cosmetic surgery patients with a functional and comfortable bra.
Most recovery bras do not account for the drain tubing and often are described as uncomfortable and ill-fitting.
“We've found that a lot of patients compared their bras to straitjackets,” Wyrick said. “When you think about coming out of a surgery like that, you're already going through so much in your head. You look down and see that ugly, white-looking straitjacket – that doesn't help.”
The patent-pending Resilience Bra is designed with 24/7 comfort in mind. It is adjustable to a patient’s ribcage and chest, has a pocket for the drain tubing and will come in a variety of patterns.
Wyrick relied heavily on feedback from physicians, surgeons and patients to design her product, particularly her mother’s own surgeon, Dr. Samuel Roy who has served as Wyrick’s mentor since the product’s inception.
Working with a factory in Jakarta, Indonesia, Three Strands Recovery Wear has produced its initial prototype. Wyrick ordered 75 bras that will be used for a beta test in partnership with Wake Forest’s Center for Healthcare Innovation early next year.
Wyrick won a $25,000 loan for a first-place finish in Velocity’s Demo Day pitch event. Following the beta test early next year, Wyrick plans to decide whether she will take the interest-free loan that would have to be paid back in one year.
Wyrick also won about $10,000 from a pitch competition and was awarded $4,500 her freshman year by Wake Forest’s Center for Entrepreneurship. She has also received donations from friends and family.
And on Monday, Wyrick was awarded a $10,000 NC IDEA MICRO grant.
Wyrick came into Wake Forest knowing she wanted to go into healthcare but figured she would become a doctor. Her entrepreneurial spirit kicked in when she took her product idea to the Center for Entrepreneurship’s pitch over pizza event and became the only freshman accepted into the startup lab at Wake Forest.
She said the startup lab completely changed her trajectory. Wyrick changed her major to business and, with the help of mentors, has seen Three Strands Recovery Wear take off.
She completed Winston Starts’ accelerator program about a year ago and just last month completed the Center for Creative Economy’s Velocity Accelerator.
“It makes me so happy to have mentors that are very blunt, very honest, but at the same time they're encouraging. They're like, we know you can do this, but I think you should look at it this way. I think that's what's made my company so successful over the past year is because I'm taking that constructive feedback that people are giving me and translating it into action,” Wyrick said.
Here’s more from Wyrick in a Q&A. The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
How did you go about designing your product? Did you have patients and physicians involved?
That is 100% correct and I think that's what really makes Three Strands stand apart as a company compared to other manufacturers on the market today. The way that we went about creating the Resilience Bra was listening to patients and speaking to the physicians because this is what they see on a day-to-day basis. The bra includes absolutely everything that a patient needs to have a proper and manageable recovery while also having a big comfort aspect. It’s a product that they can trust is going to help them through the journey, and ultimately benefit them to have a recovery a deserve.
How did Wake Forest’s startup lab help you?
That program really made me change the trajectory of where I wanted to go with my life. I always wanted to be involved with healthcare in some capacity. I realized through the program that I had been an entrepreneur my whole life – I just didn't know it. When I was little, I made these straps that go on archery bows and ended up selling them for like $1,000 to a bow shop. I also had my own help-yourself stands on golf courses. It was just snacks and treats and run on an honor system. I was able to apply what I've been doing into this new start to my new company.
Also, just seeing how many opportunities have stemmed from just me being in that program. Because I was in the startup lab, I was able to get into Winston Starts. I think what really helped me most was the mentors along the way that believed in my product and believed in me before I even knew that's what I wanted to do with my life.
How do you expect to sell the Resilience Bra?
We're looking right now at like two different business models. One is selling directly to hospitals and plastic surgeons, which will be a little harder, and the other is selling directly to consumers. I'm passionate about trying the harder business model first, because the whole point of why I created this product was for people like my mom. The “straitjacket bra” was the one she woke up in and it already started messing with her, so what I'm passionate about is being able to have this product on a patient on the operating table. It's there for them throughout their entire recovery process. It's what they wake up to, and it gives them the ability of recovering in the best possible way.
