It wasn’t an easy journey that brought Zach Gotlib to create SelfiHealth. 

Gotlib was born with a congenital heart defect, a diagnosis that will change his entire life. At 12 years old, he was told he’d should have open heart surgery. Although he didn’t should undergo the procedure on the time, the whole lot modified from there. 

“I couldn’t do gym class anymore, couldn’t take part in recess. My world was over in a short time,” he said. “Then once I was 20 I did have open heart surgery.”

From then on, it seemed Gotlib was on the road to recovery. He moved to Recent York City for law school. He volunteered for the American Heart Association and was eventually named their survivor of the 12 months in 2017, during which he was able to talk about his journey. 

“I’d have people coming as much as me afterward saying things like, ‘I needed my brother, sister, cousin could have heard you speak.’ And I kept on saying, ‘What 12 months are we living in? Why can’t they?’” Gotlib said. 

He realized how lucky he’d been, as he’d joined a young professionals group in Recent York City for those with similar experiences. He realized this was a luxury not widely accessible outside of Recent York City. With an urge to do something more for those with health challenges, he began running marathons to lift money for the American Heart Association. 

“No good deed goes unpunished because I ended up tearing my hip and I’ve had two hip surgeries and I’ve been in chronic pain for the last six years,” Gotlib said. “The blessing in all that is it brought me back full circle to how I felt being told I needed immediate open heart surgery. I used to be just lost, afraid, confused.” 

This led him down a rabbit hole of Facebook groups and Reddit pages, anywhere he could find peer support as he faced additional surgeries. 

“I hated the experience because they were all structured as discussion boards, so I could post but I had no control over who responded. I didn’t feel comfortable sharing the realities of my health concerns with 5,000 people I didn’t know,” said Gotlib. “Then, once I did post, I had people thrice my age telling me about their cats and dogs and their political opinions. I wanted to seek out meaningful peer health support.” 

It was then that Gotlib tapped his best friend and now SelfiHealth cofounder Jared Firestone to brainstorm potential ideas. Firestone himself survived a mini stroke his freshman 12 months of law school, after which he was told he could never compete or play sports again. He’s now a World Cup athlete for Israel’s bobsled and skeleton team. 

“We put our heads together and we were just twentysomething-year-olds living in Recent York City on the time saying, ‘We will go on dating apps, 10 of them without delay, put in all these filters and find someone that I actually have loads in common with for the aim of affection,” Gotlib said, noting that’s how he met his wife. “But for health care, we’re mainly grouped into these online forums based on condition, which makes it really difficult to form meaningful relationships.” 

While Gotlib and Firestone were each looking for meaningful connections on the time, experts, including the U.S. surgeon general, have emphasized the importance of strong social relationships as loneliness has grow to be more widespread. In accordance with a report from the U.S. surgeon general advisory, “poor social relationships” resulted in a 29 and 32 percent increase of heart disease and stroke, respectively. 

“That was the impetus,” said Gotlib. “Let’s develop a mobile app that operates like a dating app to match people based off health concerns and who they’re as people so interests, goals, age, gender and site. If you happen to know you may have loads in common with someone, you’re more prone to share concerning the realities of your condition. Then you definately’re more prone to help one another, hold one another accountable, each emotionally and physically.” 

From there, SelfiHealth was officially born. The platform launched earlier this 12 months in partnership with the American Heart Association. On the app, users input their information and are matched with individuals who they’ll request to message or video chat with, in addition to groups that is perhaps relevant to them, akin to heart attack survivors under the age of 45. 

“You possibly can get one-on-one meaningful support combined with resources from trusted organizations,” said Gotlib. 

Partnering with reputable organizations, just like the American Heart Association, was key for Gotlib to make sure the groups and content on the app were meaningful and expert-backed. 

“What we actually need to do is create a trusted resource for people. Our way of doing that was partnering with nonprofits to create groups on our app.…The American Heart Association has provided resources so there’s fact sheets, survivor stories, YouTube videos,” Gotlib said, noting additionally they host live events together, akin to heart-healthy cooking demos. 

Now, SelfiHealth is partnering with additional organizations, including Triage Cancer and Mended Hearts, in an effort to expand the support the platform is capable of offer. Additionally they have several letters of intent from hospitals to leverage their technology — these organizations will support the brand’s revenue model, because the platform might be free for users. Moreover, these organizations are key for SelfiHealth’s success, as they might be those marketing it to their members and patients. 

“We desired to prove it with heart problems. Obviously, that’s our area of interest and we had the connection,” said Gotlib of the early launch. “However the unlucky reality is an increasing number of persons are being diagnosed with cancer, Crohn’s, all types of chronic conditions, so once we prove it with heart disease, we will apply it on a broad spectrum to anything that’s a chronic condition.” 

While the platform could also be just like and inspired by Tinder, Gotlib explained, “This isn’t Tinder. It’s not, ‘I’m gonna keep swiping 1,000,000 times until I find love.’ What it’s is to seek out meaningful support.”