Smart Design is proud to partner with female entrepreneurs who are transforming women’s healthcare through innovation and design. Today, we feature Laura Yecies, CEO of Bone Health Technologies (BHT), who is shaking up, literally, the FemTech space with a non-pharmaceutical approach to strengthening bones in post-menopausal women with osteopenia (osteoporosis’ precursor).
Laura discusses how concerns about adverse side effects from osteoporosis drugs drove research into non-pharmaceutical treatments. From there, a collaboration between medical and product design resulted in a wearable vibration belt that strengthens bones against small cracks in the spine associated with aging. BHT’s innovative solutions challenge prevailing misconceptions surrounding women’s health, particularly dispelling the notion that post-menopausal women are destined to suffer from brittle bones. Now that BHT has FDA clearance, they have thousands on their waiting list proving the eagerness for women’s healthcare focus beyond the traditional “bikini health” realms of reproductive organs.
Laura: We were founded by physician and medical device entrepreneur [Dr. Shane Mangrum]. This physical medicine and pain doctor out of Atlanta was taking care of a lot of patients who had vertebral compression fractures [small breaks or cracks in the spine]. There was no good treatment for it. So he became very interested in how to prevent these fractures, and saw that patients really didn’t want to take the medicines [many patients recommended for osteoporosis pharmacotherapy decline treatment because they fear potential side effects]. He came across research on whole-body vibration platforms, some of which was done by NASA. Based on that, he came up with the idea for the Osteoboost and partnered with a medical device incubator for prototyping, and jointly applied for the grants to do the original research. I came on as CEO in 2020.
Laura: I think a few issues are at play. When we think about women’s health, we often think about what I call “bikini health.” The reproductive organs, breast cancer, and ovarian cancer are seen as the most important. But some other areas like bone health, cardiac, and metabolic health can be neglected. These are different for women and it’s important not to overlook that.
Pharmacologically, osteoporosis seems to be a very hard problem. The clinical research for drugs is very, very expensive because they have to do fracture studies. There have not been a lot of non-pharmacological attempts. Perhaps, there’s just too much of an acceptance that old ladies get bone fractures. And we don’t have a mindset in our culture to fight against that.
We don’t simply accept that older men have heart attacks or prostate problems, there’s a lot of research and innovation there. There’s a lot of innovation in some other parts of women’s health, but the innovation for this older women area, like the menopause phase, is quite recent. For a long time, there was an acceptance of these health conditions for older women.
Laura: I think as a culture, things are hard to talk about related to sexual health. I don’t feel like there are taboos around bone health. But menopause used to not really be talked about and it’s a big trigger for osteoporosis because women lose bone precipitously during the menopause transition. I’m glad to see that this is changing. The current generation of 50-somethings going through menopause now expects to feel good. They don’t want to take the symptoms of menopause lying down.
Laura: The juxtaposition of the small amount of research and limited funding in that area, considering that half of all women are fracturing at some point. 52 million Americans have osteopenia [1]. And so it deserves more research, attention, and focus. It’s a big mismatch, which by the way, that mismatch is a business opportunity. If BHT overcomes that challenge, it differentiates us.
Laura: There’s been a paucity of investment in many areas of unmet need and there could be significant innovations for healthcare and big businesses as well. I think that’s really exciting. I’m not an angel investor, I’m kind of too busy with running my startup, but if I were, I’d invest in women’s health.
Laura: We’re finalizing the product and companion app, getting ready to launch, and putting our commercialization and reimbursement strategy in place. We’re a small team, but we’re getting ready to get bigger. I’m raising capital and hiring some key people. There is a lot of work ahead!