WILMINGTON — Ten years ago, Jacqueline Gaulin was a new employee at Revolution Health, the online health company started by American Online co-founder Steve Case. Excited to be working at what Gaulin called a “start up on steroids,” Gaulin and other employees were assigned different health systems: neurological, muscles, vision, and so on.
Gaulin ended up with the gastrointestinal system.
“It was the one no one wanted, you know, it wasn’t exciting, it could be embarrassing,” Gaulin said. “But I didn’t care. I threw myself into. These were people, patients who were really suffering, so I wanted to serve them as best I could.”
Gaulin went on to create and manage the digestive health center for Revolution. She also started “Gastro Girl,” a blog focused on gastrointestinal health. Though it came out of her experiences at Revolution, Gaulin’s blog was her own work and, as disclaimers from Revolution stated, not part of her work at Revolution. That ended up being a good thing — when Revolution merged with Waterfront Media, Gaulin was free to keep her blog.
Gastro Girl meets world
Next Gaulin spent time at the American College of Gastroenterology (ACG) as the director of communications and digital engagement. During her time there, digestive health hit a watershed moment with the story of Tatum Williams, a 28-year old mother from Baltimore whose 20-month-old son Jesse was losing his battle with a lethal infection of Clostridium difficile bacteria.
The only cure was a fecal transplant from mother to son. According to Gaulin, the story altered the way the media approached – and the general public thought about – GI disorders.
“It was the kind of story that would have been covered for its ‘ick factor’ in the past,” Gaulin said. “But all of the sudden, it was a life saving procedure. It wasn’t just something discussed because it was gross, it was a medical procedure, discussed as part of a larger medical understanding.”
Gaulin was at the helm of the ACG’s communications department at the time, and being part of the getting the word out help cement her investment in GI health, and her belief that Gastro Girl was onto something. In the following years, Gaulin said, it was more common to hear people discuss GI disorders such as Crohn’s disease, Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), and other issues.
“But it wasn’t just that people were a little more able to talk about these things, it was also that the science was increasingly showing the importance of digestive health,” Gaulin said.
The recent emphasis on the importance of nerve clusters in the digestive tract — “the second brain,” Gaulin called it — is only part of that expanded understanding. According to Gaulin, one in four people deal with digestive health issues, with 84 million people nationwide spending $171 billion annually. Many of them, Gaulin said, don’t have access to the resources to really deal with their issues.
From blog to start-up
Flash forward several years, and Gaulin was ready to take her experience with GI health and turn into a new business. Her idea: create a virtual health platform for digestive health. In other words, put everything from WebMD style information, community forums, and access to healthcare professionals at a patient’s fingertips.
Gaulin originally considered Raleigh – known for its start-up community – but chose Wilmington in the end, moving from Washington, D.C., last year.
“There’s something precious about this town, there’s a lot of possibility, and a lot of resources,” Gaulin said.
Some of those resources included the professional development courses available at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Jim Roberts and his group Network for Entrepreneurs in Wilmington, and UNCW, Gaulin said. But other resources were had more to do with the feel of the town — and the beach.
“When you’re running a start-up, when you’re building it from the ground up, you’re under a lot of stress. There are other cities you could start a business, they certainly have great resources for that, but they can also be stressful — added stress you don’t need,” Gaulin said. “Wilmington gives you the resources to blow off steam, to relax a little bit.”
Gaulin got to work, but said she went about building her start-up backwards.
“Some start-ups, a lot of them, build their technology first, and have all the bells and whistles, and then go to find a user base,” Gaulin said. “I wanted to start with the people, the people dealing with digestive health issues, the doctors, the nutritionists, and build that community, and the website and the app and all that could come along as needed.”
A big part of that community is Gaulin’s partnership with the ACG, which – in addition to helping reassure patients that Gastro Girl is the real deal – also helped Gaulin connect with 14,000 physicians in 86 countries, as well as over 26 million patients.
What’s next?
The next step for Gaulin will be GI OnDemand, a web and mobile app allowing direct one-on-one consultations with doctors and dietitians; the “telehealth” consultations are covered by many insurance plans, Gaulin said, because GI OnDemand allows a video component. The ACG has sponsored an eight-week pilot program to see how patients respond to the telehealth approach.
Gaulin said Gastro Girl is working to establish the largest network of digestive health experts in the world, but her goal is not to “have every dietitian and doctor in the world” as members.
“There are a lot of people who, as digestive health becomes more important, are rebranding themselves as nutritionists or dietitians(with GI or digestive health experience). And that takes training — it can be incredibly hurtful to a patient if they get the wrong information,” Gaulin said. “So, our goal is to, yes, cut through the fads. We want a large community of experts, but we also want to make sure everyone can be assured they are legitimate, they’ve been vetted, and they can be trusted.”
Next week, Gaulin will attend the World Congress of Gastroenterology in Orlando, where she will launch the full version of GI OnDemand. More information, including links to GI OnDemand when it goes live, are available here.
Send comments and tips to Benjamin Schachtman at [email protected], @pcdben on Twitter, and (910) 538-2001.
