Taken from ABC 7 WJLA
In tonight’s Working Woman, Alison Starling introduces us to Robin Wiener who has developed cutting edge technology she says helps patients control their own health and their own medical records.
When Wiener was little, she was not a great student. Teachers said she was “too slow” to learn anything. She had dyslexia and a speech problem, but her parents taught her to never give up.
Wiener went on to work for an Internet company and when that company imploded, she decided to go into business with two co-workers. It was around the time of Hurricane Katrina, and they feared for someone who needed cancer treatment.
In the aftermath of the hurricane, medical records in homes, doctor’s offices, and hospitals were destroyed.
So the business partners started the company Get Real Health. Their product Instant PHR lets people store and access personal health records, and manage medicines and treatment.
Last summer, Wiener’s 11-year-old son was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. She uses Instant PHR to check his blood sugar and gets an alert on her phone if he’s out of range.
“All of a sudden, it was not just for somebody else, it was for me, and it was for him,” Wiener says. “And it hit home how important it was to be able to have a tool like this.”
Instant PHR technology has partnered with Microsoft and several hospitals and universities and is now used by millions worldwide.
Robin Wiener’s company started with three employees, and now has 65 in the U.S. and overseas.