Priya Kamani, Founder and CEO, LivingMatrix

Chronic diseases have long been the leading cause of reduced quality of life,long-term disability, and death. In fact, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), globally, more than 70 % of deaths are caused due to chronic illness. But despite the prevalence and seriousness of the situation, our healthcare system is not structured to adequately respond to the growing issue. For effective care, chronic patients require more than just medication. They need a personalized approach thatinvolves a complete evaluation of the patient with a focus on identifying the underlying dysfunction in physiologic systems and the potential root cause of dysfunction. 

This root cause approach requires a thorough history and evaluation of the patient and includes an understanding of patient lifestyle and habits that may be contributing to their issues. The evaluation of root cause, potential triggers, and mediators can enable healthcare providers to create a personalized prescription that is not just focused on medications but also includes diet, nutritional supplementation, exercise, sleep, and stress reduction to stabilize or improve the outcomes in the patients.Thus, to help practitionersto leverage this approach and improve chronic care, LivingMatrix, a leadinghealth information technology companycame to the forefront. The pioneering company is headquartered in San Francisco, CA and provides a technology-based, data, and algorithm-driven functional medicine platform to help practitioners with evaluation and engagement of patients, creation ofpersonalized care plans, and tracking of patient health outcomes.

The Beginning of LivingMatrix

The journey of LivingMatrix began when a physician, entrepreneur, and technology innovator, Priya Kamani, identified the growing concern of caring for patients with multiple chronic conditions. To effectively address the issue, she decided to bring the LivingMatrix software solution to practitioners engaged in a lifestyle-forward, personalized, root-cause approach. The LivingMatrix platform was designed by clinicians in collaboration with the Institute for Functional Medicine with a focus on assisting practitioners to create superior, life-changing health outcomes.

Today, LivingMatrix stands tall as the only collaborator in its category to work with the IFM. Recognizing its success and technology/data leadership in personalization, Atrium InnovationsacquiredLivingMatrix in 2019, and soon it became a part of the Nestle Health Sciences (NHSc) family of companies focused on personalization. 

Enhancing Clinical Efficiency through Collaborative Care Model

Today, LivingMatrix caters to all Integrative and Functional Medicine practices starting from smaller free-standing practices to larger practices that are part of a health system. It provides automation, clinical efficiency, and patient engagement tools that save significant time for the practitioner. Thevisual tools engage the practitioner and patient in developing a shared understanding of the patient’s health issues.

The practitioners educate their patients using the data gathered and the visual tools, sopatients are then more likely to be motivated to take action and follow-through with the recommendations made by the practitioner.

“We designed the LivingMatrix software for a collaborative care model where clinicians, nutritionists, health coaches, and others work together to support the patient through the recovery process. The software assists the practices in developing an efficient, scalable model in an otherwise labor-intensive approach, allowing them to track patient outcomes using validated instruments like the NIH developed PROMIS-10 Global Health form,” explainsPriya.

Efficiently Addressing the Needs of Practitioners and Patients

Fundamentally, the philosophy of LivingMatrix is rooted in a clear understanding of clinical care and this helps the company to address the needs of practitioners and patients. The strong clinical background and in-depth understanding of the clinical process enable Priya and the proficient team at LivingMatrix to respond in a meaningful and timely fashion to challenges that its practitioners face. For instance, as the Covid-19 pandemic started intensifying across the globe, the team at LivingMatriximmediately sprang into action. Given the economic difficulties that practices experienced with the advent of the global pandemic as patients stopped coming into their offices, LivingMatrix provided itscustomers with a free month’s subscription. It also provided thought leadership with information and webinars on how to adapt practices to Telehealth and designed tools in the LivingMatrix system to assist practices.

Delivering a High Level of Personalized Customer Service

In this day and age of chatbots and autoresponders, many businesses prefer digital customer service for saving time. But standing apart from the rest, LivingMatrix believes in providing a high level of personalized service with a focus on human contact with its customers. Keeping human touch as an integral part of its customer service, the company strives to provide the best possible support to its customers. 

“Our training and support teams are readily available to our customers via video chat, phone, and email and we also have free weekly coaching sessions where practitioners can quickly get advice from peers who are also in practice. We are the only company in our category, offering peer to peer coaching,” asserts Priya.

Fostering a Winning Work Culture

Apart from creating satisfied clients through its personalized customer service, LivingMatrix also heavily focuses on enriching its work culture by nurturing a sense of belief and ownership of their work among its team members.

“At LivingMatrix, our team members mean everything to us; without them, we could never provide the high levels of service that we do. We have a very flat organizational structure without much hierarchy, and our work is mostly collaborative,” states Priya.

The company strives to empower its employees andopportunities abound for growth, personal development, and coaching/mentoring. It always motivates and encourages its employees to express their views and helps them reach their maximum potential.

Set To Expand Personalization Offerings

Advancing into the future, LivingMatrix is continuously leveraging its ability to dramatically increase the efficiency and effectiveness of healthcare. Speaking of the company’s upcoming endeavors, Priya affirms, “We are very excited about the future of LivingMatrix. As a core part of the NHSc companies focused on personalization, we will be able to expand personalization offerings as part of the LivingMatrix solution and pursue EMR and other integrations with solutions utilized by our practices.” Forging ahead, the company also plans to collaborate with Atrium brands like Pure Encapsulations to bring personalization to their offerings.