Fellows take the lead on addressing a wide range of health care challenges through their leadership ventures. These ventures impact the health and well-being of Americans in a myriad of ways. 

Delve into two case studies, exemplary of Fellowship ventures, below.

The Togetherness Project
Sachin Jain, Class II
​Sachin Jain, MD, president and CEO of CareMore and Aspire Health, health care delivery companies, is addressing senior loneliness through his venture, The Togetherness Project, which recognizes that senior loneliness and social isolation affect physical and emotional health and should be treated like any other serious medical condition. In this first-of-its-kind program... read the full case study here.

Click below to get a glimpse into how Fellows are tackling health care's biggest problems.

Lisa Suennen, Class I: CSweetener 
Matching emerging female health care leaders with mentors who have successfully navigated the C-suite 

Lisa created a web-based, tech-enabled mentor matching service, CSweetener, to connect female leaders on the path to—and already in—the health care C-suite with male and female industry leaders and innovators. CSweetener features a combination of services and technologies that profile female entrepreneurs and help them identify the kinds of support they need. It then matches these women with mentors using algorithms that ensure ideal pairings and opportunities for one-time or long-term engagement. The need and demand for CSweetener’s services have continued to grow since its founding, and, in October 2019, Lisa announced that the HLTH Foundation would acquire the mentor matching service to shepherd it through its next stage of growth and opportunity.

Stacy Lindau, Class II: MAPSCorps USA 
Illuminating critical resources in high-poverty communities by engaging youth in meaningful, hands-on STEM and civically oriented work 

Stacy is scaling her nonprofit company, MAPSCorps, from a sustained local effort operated initially from her University of Chicago lab to a successful independent organization with national scope. Her venture leverages MAPSCorps and another company she founded, NowPow, LLC. MAPSCorps is a technology-based asset mapping organization that partners youth from higher-poverty communities with science-oriented college students and local community-based organizations to conduct an annual "feet on the street" asset census that captures data about every public-facing business and organization in target communities. NowPow is an IT company that shares adjacent space and talent with MAPSCorps and purchases its community asset data to catalyze its community resource referral platform. As the MAPSCorps Chicago effort and impact grew, demand started percolating from other geographies. MAPSCorps USA is producing a stream of high-quality, youth-generated community asset data in rural and urban communities across the nation while providing meaningful, hands-on STEM work experience for youth.

Rushika Fernandopulle, Class III: Taking Back Healthcare 
Building a consumer-based social movement that reshapes the U.S. health care system

Rushika is sparking a long-term, consumer-based social and political movement to transform the U.S. health care delivery system. Steeping his work in the lessons of other social movements, he is first writing a book to share his thoughts on the topic, after which he will use the momentum from the book, speaking engagements, and other opportunities to engage consumers to take back power from the current incumbents and demand a system that serves the public. The ultimate goal is a system that produces better health, at lower cost, and with more dignity.

Megan Jones Bell, Class II: Headspace Health
Incorporating meditation into digital medicine to improve health outcomes

Megan is using her platform as Headspace’s chief science officer to pioneer the incorporation of the Headspace mindfulness experience into digital medicine. Her venture led to the creation of Headspace Health, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Headspace focused on driving meaningful clinical outcomes and helping patients create healthy routines. Headspace Health looks at patients in a holistic way with programs specifically designed for those suffering from a broad range of stress-related chronic diseases, furthering Headspace’s commitment to improving the health and happiness of the world. In a parallel philanthropic effort, Headspace has also committed to providing its mindfulness program at no charge to health care professionals through partnerships with health systems and professional associations, such as the American Medical Association.

Ann-Gel Palermo, Class I: East Harlem COAD (Community Organizations Active in Disaster)
Tackling public health disasters as a community

Ann-Gel helped launch and oversee the development of a neighborhood-based emergency management organization in East Harlem, a historically low-resource community that is vulnerable to public health disasters. Through the East Harlem COAD, Ann-Gel organized a coalition of local organizations and businesses who work together to prepare for, respond to, and recover from disasters that affect East Harlem residents. The East Harlem COAD aims to facilitate emergency planning, training, and rapid communication processes as well as identify and distribute resources during public health emergencies. The organization also supports community recovery by coordinating resources and identifying lessons learned.

Check out the many ways Fellows are stepping up to lead.

Elsie Taveras, Class II
​Elsie Taveras is leveraging her role as executive director of the Kraft Center for Community Health at Massachusetts General Hospital to fight the opioid epidemic. Her venture, CareZONE, aims to make treatment easily accessible at overdose hotspots across Boston. Listen here to the NPR story about CareZONE’s work and impact.

Ann-Gel Palermo, Class I
​Ann-Gel Palermo is going beyond the walls of Mt. Sinai, where she’s the associate dean for diversity and inclusion at the Mt. Sinai Medical School and the chief program officer for the office of diversity and inclusion of the Mt. Sinai Health System, to speak up about bias in health care and how to address it. Listen here.

Rushika Fernandopulle, Class III
​Rushika Fernandopulle is continuing to shift the paradigm on primary care models through the success of Iora Health, which he co-founded and leads as CEO. This work earned him a spot on Business Insider’s 2019 Top 10 People Transforming Healthcare list.

Nina Kjellson, Class IV
​Nina Kjellson, general partner of Canaan Ventures, is amplifying the voice of successful women in health care, tech, and business through her podcast, WoVen. Her first guest is fellow HIF Fellow Odette Harris, the first Black female tenured professor of neurosurgery in the country. Listen here.

Michael Lindsey, Class IV
​Michael Lindsey, executive director of NYU’s McSilver Institute for Poverty Policy and Research, published a study on the rising rates of suicide attempts among Black youth. This work, which ties into his venture to address Black youth suicide, has been covered by countless news outlets and has raised awareness of this devastating problem.

Hanni Stoklosa, Class IV
​Hanni Stoklosa, executive director of HEAL Trafficking, is making her voice heard in the fight against human trafficking. She recently advocated for the WHO to add forced labor and sexual exploitation to the International Classification of Diseases, which would make it possible to collect anonymized data about the interaction between human trafficking and health care, helping to prevent trafficking and provide care to survivors.