Women have been alarmingly underrepresented in both healthcare and healthcare research. From traditionally being excluded from drug trials to reportedly feeling dismissed when seeking medical help, women’s healthcare is an uphill battle. But it’s a challenge Sophie Smith is willing to tackle.
As the Founder and CEO of Nabta Health, a hybrid healthcare platform, Sophie Smith aims to empower women to manage their health by providing accessible and women-centric options, and in the process, eliminate the shame women are made to feel about their bodies.
In this interview, Sophie unpacks her reasoning behind Nabta Health and discusses just how she aims to close the gender health gap.
What led you to the concept of Nabta Health?
It was because of my grandmother, Rixa. My wonderful, warm, Austrian grandmother, who passed away with cancer in 1998, aged 59. And if the healthcare system had been built for women, she might not have died.
When she was diagnosed, she got treated, went into remission and after five years, was given the all-clear. About a month later, she started feeling unwell again, but the doctor dismissed her, telling her to go on a diet. She did and lost a lot of weight over three months. But she wasn’t feeling any better, so she went back to the doctor. Only then did he think it was worth investigating the issue, but by that point it was too late—the cancer had spread to her liver, and she died a couple of months later.
Now, my grandmother was not your average woman. She used her big heart and her big voice to stand up for those who could not stand up for themselves. But even she couldn’t make herself heard in the healthcare system, and paid the ultimate price for it.
Today, it still takes four times longer on average to diagnose women with the same chronic conditions as men, even though they’re twice as likely to see a doctor. When 40% of women have at least one chronic condition by age 45, we’re not dealing with individual health problems; we’re dealing with systemic failure that’s costing women their careers, their potential, and even their lives.
Talk us through the Nabta process
Once you download the app, you get to choose 1 out of 22 health goals, and we assign you a dedicated team, who help you achieve your goal over the course of the year. This way, there is no bouncing between specialists who know nothing about your case.
You get 24/7 app access, monthly virtual check-ins, and evening clinic hours when you can make appointments without taking time off work. Most importantly, you get preventive monitoring—addressing any underlying issues before they become problematic.
How can the average woman make the most out of Nabta Health?
The process at Nabta starts before you think you need healthcare. When you start with health goals rather than symptoms, you engage with health before the stigma and the shame. Over 80% of breast cancers in MENA are diagnosed at Stage 4. Why? Because women are afraid to know what’s wrong, of what will happen if something is wrong.
But there’s nothing wrong with having the goal of getting to know your body better and prioritising your health. Engaging with health goals before they become pain points makes proactive healthcare an easy decision, rather than a difficult one.
So the best way to make the most out of Nabta is by being honest about your goals, using the app for questions, and thinking of your care team as partners in your long-term success, not just people you see when something’s broken.
What are the challenges you’ve faced while establishing Nabta Health?
Walking into investor meetings and hearing “But is this really a big enough market?”, being told for the umpteenth time that women’s health is a “niche market”, and living the reality of just 2% of funding globally going to female-founded companies, these were the biggest challenges.
That said, ultimately, our greatest challenges become our greatest opportunities. Every “no” just proved our point about systemic bias, so it became fuel rather than discouragement.
Society at large is usually uninformed about what health concerns for women could look like. Do you have any knowledge to share about common health issues that affect women and how we can identify them?
Yes. PCOS affects 1 in 10 women, but takes an average of 3 years and 3 doctor visits to diagnose. Endometriosis affects 1 in 9-10 women (as many as Type 2 Diabetes) with a 7-12 year average diagnosis time. Perimenopause can start in your 30s, but most women don’t even know that’s possible. But with woman-centric care, all of these things can be identified quickly and easily.
Here’s what I wish every woman knew: if something feels off with your body, it probably is. Normal periods shouldn’t be debilitating. Fatigue that doesn’t improve with rest isn’t just “being busy.” You are the expert in your own body, and if something isn’t working correctly, you should feel empowered with knowledge, tools, and access to get to the bottom of it.
Speaking on the gap in gender healthcare, what areas of women’s healthcare are misunderstood? And how can Nabta Health close this gap?
One of the biggest, longstanding misassumptions in traditional healthcare is that women’s health equals obstetrics and gynaecology. We treat women like walking wombs instead of complex humans. This means that women aren’t encouraged to look at their heart, brain, and gut health, and symptoms of underlying conditions outside the reproductive system are often overlooked.
Mental health in the context of women’s health is also hugely misunderstood. So is pain tolerance; women’s pain is consistently underestimated and undertreated.
Nabta closes these gaps by treating women as whole human beings with interconnected health needs, and our care teams are structured to care for the physical, mental, nutritional, and emotional health needs of every woman. Our teams understand that reproductive health affects mental health, which impacts energy, which influences career performance. We also normalise conversations around these things.
When women’s health is discussed openly, it stops being taboo and starts being just healthcare.
Nabta Health is the start of something promising within women’s healthcare. In your opinion, what does the future of femtech look like?
The future of femtech is a suite of interconnected and personalised healthcare options that are tailored to the genetic profile, lifestyle, and cultural background of every woman. With more women developing the tools that are meant for them—from speculums to contraceptives to mammography—health outcomes will improve, the size of the women’s health market will increase, and women’s health will finally get the investment it deserves.
But here’s what excites me most: the normalisation. When your fitness tracker includes menstrual cycle insights, periods aren’t taboo; they’re just data. When every company dispenses sanitary pads in toilet cubicles, and every office has a dedicated breastfeeding space, women stop having to turn somersaults to accommodate their health needs in environments that were never designed for them, and can just be.
The future of femtech isn’t better apps; it’s a world where women’s health is prioritised and women’s health needs are met so that they can engage fully with life and become the people they were always meant to be.
