Ripple Medical’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Trevor McCaw, is paving the way for wearable health technology and addressing hypertension, a blood pressure disease that’s widespread in the United States. The disease is often first detected in one’s early 30s, and is known as the “silent killer” because it has no noticeable symptoms aside from damaging blood vessels. 

“The earliest you see it is in your 30s, but there are 120 million patients in the United States who have hypertension,” McCaw said. “It’s about half of all adults in the United States.”

This drastic number makes hypertension the second most prevalent disease in America, behind obesity. McCaw’s startup aims to tackle the issue by creating wearable wristbands that constantly scan wrist veins. 

“You can’t take your blood pressure once a week and figure out what to do because your blood pressure changes, literally, minute to minute, hour to hour,” McCaw said. “These wearables give you data. Algorithms, [artificial intelligence] and advanced technologies will really be able to change the trajectory of people’s health.”

McCaw had been interested in health care from an early age, originally inspired to attend medical school while spending summers volunteering at a hospital. He spent time at Harvard Business School before his journey into the business world, in which he struggled to find motivation.

“I really wanted to make the world a little bit better of a place. So, I thought healthcare was the good spot where I could get a lot of leverage and really make a big difference across different patients,” McCaw said.

McCaw also highlighted his natural ability as a leader and his enjoyment of creating startups. 

“I [enjoy] setting the direction and rallying people around a common goal,” McCaw said. “I love that there isn’t a lot of bureaucracy and process [in a startup], as I really thrive in ambiguity.”

A long-time colleague and current Senior Vice President of Strategy at Ripple Medical, Scott Davie, has joined McCaw in talking to nearly 50 nephrologists (kidney doctors), finding eye-opening statistics.

“The majority of [nephrologists] only get data from about 20 or 25 percent of their patients for blood pressure, so they’re trying to titrate medications without any data,” Davie said.

Blood pressure monitoring dates back over 200 years, yet physicians still don’t possess all of the necessary information needed to protect those affected by hypertension.

“Over 80 percent of the patients aren’t getting the data they need to treat the disease,” McCaw said. “We still don’t have the data that we should, and that’s the problem we’re trying to solve.”

Davie detailed the possibility of misinterpreting hypertension for white coat syndrome, which according to him can give a “lousy [blood pressure] number.” White coat syndrome is when a person’s blood pressure is only high in a medical setting but normal elsewhere, and it can often lead to a misdiagnosis by a doctor.

“Home blood pressure is generally regarded as superior to an office pressure, as just being in a doctor’s office stresses people out,” Davie said. “The opportunity to have an accurate, wearable, cuffless blood pressure at home is huge, and can help get rid of the white coat syndrome.”

Ripple Medical’s wristband technology works similarly to that of commonly found wearables, like the Apple Watch or Oura Ring, technology that is worn by just under half of Americans today. 

“We shine light into the skin, and we look at the reflection. From that reflection, we can tell the blood pressure,” McCaw said. 

The next big obstacle for the company is getting government approval to put the technology in the hands of patients, clinicians and doctors.

“Our technology is regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which regulates drugs, food and diagnostics,” McCaw said. “We have to meet a certain bar in order to go through [to the next stage], and prove that this will be safe for patients.”

Once approved by the FDA, Ripple Medical plans on starting off with a limited launch with under 1,000 devices being released in order to pressure test certain parts of the company. Releasing a new device in a new market requires fixing certain processes before distributing more devices across the United States, but it could ultimately lead to over 100 million patients getting the accurate treatment they need to stay healthy.