Plant Chat: Nageen Sharma, Founder of NourishDoc

It’s my pleasure to have  Nageen  Sharma, founder of NourishDoc, on my blog today. Nageen is a seasoned entrepreneur who has co-founded startups in technology and successfully grown them as thriving businesses. He is passionate about natural medicine and holistic living and wants to instill the core philosophy through NourishDoc.  Technology is getting really huge in the nutritional care community, and this service is perfect for registered dietitian nutritionists as it allows them to:

• Create a customized professional profile section
• Confirm appointments online
• Conduct online client consultations via paid and secure video, audio, or text chat formats.
• Promote wellness package
• Network with peers
• Publish and share new content, and in one click post to social channels
• Market your practice from a single platform.

You can lean more about NourishDoc’s platform here; and registered dietitian nutritionists can even    join for free. We sat down with Nageen to find out more about his vision for NourishDoc. Read on to learn more.

What is the inspiration for NourishDoc? 

NourishDoc is in many ways a result of a personal quest to find natural remedies for my own ailments. Fighting severe bouts of allergies annually, high LDL levels, high lipids, and high stress related disorders made me look for the root cause of my problems. While there was a lot of information on the web, how it affected me specifically remained a hit and miss game. Some remedies worked and some backfired. A combination of relevant evidence-based treatments, personalized expert advice backed by scientific research seemed to be the answer. We created NourishDoc, a platform to not only consult with holistic experts, but interact with the community and share your experience as well. At NourishDoc, we have created an interactive holistic health community and ecosystem to bring Holistic experts, researchers, and clients/members to interact with each other.

How has NourishDoc been embraced among the dietitian community?

We are a young company, but are encouraged to see over 250 experts join our platform in the last two months. We are also getting a lot of constructive feedback, which we value and welcome.

How can NourishDoc help dietitians engage with clients to provide better nutrition services?

There is mounting scientific evidence that lifestyle changes are usually the best approach to prevent or reverse many chronic conditions. The right treatment, the right support, and the right tools can do wonders to restore optimal health for people.  NourishDoc can now make this possible by enabling such high touch holistic interventions for dietitians online.

We also remove a lot of friction from the traditional model. Dietitians can create their professional profiles, view member profiles, confirm appointment requests, host secure audio/video or text consultations, network with peers, post content, and share on social channels with one click – all from one site.

Members also find it easy to read content from experts and researchers for their specific conditions. They can choose from the best-matched dietitians, schedule appointments, receive treatment advice, maintain a daily journal for compliance, provide feedback and ratings, and schedule follow-ups.

What is your philosophy on how technology can interface with nutrition professionals in the health care community?

Technology can help simplify and personalize nutrition advice provided by nutrition professionals to increase widespread adoption. It can dramatically change business models, delivery methods, group therapies, and help with behavioral change and compliance in a way that was never possible before. The human touch of the nutrition professional is key in this model, so members can resolve the underlying issues. They can also collaborate with fitness, meditation, and other professionals to bring a holistic solution to a member’s wellbeing. And it can be done conveniently online.

What are the challenges that health care professionals face in today’s world of wellness and prevention to stay relevant and reach people to improve their lives?

Some of the challenges for healthcare professionals are to stay on top of new research and educating their clients. Health professionals also have to be creative to market themselves via blogs, social channels and to make sure that they give accurate, updated health information to their clients.

Health care professionals can use technology to leverage their expertise and make a difference like no other time in human history. They can collaborate with peers online to help members who are struggling with conditions and provide scientifically proven therapies, regardless of geographic proximity. Using tools to improve discovery, treatments, compliance, and follow-ups can create tremendous opportunities for professionals who can adapt.

Can you share any success stories of how NourishDoc has helped dietitians?

Many dietitians have told us that they can now benefit from scheduling on their terms, doing consultations online via video/audio or text, posting their contents and simultaneously posting on their Facebook page, sending meal plans, and how messaging patients on one platform eliminates multiple systems, reduces their cost, and improves their clients’ experience. Some have offered group online sessions that can expand their traditional client base, and built a vibrant community of members keeping each other accountable and helping each other. Most importantly, NourishDoc has become their partner to help them focus on their business and help streamline their business and marketing operations.

What do you see as the future for dietitians hoping to engage with people to provide the wellness promotion services that they need?

Clients have become used to a results based delivery model in every aspect of life. Health and wellness is no different. Dietitians have very specialized wellness packages based on their background, culture, ethnicity, education, and their real world experience dealing with clients. They have to deliver results as well. In a data driven world, they will have to create evidence based wellness packages using multiple scientific disciplines, measure results, modify if needed at regular intervals, measure results, and so on. This is a cumbersome process if done manually, but is possible using easy to use evidence based, interactive online tools integrated on a platform.