FoodsOverMeds

Inspiration

My friend Dan and I, the founders of FoodsOverMeds, have been personally impacted by chronic ailments. I have grappled with psoriasis, and Dan has battled Crohn's disease for nearly a decade. These experiences led us on a journey through intensive care retreats, explorations of various treatment modalities, and significant lifestyle changes.

We also spent thousands of hours sifting through medical research and unstructured information on the internet to better manage our symptoms. Despite our extensive scientific training, extracting useful insights was a daunting and time-consuming task. As we started integrating our findings into our daily lives, we experienced the impact of lifestyle changes on our conditions. In particular, I reduced the severity of my psoriasis from severe to mild, and Dan achieved remission from Crohn's disease.

Our personal journeys ignited a deep commitment to create a solution that could help others in similar situations. We envisioned a tool that could save people the time, effort, and confusion we faced when seeking information to manage our chronic conditions. Thus, FoodsOverMeds was born.

What it does

FoodsOverMeds is a medical chatbot tailored for the 2.4 billion individuals worldwide with at least one chronic disease, along with healthcare professionals. It provides information about nutrition adjustments that people can make to manage their chronic diseases, while avoiding harsh medications.

The platform lets users choose from various healing systems, including Western medical research and Ayurveda (with more option to come). It guides users based on their health status and symptoms, accepts blood test result uploads for analysis, and recalls past chats for better personalization.

The chatbot offers advice on a range of health-related concerns, all grounded in peer-reviewed medical research. It provides healthcare professionals with immediate access to relevant medical research and customized nutritional information.

Our vision is to build FoodsOverMeds into a comprehensive, AI-driven health platform that offers an accessible alternative to traditional medication. We aim to empower users to manage their chronic conditions through natural methods and lifestyle changes.

How we built it and challenges we ran into

Building FoodsOverMeds began with a deep dive into the research landscape around chronic diseases. We faced the initial challenge of accessing high-quality information to fine-tune our data engine, as much of the scientific research we sought was locked behind paywalls. We overcame this hurdle by using proxies, such as writings from doctors and researchers about the scientific research.

We constructed a knowledge base, using it to fine-tune ChatGPT models, improving the accuracy and relevance of the responses generated. Every piece of text we collected was accompanied by links leading to the original peer-reviewed research, ensuring our AI had a wealth of accurate data to draw from.

We intertwined these links with the text, guaranteeing that when Pinecone returns documents with context for ChatGPT to use in crafting a response, this response includes relevant and accurate citations. This bolsters the transparency and trustworthiness of our system.

Another challenge was the issue of contradictory health advice, especially from different medical systems. As we're not doctors, we decided to let users choose the medical system they trust the most, ensuring they receive consistent and compatible recommendations.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We're particularly proud of three accomplishments. First, our system produces better and more specific nutrition recommendations than ChatGPT-4. Second, in some cases, our system can suggest food or beverage equivalents to medication, enabling users to avoid potential side effects, which we imagine would be enormously useful to some people. Finally, we've been able to provide health recommendations from both Western medical research and Ayurveda, broadening the scope of advice users can receive as well as allowing for cultural differences and various user preferences.

What we learned

One key takeaway from our user interviews was the strong desire for compassionate and supportive language in our system's responses. While chronic diseases often primarily affect the body, such as in the case of heart disease, they can also put individuals in a distressed emotional state. As a result, users are seeking not only knowledgeable resources but also a reassuring and compassionate companion. This strong preference for warm, empathetic responses underscores the importance of emotional well-being in our design and development process.

On the technical front, we found that the phrasing of a question can significantly influence the utility of the response. To address this, we aim to refine user prompts by generating several variations and creating a more information-eliciting final prompt. This strategy will ensure better results for our users, who may not be experienced in crafting effective prompts.

We've also observed that our system can sometimes take a longer time to provide an answer, which might deter some users. To mitigate this, we plan to save the best responses into a database, enabling us to provide instant answers to the most frequently asked questions.

Additionally, we've learned that tailoring an answer based on user data, such as blood test results, presents a challenging problem to solve. While this was part of our initial intent, we remain committed to finding a solution. This challenge has highlighted the complexities of personalized health advice and underscores the ongoing need for innovation in this area.

These insights have been instrumental in shaping FoodsOverMeds, and we remain dedicated to improving and evolving the platform to better address users' needs and enhance their experiences.

What's next for FoodsOverMeds

We're planning to commercialize FoodsOverMeds and expand its features. Upcoming features include a doctor visit simulator, personalized recommendations based on lab results and genetic makeup, curated care packages of supplements and foods, a list of commonly asked questions, and immersive health retreats. By continuously refining our product and introducing new features, we aim to help more people effectively manage their chronic conditions and lead healthier lives.

Built With

• docker
• firebase
• google-cloud-run
• nextjs
• openai
• pinecorn
• python
• react
• typescript
• vercel