gut app

Inspiration

Gut health is trending in 2025, and for good reason.

The gut does so much more than just digest food. It helps your immunity, energy and mood. And when it’s off-track, the effects can be felt through the whole body.

Working in ICU and surgery, I often see patients facing one of the most serious gut conditions: bowel cancer. And concerning evidence suggests that younger patients are being diagnosed with bowel cancer. 1

One of the simplest ways to protect gut health is by eating more fiber. It not only improves digestion, but it also reduces your risk of dying from cancer and heart disease. 2

But research shows that most of us do not eat enough of this crucial nutrient. 3 This is ultimately what inspired me to build gut app.

People have always tracked calories and protein, but the future is a focus on fiber.

What it does

Gut app is simple: input food and poop, we'll do the rest.

Trends for fiber, plant foods and other nutrients.
Food and poop AI analysis.
A rolling 7-day gut score that brings together what you eat, poop quality/frequency and symptoms.
Personal food and poop diary.

How it was built

This was not my first app (the last one flopped). From that I learned two things:

Distribution matters most
Ship faster

I started with research. Studies on fiber and plant food intake stood out as the most evidence based ways to improve gut health. Then I looked at successful calorie apps, borrowed what worked, and added poop scanning with a 'human-in-the-loop' approach.

Many iterations were made of the design (maybe too many).

Challenges I ran into

Balancing shifts as a doctor while building a startup → had to use AI to save time.

I thought distribution was sorted, as I felt like I was close to a cofounding deal with an influencer in the space. But things broke down and I had to distribute the app myself.

Needed to avoid medical device territory (no diagnosing or treating here)

Despite the above, the app store review process was somehow the worst challenge I faced.