HealthTech Solutions Inc. aims to help improve secure mobile messaging

More than 122,000 patients in the United States are on the waitlist for an organ transplant, while about 54 percent of donated organs go to waste.

With this staggering percentage of organs not being used for various reasons, 22 patients are dying per day as they wait.

HealthTech Solutions is trying to limit the number of organs that go to waste by creating a more secure way of communication between hospitals. The company was profiled as part of an ongoing startup series written by UW-Madison students.

The company’s software — called TXP Chat — is a secure mobile software application platform that optimizes clinical communication and information flow for organ transplant teams. All a medical professional needs is a personal or work mobile device, tablet and or desktop with Android, IOS or Windows programs.

The company was born of experience. Co-founders Dalton Shaull and Eric Pahl were both personally affected by the organ and tissue transplant. Shaull shared a story about his experience with transplants:

“My uncle was a transplant surgeon, and I saw him get an iMessage and asked if this was the only way of communicating for organ donations and he said yes. I then asked if there was anyone in the industry who is making a more secure way of communication from doctors to hospitals about these transplants and he said no, so (HealthTech Solutions) became something I was really looking into and decided to start.”

There was another reason why Shaull wanted to start this company: He is a transplant recipient, while Pahl has four family members who are currently on waiting lists that could save their lives.

“This company hits home for us as I was a nerve transplant recipient, and Eric has three aunts waiting for life-saving liver transplants,” Shaull said.

These two wanted to figure out a way to incorporate technology to help improve the system to create a better experience with organ transplants.

Transplant professionals currently rely on phone calls, faxes, texts and proper records while communicating about the donor-recipient information. This includes 500-plus phone calls and 1,000-plus text messages just for a single case. This type of communication is not in a secure chat, which is something Shaull and Pahl wanted to emphasize.

“It’s a secure chat room. The basic product offers a safe way to communicate. If they know how to use iMessage they will know how to use this product. With this we are hoping to decrease the 40,000 organs that are discarded yearly, in hopes of saving more lives,” Shaull said.

Current competitors may have a way to communicate via text message, but they don’t offer ways to enhance communication about the wasting of human organs.

The team includes five transplant surgeons and a board chairman who is the founder of St. Jude Medical. The team has five successful company or product exits.

HealthTech Solutions presented to a group of potential investors at the Wisconsin Technology Council’s Early Stage Symposium, held in November.

By Mellissa Channell
Channell is a graduate of the UW-Madison Department of Life Sciences and Communication.