Wow! 2021 has really flown by!
We decided to take the time to reflect and look back on all that we’ve achieved - just like a home therapy program, it’s easy to keep looking forwards towards your goals, but it’s good to acknowledge how far you’ve come too.
Our founder Laura Simmons started Theratrak back in 2018. It took a year of development to get the first version of the platform live and the team has been working hard to build the best features for therapists ever since.
Even though the year 2020 had many challenges, it turned into a good year for Theratrak. After the pandemic hit Australia in March 2020, we had an influx of therapists using telehealth services and wanting to use our platform and learn how they can increase engagement in therapy and commitment to home therapy exercises.
2021 posed a lot more challenges for all of us.
At the start of the year, we were really optimistic that we would quickly return to some sort of normalcy, but after extensive lockdowns in Sydney and around Australia, we know we’re operating in a new normal.
Just like our participants, we persevered through setbacks and continued to work towards our goals.
Check out all that we achieved this year below.
Below is a summary of all our Theratrak activity throughout 2021, including:
Product updates that have completely changed the way therapists can engage with their participants
Startup programs, pitches, awards and events
Partnerships with like-minded innovative healthcare providers
Interviews, podcasts and publications showcasing the evolution of Theratrak
Here’s just a snapshot of what we’ve been up to this year!
Theratrak platform and product updates
This year, we had many, many updates to the Theratrak platform. After we worked to refine the tracking components, we’re so happy now that the platform officially allows therapists to prescribe, track and monitor home therapy programs over time - all with two way feedback and custom notifications.
Here’s a summary of all the product updates we’ve made this year:
We launched TheratrakU to support users to make the most of our platform. The videos accessible via the platform include explanations for how:
clinic owners can set up the clinic portal, manage accounts and logins
clinic owners and therapists can manage logins, and create custom activities
therapists can create participants, create and send home programs, and set custom notifications for participants
participants can send feedback to therapists
We’ve updated the clinic portal so that clinic managers and therapists can easily see an overview of participant program progress and completion data.
We changed the layout of the therapist app so that it’s easier for therapists to find participants, activities and feedback.
Therapists can now easily copy home programs within their app so that when they’re creating home programs long-term or for different participants that have the same or similar exercises in them, they can easily duplicate them with just a few clicks.
Participants are now able to create multiple guardian accounts so that more than one parent or caregiver can get access to their child’s home program. Participants can also provide custom feedback back to their therapists in between sessions.
Therapists are able to create custom notifications for their participants so that participants can be notified when to do their home programs at times that suit them.
Startup programs, pitches and awards
This was a big year of programs, pitches and award wins for Theratrak!
In March, Laura pitched (without a pitch deck!) at the Australian Healthcare Week pitch competition and ended up coming second in the competition! At the same event, Laura presented alongside Melinda Webber of South West Kids Clinic on the importance of co-designing programs with participants with the goal of clinical adoption.
In April, Laura attended the Telehealth Summit where she met with game-changers in the health industry who are dedicated to supporting people with their health no matter where they are located.
One of the biggest milestones this year was a recent one. Our founder Laura Simmons graduated from SBE by Springboard Enterprises Life Science program and pitched publicly at the end of the program.
At the regional iAwards, Theratrak won the NSW Startup of the Year award which led to the national iAwards ceremony where Theratrak were the Merit Winners in the National Startup of the Year category.
In September, Theratrak was one of just 10 startups shortlisted to pitch at the She Loves Tech competition - one of the biggest and most competitive startup pitch competitions for women entrepreneurs.
Later in November, Laura also pitched at the Informa Innovate Health conference and had the chance to meet some of the best health and impact investors in Australia.
In 2020, Laura participated in Fishburners Fempowered 6-month program in partnership with Google for Startups as a launch pad for female founders to build sustainable businesses. Laura was included in their inaugural cohort. In November, they had a Fempowered book launch which featured Laura and showcased some of the founder stories from the cohort.
This year was the first time we expanded her impact to support students as well. Laura presented her experience and insights of supporting kids in private practice and with Theratrak to Masters of Occupational Therapy students at the University of Sydney and to Masters of Occupational Therapy students in their assistive technology class at the University of Canberra.
Working in the allied health industry, there’s many opportunities to connect with inspiring people. If you’d like to partner or connect with the Theratrak team or Laura, feel free to get in touch here.
Theratrak partners and inspiring therapists
We partnered with game-changer health organisations going the extra mile to support their participants:
One of our biggest wins this year was working with Everyday Independence. They joined us as our first enterprise customer and we’re now co-designing Theratrak alongside hundreds of their therapists. Learn more about our partnership with Everyday Independence.
CoordiKids joined our platform and we made some of their most engaging videos accessible to all therapists on the platform! Learn more about the CoordiKids activities available on Theratrak.
12 Point Psychology delivered asynchronous mental health telehealth support during the pandemic with thanks to the Theratrak platform. We’re looking forward to share more impressive results from this program in 2022. Learn more about how 12 Points Psychology used Theratrak.
We interviewed some of inspiring therapists about their careers and experience using Theratrak.
Read the interview with Kyleigh Garden of Garden Speech Therapy.
Read the interview with OT legend Marga Gray from CoordiKids.
Interviews, podcasts and publications
Laura loved connecting with people passionate about improving the healthcare industry and had the chance to share her story on a few podcasts including:
Clinic Mastery podcast: Laura shares how Theratrak is making therapy more accessible and impactful
Occupied podcast: Laura shared how she balances being and OT and tech founder
Talking HealthTech podcast: Laura shared the recent impacts on the allied health industry and rural therapists, as well as the important of community in healthcare
We hosted our first event in partnership with General Assembly on the Future of HealthTech. We collected some of the best allied health professionals turned innovators in healthcare. A big thanks to our speakers for joining us and sharing your insights:
Jack O'Brien, COO of Clinic Mastery, Physiotherapist & Clinic Owner of Terrace Physio Plus
Yianni Serpanos, Founder & CEO of coreplus, Founder of HealthTechX
Melinda Webber, Occupational Therapist & Director of South West Kids Clinic
Watch the Future of HealthTech event here.
Laura was also featured in national allied health news including publications: Occupational Therapy Australia, Aged Care News, and Digital & Health Informatics Network.
Laura also shared her views on work-life balance with Balance the Grind and Tech Invest featured Theratrak in their independent insert distributed nationally within the Australian Financial Review.
Looking forward to 2022 for Theratrak
Next year is all about engagement, communication and integrating technology into therapy to make everyone’s lives easier.
We’ll be announcing some really exciting features next year including integrations that will make note writing easier and maybe even a bit of gamification to make home therapy programs even more fun.
If you want to be part of this exciting journey, be part of our co-design team and help us to build the features therapists really want, reach out here.
A note from our founder, Laura Simmons
“Wow, what an incredible year 2021 has been. Reflecting on this year, I feel blessed to have met and learnt from so many amazing people in the allied health, digital health and female entrepreneur space.
I’m so very grateful for Theratrak’s ever-inspiring hardworking team. Bringing Theratrak to life has been such a passion project, and I’m super lucky to have an epic team to create the platform with me. I’m so excited for what 2022 will bring the new features, partnerships, and growth plans are just the tip of the iceberg for what we have planned, and I can’t wait to share it with everyone.
Also, a huge shoutout and thank you to all of the fantastic Theratrak mentors, advisors and co-design partners for your words of wisdom and endless support. Bring on 2022!”
