Ten percent of the health budget is spent on patients with hypertension – high blood pressure, and 1.2 billion people live with this today. Based on research, Myworkout has developed a scientifically accurate measurement of physical capacity and risk of developing lifestyle disease.
This spring, Myworkout has accompanied Norway Health Tech to Berlin and Europe’s largest conference for eHealth – DMEA to showcase its pioneering technology:
– High blood pressure is very important to treat, as it is a gateway to chronic diseases such as type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Today, patients are treated with a pill that reduces high blood pressure as a symptom, but not for the cause of the elevated blood pressure, says Knut Løkke.
He is the general manager of Myworkout, and has extensive experience as an entrepreneur. He is now on his third entrepreneurial journey, with the app Myworkout GO which measures so-called maximum oxygen uptake (VO2max) and has been tested clinically with patients over six years of age.
– We have shown that we can reduce blood pressure twice as effectively compared to the best blood pressure pill on the market. And then we treat the cause, and not just the symptom, says Løkke.
High pulse in the B2B market
The starting point for the innovation is the research of Dr. Jan Helgerud and Dr. Jan Hoff – renowned medical professors with over 30 years of experience and over 200 scientific publications behind them. Løkke calls Myworkout GO an innovative app that revolutionizes the way we understand and work to improve health and quality of life. They have existed since 2014, and are today in the business market in Norway with over 14,000 paying users. They recently signed an agreement with Hydro. The company also has customers such as Storebrand, DNV and Oracle.
World’s first
In recent times, Myworkout has started to look abroad, and has been involved in several of Norway Health Tech’s activities. Løkke is also part of Norway Health Tech’s resource group for Germany, where companies come together and exchange experiences about the German market. The company is currently working to get a diagnosis-specific version of the app approved as a medical device to treat high blood pressure in the EU and the US.
– Unless something unforeseen happens, we can expect to get FDA (Food and Drug Administration – editor note) and MDR approval at the turn of the year. Then we will be first in the world. We prioritize the market in the USA because it represents 40% of the world market. But the EU is also important, especially Germany, which is a large but divided market, with different practices in the different regions. The advantage is that they have already established a reimbursement system for digital medicine, the DiGA scheme, which is already connected with doctors and insurance companies across the regions, says Løkke.
Myworkout has been a member of Norway Health Tech since 2021 and is active in several of the acceleration programs and activities that the cluster organizes, including to the USA, Germany and the UK.