Easy, Affordable Stem Cell Banking | Kathryn Cross (Anja Health)
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Podcast Notes
Wyndly lets you live life without allergies: https://www.wyndly.com
This episode covers the benefits of Anja Health, and how they're helping to save lives by creating affordable stem cell storage, how it works, and how it can help you. Kathryn Cross, founder of Anja Health, joins Aakash to discuss how she has helped to create affordable stem cell storage. Anja has been using social media to spread her message and has been having great success with it!
Kathryn's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathryn-cross/
Kathryn's Twitter: https://twitter.com/kathrynjc7
Anja Health: https://www.anjahealth.com/
My Website: https://www.aakash.io
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mraakashshah/
Twitter: @aakashdotio [https://twitter.com/aakashdotio]
Tik Tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@wyndlyteam?lang=en
Music: Syn Cole - Gizmo [NCS Release] provided by NoCopyrightSounds
Produced by Thomas Troy
Autogenerated Transcript
[00:00:00] Aakash Shah: Hi there I'm Aakash, founder of Wyndly, where we fix allergies for life. This is Founders and Builders, where I talk to people who are working hard to bring something new and meaningful into this world.
[00:00:13] Aakash Shah: My guest today is the incredible Kathryn Cross. She runs Anja Health. She has been doing something that I've never seen before. I think you're gonna be really excited with this conversation. Kathryn, please introduce yourself and, you know, give us the elevator pitch for Anja.
[00:00:30] Kathryn Cross: Thanks for having me. I am the founder of Anja Health and we help pregnant parents freeze their vocal cords for its stem cells and they can also do the same with their placenta and so we are a stem cell safe.
[00:00:42] Aakash Shah: What's the difference between stem cell safe and stem cell?
[00:00:44] Kathryn Cross: They're basically the same, but I think the ideas with the stem cells safe, we provide a really premium user experience and folks are able to have a concierge that they can always be in touch with. I think typically with banks, they're sort of a cold clinical connotation and it's just sort of like a one stop shop. We really want to be a fully informed experience and really ensuring that it can be one that feels supported, especially because it's around birth and pregnancy, which is already somewhat of a lonely experience for so many.
[00:01:16] That right there was a very pointed term. Like birth is a very lonely experience which you wouldn't really expect. I think if you haven't been through it or if you don't have a personal experience which is even more insulting when you realize that most people, well, not most people, a large percentage of the population has had a child so do you feel the like public perception of going through pregnancy and maybe not public perception, but maybe the Hollywood perception of going through pregnancy and going through birth doesn't necessarily line up with the actual experience of having a child.
[00:01:46] I think the excitement generally does, I think that's, what's normally portrayed in Hollywood and I do think people feel that but I also think there's a large part of sort of feeling frazzled and like not sure what you're doing, especially if you're a first time parent. But even for second and third time, parents, it's always a little bit different than the first time around and so I think there just, isn't a centralized hub of media where people feel like my concerns are really being heard and they just sort of feel like they have to do comprehensive research into basically every topic so even things like breastfeeding, there's so many things to know about breastfeeding and how you can properly do it but that information isn't super accessible, unless you can get a lactation consultant. And a lot of people don't even know what a lactation consultant is and when you get one, you may realize that there's like all these tactics and things like that and if you don't have one, then you may feel like bad about yourself because you can't produce enough milk or what have you so there's just all these different avenues that I think people go down sort of unnecessarily because there isn't a centralized place where people can really think about proper birth information and how to go about the whole process and I think for dads it's honestly even worse. There really isn't a lot of media that is geared towards dads.
[00:02:59] Aakash Shah: It sounds like a unfortunately too common tale in the modern healthcare system here in the US, which is a lot of the information out there isn't in depth enough. It isn't comprehensive enough and there isn't a way to self educate or find a trusted resource because the trusted resource ends up being an overworked doctor or an overworked medical professional, who doesn't have the time to really spend on you and make sure that you are comfortable as a customer or as a patient. That's what we see here at Wyndly and building a better experience around that. I think it's an obvious need, but help me understand why saving stem cells is where you're starting.
[00:03:41] Kathryn Cross: So when I was three and my brother was one, he was in a near drowning accident that gave him cerebral palsy. As a result, my parents began looking into what could potentially help him and they found that umbilical cord blood stem cells had been used to be readministered into someone. So basically parents would save stem cells from the umbilical cord, and then later on realize their child has cerebral palsy and then they receive it back into them through a treatment. So very similar to like an IV and it's administered intravenously. So at that point, they are generally able to see motor and social scale improvements in children with cerebral palsy, because they're able to receive these stem cells that are a perfect match for themselves and the stem cells are super regenerative. So very similarly people have used these stem cells for other diseases. Very similarly, people have been able to use these for other diseases and as a result, I have always known about it and when I was looking at building a business is around the time that my brother passed away, so I really wanted to do something that would've been able to positively impact him. I started poking around in the cord blood space in general so I knew I wanted to work in that but then learning about pregnancy just became a part of creating the business and now it's a part of our broader mission to really ensure that pregnancy across the board can be a better experience and that this is the starting point but it's more like I learned about that and then learned about pregnancy rather than the other way.
[00:05:13] Aakash Shah: That was very personal. I think like that's a very strong connection to what you do. I'm sure you oversimplify it, but it made it sound like you wanna save the stem cells from the umbilical cord and then you just inject it back into the body.It makes sense, right? If you think about it.
[00:05:30] I know nothing about stem cells. So assume that my only educational stem cells is like what I learned in high school too many years ago.
[00:05:38] so catch me up to the latest research.
[00:05:40] It's typical for most people to just know very little about stem cells but if you think about just the way that pregnancy works and it makes sense, like the baby is attached to the umbilical cord and on the other end of the umbilical cord is the placenta and that is all in the womb and throughout the course of the nine months of pregnancy, the placenta and umbilical cord are super rich with stem cells that are constantly generating a baby and so these like fetal cells as well are super regenerative and able to create this baby so it makes sense that when the umbilical cord and placenta come out right at birth, they are still super rich with these stem cells, even though the baby is born at this point. It's just something that can really be saved at that point and then used later on in life when you need that regeneration again and they are a perfect match for the baby, but can also be used for other family members, potentially who could be a partial match or even more than a partial match and that's a better option than trying to find someone else's umbilical cord in placenta, because then it's very similar to a transplant and you could potentially face the chances of rejection and any negative effects there.
[00:06:47] Aakash Shah: So it's almost like insurance, right? I'm sure you've made it a very easy and simple thing to do. You do this action right then and there, and then you're just stashing your stem cells away if you ever need them in the future. Help me understand what stem cell therapy helps with. You've alluded to Cerebral Palsy and other issues, but is there any way that a more able adult if they got an accident or something, does stem cell therapy apply there also?
[00:07:12] Kathryn Cross: Definitely. I have been reading a lot of success stories specifically out of a European stem cell clinic that specializes in stroke treatment. So not only strokes in adults, but strokes and other brain related issues within children this past year, the third person ever used it to cure their HIV. It's also really frequently used for cancers, specifically leukemia so we actually have someone on our team that received a stem cell treatment when he was diagnosed with leukemia in 2019 and things like Type One Diabetes as well.
[00:07:44] Aakash Shah: So this isn't like when we bank our stem cells with Anja it's not like we're only helping ourselves and when I say we, I mean like when someone's with a baby. We're not trying yet, it's in the future. It's not just insurance for the first five years of my child's life, but it's really insurance for once I'm gone, right? Even if they have heart disease, when the child is 80 this is something that probably will help them regenerate, whatever they need to. That sounds magical.
[00:08:11] I think a lot of people have a misconception. Oh, you'll only use it in the most dire use case, but I really believe that if someone stays up to date with the use cases for stem cells and they have access to their own, then they will use it at some point. So it's not even just like really dire use cases, but even things like sports injuries. You mentioned heart disease. It's been used before for that. Even the chances of getting type one, diabetes is one in 300, by the time you're age 18 and in 2012, they conducted a study where they were able to reverse type one diabetes in the patients with cord blood, so I think the possibilities are endless.
[00:08:47] Note to self for future Aakash make sure that I bank my baby's umbilical blood. What exactly is being banked? Sorry.
[00:08:53] It's the blood inside of the umbilical cord so that is the cord blood and then the cord tissue, which is the cord itself. We remove the artery and veins inside of the cord and the cord tissue also contains stem cells that are really inclined to tissue regeneration. So things like more organ repair and tissue related and then the placenta also contains stem cells, which can be banked as well. Placenta stem cells have been used in conjunction with cord blood stem cells for treatments and has also been used for things like even acne scars so things like that are the sort of less dire consequences that I've mentioned that. people can use stem cells for and people have also looked at placenta stem cells to help alleviate anxiety with autism and things like that. So for all three sources they're slightly different forms of stem cells. But they've all been able to help ailments into some degree.
[00:09:43] Aakash Shah: Kathryn, I was gonna ask you, we had just covered what stem cell therapy enables and why it's so important and furthermore, why it's so important to capture these stem cells at your point of birth. What I really wanna dig into is this seems impossible to do to me. I would have no idea where to start. I would love to hear how did you get the product? How did you start your collection kit and make that partnership with a stem cell bank? I think that's a great place to start like how did you take the very first step to enabling Anja to collect?I think the first step was really just getting in touch with those that had done it before and really beginning to set up the supply chains. I think setting up the supply chain for something like this is pretty difficult because there are just so many pieces involved and also in healthcare in general, things just move slower. It's very bureaucratic. It's not like people have their phone numbers listed on Google. My mom has sort of been involved adjacent to the space and in pharmaceuticals in general and so it was really through her that I was able to better understand how to assemble the supply chain and really go about just creating that and then it was just a matter of running tests to make sure that everything was functional when it was put together and from there I started posting on TikTok as I was setting up the supply chain. I wanted to test how people were responding to me talking about it and just understand what kind of questions people were having around this topic. Once the supply chain was ready to go and I had run a couple tests. I just started really pushing on TikTok that this was available now.
[00:11:18] Regarding the supply chain, how many conversations did you have before you found that first partner that was like, yes, I wanna work with Kathryn and I will start banking. Are you across all 50 states in the US?
[00:11:30] Kathryn Cross: Yeah all
[00:11:30] fifty states.
[00:11:31] Aakash Shah: I'll start banking with Kathryn and the people that she.
[00:11:34] Kathryn Cross: I definitely called around 50 plus people but I would say that only a few of them actually took my call and was really considering having us and so I think it was difficult in the beginning to try and just break through to anyone but it was really through my mom that I was able to better understand how to do that.
[00:11:53] Aakash Shah: If I'm following your zero to one journey, you had a very personal experience that made you want to bring something into the world and started that, but just by doing the groundwork and 50 calls is a lot for someone that isn't doing it very regularly. Even finding people's phone numbers and yes, you had an in somewhat with your mother, but you still had to convince mom, which you know, sometimes I feel like it's harder for me to convince my parents I'm doing the right thing than anybody else.
[00:12:23] It sounds like it was just about being willing to do the uncomfortable work and just grind through until you got to that one "yes". Would you agree?
[00:12:33] I think so. But yeah, my mom was like, you just have to keep calling and keep persevering. I think my mom is like that as well. So that was helpful for me.
[00:12:40] Aakash Shah: And then on top, I think one thing that was very interesting you said you were talking about your journey, your TikTok, as you were doing this, you were documenting it on TikTok. Were you naturally getting a lot of traction? How much of the initial traction that you got on TikTok do you feel came from just what you were doing really resonating with people versus you being very adept on the TikTok plug?
[00:13:00] Kathryn Cross: I think probably a bit of both. I think people on TikTok are generally more responsive to hearing about my family story. I think it helps to tangibly understand what the benefits are behind being able to freeze their own umbilical cord and placenta and also it's just something that nobody is really talking about on TikTok and so I think especially for pregnant followers, it was something that was unique. Also I had been posting on TikTok for about a year but it was sort of like random content. I was learning the TikTok dances during quarantine, as my workout and stuff like that. So I would just post them. But I wouldn't say I was like adept per se to the platform. I was just comfortable on it. Just by nature of being young. I think just being social media native is something that is easy for me.
[00:13:47] Aakash Shah: So you were comfortable in the same way as you were comfortable going out and finding your initial partner. You were comfortable trying out this new channel to tell your story. Right?
[00:13:56] Kathryn Cross: Right.
[00:13:57] Aakash Shah: Then you saw that it was really resonating. I don't think we've talked about how TikTok has been such a massive lever for you. If you wanna tell us a little bit about that.
[00:14:04] So I started posting on TikTok because in 2020 I founded a marketing agency and I pretty much recommended to all of my clients that they get on TikTok because I just think the discoverability is so rare and so unique for social media platform. Previously on Instagram and things like that you only see content that you've prescribed to, but now it's not only content that is new, but it's content that's tailored to what you wanna see and so it's sort of is like a two way street where I'm able to reach the people that I want to, and they're able to see content that they're receptive to. I just think the discoverability is a really crazy part of social media that hasn't been done before. Because of that, I told everyone that they should get on TikTok and for me, it was something that I knew I wanted to do and I wasn't a hundred percent sure if it would be the right channel and the right place to talk about this but. I just started posting videos and now I have around 120,000 followers. So people are able to be receptive to the content. I still don't think I'm the best Tik Toker out there and I've been working on things like being more personal on my platform so that's why going live right now is on my TikTok tongue gown is something that I've been trying to explore. But trying to be 1% better every day.
[00:15:16] Aakash Shah: Get that compound return by being better. A hundred thousand followers, but you've had multiple millions of views, right?
[00:15:22] Kathryn Cross: Yeah.
[00:15:23] Aakash Shah: I think you're being a little coy on how well you've been able to take advantage of this new channel. It sounds like media education content is a very important part of what you're doing at Anja. You really have this strong message of Anja is the place to go. If you have any questions about pregnancy and even post pregnancy, Anja not only is the place to go for education, but also to get the right type of service, to get the care and attention that is deserved by new mothers and babies. I didn't know if I was allowed to say mothers, I had to catch myself for a second. Talk to me a little bit more about why you chose this direction and how it's been working for you. Some interesting things that you've learned.
[00:16:09] Kathryn Cross: I chose it because I think I was already talking about umbilical chords in placenta, so it makes sense to also make adjacent content for my viewers and really ensuring that I'm creating content that they wanna see, not just specific to umbilical cords and placentas, but other relevant content to them so I started making other pregnancy related content and I think that really opened my eyes to the fact that there were so many issues within pregnancy or just pregnancy media that people were facing because I would get comments along the lines of like, "Oh no one told me about this. Like I wish I knew sooner" or "I'm afraid to tell my doctor this," or like, "How do I talk to my doctor about this?"People were sharing their personal stories and I just came to realize that throughout the pregnancy journey, there's just so many holes. I remember speaking with an OB GYN once about how often she sees her patients and she does see them in the sort of stereotypical fashion that you do throughout pregnancy, but she only spends like max 15, like, she was kind of shocked when I mentioned 15 minutes as a gauge of time. She was like, whoa, you have a really good OB GYN if they're spending 15 minutes with you. I think sometimes it's around like five or 10 more so, even that alone made me realize that I think pregnancy and people that are pregnant, they just need more attention because there's just so few resources out there that are really trustworthy and the ones that are generally available, like a physician just are spread thin so it's useful to have other places that you can go to for learning about what's so crucial throughout pregnancy.
[00:17:41] Aakash Shah: Well, there, you have it, a very succinct explanation of what's wrong with our healthcare system today. Doctors don't spend enough time with you and they're not allowed to and so people are left without the help that they deserve and without the advice that they need. Is there anything you wanna say before we wrap up.
[00:17:58] Kathryn Cross: Yeah, if you know anyone pregnant then definitely consider Anja Health or at least consider learning a bit more about your umbilical cornine placenta and how crucial those stem cells within, near umbilical cornine placenta can be. My goal is obviously to get more folks to bank their stem cells but really my secondary goal is to just get people to know about it because I think right now there's so few people that even know about this is, an option, and then later on they just feel at loss that they weren't informed and it's actually a legal mandate in over 20 states that they are informed about stem cell banking specifically but a lot of OBs don't even know that that's a mandate and a lot of patients as a result, never hear about it.
[00:18:41] Aakash Shah: Where can people find you?.
[00:18:43] Kathryn Cross: So on TikTok. I am @KathrynAnja K A T H R Y N A N J A and our site is anjahealth.com and then our Instagram is anja.health and our Tik Tok is @AnjaHealth.
[00:18:56] Aakash Shah: There we go. Thank you so much for coming on. It was a great time.
[00:19:00] Kathryn Cross: Thanks for having me.
[00:19:01] Aakash Shah: This episode of Founders and Builders is brought to you by Wyndly. At Wyndly, we fix allergies for life with personalized treatment plans that train your body to ignore your allergies.
[00:19:12] Our doctors use allergy immunotherapy, to train your immune system to ignore its allergy triggers. By exposing you to naturally occurring allergens in gradually increasing doses, we fix the root cause of your allergies. Plus the entire Wyndly experience is convenient and easy with telehealth visits and medicine sent right to your door. You never have to go to a doctor's office.
[00:19:35] If you want to live without allergies, then visit https://www.Wyndly.com that's wyndly.com. Remember, life's better without allergies.
[00:19:46] Aakash Shah: Thanks for listening to Founders and Builders. Make sure to subscribe and share this episode with a friend. You can find more episodes at https://www.aakash.io. That's aakash.io, or just find Aakash on Twitter @aakashdotio.