Dialing up human longevity

Lifeforce CEO on the benefits of delivering longevity medicine via telehealth.
Earlier this year, US personalized health and longevity company Lifeforce landed $12 million in Series A funding from investors including M13 and Peterson Ventures. The new funding follows seed investment from co-founders Tony Robbins and Dr. Peter Diamandis, and tennis legend Serena Williams. The Los Angeles based telehealth provider is on a mission to improve human longevity with an integrated health optimization platform combining biomarker data with clinical expertise and validated interventions.

Every three months, Lifeforce members receive in-home diagnostic blood tests covering more than 40 biomarkers relating to physical, cognitive, sexual, and psychological performance. Results are then interpreted by medical doctors, who create personalized programs, including lifestyle adjustments, supplements, and even hormone and peptide therapies customized to a person’s specific biology and goals.

Longevity.Technology: While the world awaits the development of longevity drugs that will boost healthspan and longevity, many people are already trying to take more proactive control of their health through lifestyle changes, supplements and beyond. Recent years have seen the increasing emergence of clinical providers seeking to support those looking to optimize their health as they age. Indeed, Lifeforce’s stated aim is to “redefine the way we approach preventative healthcare and aging” so we caught up with co-founder and CEO Dugal Bain-Kim to find out how.

Bain-Kim has worked in digital health most of his career but found that healthcare’s predominant focus on “sick-care” was often still reflected in digital health approaches.

“Working in digital health was an awesome experience,” he says. “But it was still one step removed from my personal passion: proactive health and longevity optimization.”

‘No incentive’ for longevity in healthcare
The traditional approach to healthcare is, says Bain-Kim, not working for the increasing number of people who expect a more proactive approach to their health.

“If you’re a health-motivated person, who wants to stay on the front foot, making sure you are functioning at your best and keeping yourself on the right track, then primary care is not cutting it for you,” he adds. “The incentives aren’t aligned – doctors don’t get paid for practicing effective longevity medicine.”Things came to a head for Bain-Kim when he reached his own health roadblock aged 38.

“After six or 12 months of poor health habits following the birth of my daughter, I decided it was time to get back on track, and I was quite cocky about my ability to do that, having always been a health motivated person and athlete,” he recalls. “But when I tried to do it through the same things I’ve always done before – tightening up my diet, working out a little bit harder – my body just didn’t respond like it had in the past. I was 38, not 28, and my physiology had changed.”

Consumer experience a ‘kick in the pants’
Not knowing where to go to get the expertise and the right tools to make the right decisions, Bain-Kim set out as a consumer to try and find answers.

“It was a terrible experience – incredibly fragmented, expensive, ineffective – bouncing around between at-home finger prick and saliva tests, all from different labs and only showing one piece of the puzzle,” he says. “Or conversations with my primary care doctor – seven-minute visits with zero interest in longevity or proactive health optimization. I even looked at these concierge clinics wanting to charge me $50,000 a year to take care of me. But I ended up back in the same spot that most people are in – with a bunch of supplements in my cupboard and no idea what’s working or what I need to be taking.”

Dialing up human longevity