Wisdo Solves Heathcare App

Wisdo, an app that helps connect people facing cancer, the loss of a job, loneliness, and other major life challenges with others who have been through similar experiences, today announced it is launching out of beta with $11 million in funding. Wisdo currently has 500,000 users after beta testing for about a year.

Wisdo CEO and cofounder Boaz Gaon told VentureBeat that he started the company in memory of his father, Israeli businessman Benny Gaon, who died from pancreatic cancer in 2008. The senior Gaon was president of the Israel Association when he was diagnosed. Gaon said that even though his father was afforded access to top doctors, what the family wanted most was to talk other families with a similar diagnosis.

“We very naively thought we were this ‘ideal cancer family’,” Gaon told VentureBeat. “The truth is when you’re going through something like this that you’ve never gone through before, you’re going to make mistakes, and we made a lot of them.”

Wisdo currentlyI aI  has more than 70 communities users can join, each one tailored to users with a “shared experience.” The app is only open to users older than 18. Some communities talk about how to prepare for college, or about buying a house. Others are for survivors of sexual assault, or for users to talk about experiences with depression and anxiety. Users are also asked to create a “timeline” highlighting different steps they’ve gone through — if they’ve found a therapist or have told their family members they have depression, for example.