On Tinder, you can search for a date. What if you could search for the right nutritional match for your health problems, much like the dating app? Using a simple swipe left and right method? CORA Health, a Bengaluru-based e-commerce platform is enabling users to access healthy food alternatives based on their medical conditions and lifestyle diseases. The platform houses over 3,000 products by over 200 brands like OZiva, D-live, Dr. Morepen, Neuherbs and Sattviko.
Snigdha Kumar founded CORA Health while dealing with her health issues concerning PCOS and gall bladder, which required dietary modifications. She defines CORA (where C and O stand for ‘core health’ and ‘outstanding’ respectively) as a preventive healthcare aggregator platform integrating tech to find healthy meal replacements and personalisation.
About what made her conceive the platform, she says, “There was too much clutter in terms of advice on what to eat and what to buy to resolve your health concerns. Unfortunately, this is often unverified and unprofessional advice. Most importantly, generic advice. I have tried a dozen solutions to treat Polycystic Ovarian Disease (PCOD) and gall bladder issues but to no avail. But when I found a personalised solution based on my health, age, location, food, dietary habits, and the type of PCOS (there are four types), it worked wonders. I wanted to give the same online experience to others who approach us with health issues.”
Considering she has worked in brands such as Flipkart, she could see exactly where the gaps were. Thus CORA was conceived in 2020 along with her colleague Shrijit Venkatesh. The duo is now working on integrating AI into the platform that will soon take the shape of a virtual assistant—Alexa for Nutrition. The virtual entity will answer queries on food and nutrition taking into consideration the individuals’ health condition, preferences, age, diet and 10 other factors, including allergies, exercise patterns etc.
“We have the user’s health information (collected with permission) like age, health concerns, the cuisine they eat, exercise frequency, etc. We are a matchmaking health platform that finds the right vitamins and nutritional supplements. The products are picked by food scientists and nutritionists. A swipe left and right helps you get closer to the right solution.
A live chat with an expert gives the users the advice they need. Food is medicine and one has to prescribe that only after thought and research,” says Kumar.
The products are classified under heads such as PCOS, immunity, guilt-free snacks etc. The last section features 170 products ranging from walnut kernels to organic whole grain unsalted, brown rice cakes. In another section, it ranges from herbal tisanes to camel milk chocolates. They are also classified based on the age group or dietary demographic (vegan, gluten-free or sugar-free). Users can use webchat or WhatsApp to get advice from experts before ordering products.
Turnaround time
CORA has two nutrition experts who personally go through the queries and give answers to specific problems and suggest products. For example, a new mom who is lactating needs a different solution compared to a woman who is not nursing. The typical turnaround time is between five and 20 minutes. Special and complicated cases are prioritised and receive a callback sooner.