You know that feeling where you just can’t seem to think clearly? It’s late in the day, you’ve been looking at a computer for hours, and for some reason your brain seems foggy. Maybe you have to re-read a sentence a time or two to really understand it. That’s what Lola Priego was feeling a few years ago, and she couldn’t understand why.
“It’s hard to know what’s going on with your body. Like, I wasn’t sick, I just wasn’t at my best. So I decided to go to the doctor,” Priego told Built In.
Several weeks’ worth of doctor’s visits, lab tests and questionnaires later, she was told she had a hormonal imbalance and was vitamin deficient.
“[The process] was so hard and it took so long,” Priego remembered. “I had to take time out of my work day to go get lab work done and talk to the doctor. I just knew there had to be a better way. That’s when I went on this mission of making lab data more accessible.”
About a year later, she founded Base, an at-home lab testing company and digital tracking app that helps users get personalized answers and treatment for day-to-day issues like brain fog, lack of sleep, low sex drive and diet.
The company announced Wednesday it closed on a $1 million pre-seed funding round led by Brooklyn Bridge Ventures, Lakehouse, AmplifyHer Ventures, K50 and several angel investors. Now, users can test their sleep, stress, energy and diet; sex drive tracking will be rolled out in the fall.
Base’s mission is to blend the science of lab tests with the convenience and accessibility of an app to provide users with a more holistic view of their body and lifestyle. Customers receive an at-home testing kit where they provide either a saliva or self-administered blood sample (alternatively, they can stop by a Quest Diagnostics center near them and have a healthcare professional administer the test). Then, Base analyzes those samples and provides users with comprehensive, science-based results and recommendations for how to improve their health through things like supplements or dietary changes. Tests can be purchased at $55 a month or $57 every four months and the tracking app is available for $4.95 a month. Other than that, Base says there are no hidden lab fees or copays.
The goal is to provide people with a sense of agency over their own bodies without having to go through the time consuming, costly and potentially judgmental process at a traditional doctor’s office. With Base, users don’t have to wonder why they feel a certain way, and they don’t have to feel like they should blame themselves. Instead, Priego says, the platform is “tweaking the equation a little bit and saying ‘it’s not you, it’s your hormones.’”
“There’s magic when someone says, ‘Hey, I want to feel better and want to learn about my body,’” Priego said. “When you get a test sent right to your home, that’s when you feel motivated. You don’t have to schedule anything, you don’t have to get out of your routine to go get tested. It’s really, really easy.”
Incidentally, this model is also ideal for a post-COVID world. All of Base’s tests can be done at home and results can be accessed through the app, meaning no in-person visits to a doctor’s office or lab.
Going forward, Priego says Base will use this pre-seed to enhance the product and build the company’s brand, especially within communities that may not otherwise be able to afford this kind of testing.
“We want to be the first ones to introduce continuous testing to the world. I think this is a very unique opportunity to disrupt healthcare and to change, finally, how expensive things are. We want to help people understand what’s going on with their bodies,” Priego said. “I’m really looking forward to the day when we finally have a measuring tool with these products that tells us what works and what not for your own body, because it’s not a one size fits all.”
