Listen to this articleBelow is our recent interview with Ken Lambrecht, Founding Owner and Medical Director at West Towne Veterinary:
Q: Could you provide our readers with a brief introduction to your company?
A: Our free app Healthy Pet Connect, is an interactive pet health platform for pet parents that allows input of type/amts of food, treats, weights, exercise and an estimate of Body Condition Score (BCS) similar to BMI in people. Subscriptions for overweight pets are paired with a personalized feeding system (food scale and a caloric measuring system) that works with all feeding styles & devices and a body weight scale for pets less than 25#.
The app provides remote monitoring (charts and graphs) to detect abnormal rates of weight loss alerting both the veterinarian and pet parent to ensure safe, effective, weight loss. The service is for both dogs & cats and is also effective in detecting unintentional weight loss to help in early detection of senior pet diseases.
The app strikes a balance between being engaging & fun yet being a powerful telemonitoring tool to detect & prevent disease by sharing home pet health data with a pet parent’s existing veterinarian.
Q: Any highlights on your recent announcement?
A: We presented to veterinarians at the VMX conference in Orlando in early June and received strong interest and support from practicing DVM’s, veterinary nurses, insurance companies, veterinary software providers, home pet health technology products and some pet parents who see our platform as a true solution to the pet obesity epidemic and other preventable diseases.
Q: Can you give us more insights into your offering?
A: Obesity in pets is considered an epidemic by veterinary experts affecting up to 60% of pets in the U.S. As Medical Director of Fit Pets for Rescues I collaborated with IoT device manufacturers to develop home health ecosystems to treat obesity remotely. In 2020 in collaboration with Dr. Barr Hadar at OVC, Guelph and his Popmatrix team, our study (soon to be published in a peer reviewed journal) showed a technology system (scale, smart feeder, activity monitor and webcam) was 4 times more effective than traditional methods of weight management for cats in multiple cat households. We created the app for all pets, as prevention of disease is part of our veterinary oath. The study showed us that educating pet parents, getting reliable information easily to a pet’s veterinarian, saving veterinary team time, is vital to treating & preventing obesity as a disease. Everything in our monitoring is evidence-based and based on established peer-reviewed veterinary medical guidelines (AAHA, AAFP, DACVN).”
Q: What can we expect from your company in the next 6 months? What are your plans?
A: We will be adding a recall food feature to the free version that alerts both the veterinarian and pet parent of any food or treat recalls as long as they have entered that information in our app. We will be enhancing our nutrition calculators and the veterinary dashboard to help save valuable veterinary team time. After that we will be adding health related quality of life questions to the platform to make sure we provide early detection and preservation of pet vitality.
Q: What is the best thing about your company that people might not know about?
A: We donate 5% of every subscription to the rescue of the pet parents’ choice. Over the past 11 years we have raised over $25,000 for local Madison, Wisconsin Rescues and we are now excited to share that nationally and maybe even internationally so when any pet gets fitter using our subscription that the rescue of the pet parent’s choice get a donation to do more of the great work they do. We currently have Spudge, a 35 lb cat who we are fostering as a rescue from the Dane County Humane Society who is on his weight loss journey to reach his ideal weight of 12 to 15 lbs. Our passion is vitality for all pets and helping to increase the bond between pet/pet parent and their existing veterinarian.
