Online Therapy or Face to Face Counselling? How about Blended Psychotherapy? Florence von Gunten, Ylah

Florence von Gunten: 0:00

Our brain is actually like a muscle. So, you know, training is everything in psychotherapy.

Alex X-Health.show: 0:06

[INTRO] Hi, I'm Alex and welcome to the X-Health.show, where I talk to visionaries behind the latest innovations in healthcare. For the eXtra health of the future. We're in Bern, Switzerland, I'm sitting with my back towards the glass wall, so that I'm not distracted by the view of the sloping roofs surrounded by mountains. Across the table, Florence von Gunten is courageously facing the scenic view. She's a registered nurse turned psychologist turned startup CEO. She has this gentle flair of kung fu practitioner. And for a reason. She co-founded Ylah, an online therapy platform for psychotherapists and their patients to support the treatment between face to face sessions. We'll talk about mental health, blended psychotherapy, depression, anxiety, motivation, routines, and more. Apparently, it's obvious for people who speak Swiss German. But what does Ylah mean?

Florence von Gunten: 1:31

Yes, so Ylah means "to engage with therapy". So Ylah is the Bernese word for "engaging with", and that was actually what I normally said to patients when I worked with patients. So if you'd like to make therapy work, you have to "ylah" or to engage with therapy. But at same time, I also realised that it's now not so easy for patients to engage with. And that's what we're doing now. So we provide them with a solution to help them to engage better with their treatment.

Alex X-Health.show: 2:09

Lovely, we'll we'll get there in a minute. But first, tell me, like, how did you come up with the idea of the platform that offers online therapy to face to face therapists?

Florence von Gunten: 2:23

So basically, the idea existed in research already. So there is a broad body of research from online psychotherapy heading towards in recent years that they figured out that blended psychotherapy, so the setting where not only the app is provided but also still there is a mental professional involved, that the setting has better outcomes than online psychotherapy only. And also face to face psychotherapy only.

Alex X-Health.show: 3:00

Like, let me just add here because, like, I've just read that three quarters of therapists in New York they never got back to face to face therapy. So they still work online. They started during COVID and they still work online, which to me is, like, I mean, that's huge. Because people want to save time on travel.

Florence von Gunten: 3:25

Yeah, true. And I also hear a lot from patients, you know, it would be cool to have more online sessions. I also heard from therapists that they are now nowadays more flexible, also offering online psychotherapy. But still, I would think that majority of Swiss psychotherapist, they still prefer to have on-site sessions and setting next to maybe, let's say from time to time, a check-in which might be with a text message or a phone call, and hopefully also in the future more and more with our platform.

Alex X-Health.show: 4:06

What's your take on online only therapy? Like, what do you think about it personally, from your experience?

Florence von Gunten: 4:15

So I think online psychotherapy works for certain people, like, for instance, if you're not yet experiencing very severe mental disturbance or distress but I think as soon as you experience severe symptoms or loads of distress, and especially if you realise it affects you in your daily routines, it affects maybe your relations, your work, etc., latest at that point, you should really go and see a specialist.

Alex X-Health.show: 4:49

What are the benefits of face to face therapy over online therapy? I'm just thinking, you know, because to me, you know, I'd like rather have a connection with a real person, especially that I spend loads of hours, you know, screen hours.

Florence von Gunten: 5:08

I think it's exactly what you said – this personal contact is what many people wish to have. And also, in face to face psychotherapy, you can very individually adapt to a patient's needs. So normally the talks you have, you know, there are these manuals on how to treat depression, how to treat anxiety. And obviously, that's good guidelines to follow, overall. But in the end, the individual treatment and talk, let's say the therapeutic talk, you have to patient is quite on an individual basis and should be able to adapt to the current situation, to the patient. And there is where I think the the face to face talk or psychotherapeutic session has, like, an advantage compared to online psychotherapy, or even a chatbot. Because I think it's still... you grasp with verbal and nonverbal behaviour and communication... you grasp way more of of, let's say, the entire patient, as an individual than app or a chatbot could ever do.

Alex X-Health.show: 6:25

So what is Ylah solution? And actually, for you guys listening, it's spelled Y L A H dot C H. So ylah.ch.

Florence von Gunten: 6:38

Exactly. So the.ch obviously, refers to our web page. And what Ylah is it's like, we say it's like, not only an application. So of course, we have an application, which consists on the one hand it's a web app for psychologists and psychiatrist. And on the other hand, there is a mobile app for patients. And then the practitioner can connect through this application with the patient. And on the one hand, like, treatment activities like exercises, questionnaires, used in treatment, are conveyed from the specialist to the patient. So then the patient can also, between sessions, continue on working on his treatment.

Alex X-Health.show: 7:30

So the platform is basically for therapists, not for people who want to treat themselves.

Florence von Gunten: 7:37

Exactly, it's always connected with treatment, with a therapist. But also, I said, it's not only an application. So with blended psychotherapy we also very much... So our customers are clinics and institutions that offer psychotherapy and what we learned is that they have a need on really knowing on how to best implement psychotherapy, or blended psychotherapy. Because practitioners, they don't have time during their daily life in learning a new solution, they have a high pressure, they have many, many patients to treat. And basically, there is really few times to adapt to a new method or therapy. So that's why we want to support these institutions or clinics, the best that they can very fast and easy, get used to this new method. So it should fit very well to their current processes. And that's where we also support our customer. It's not only giving them the app but, like, supporting them with workshops and the full process to implement the solution so they can profit, they're very fast from the the good benefits of it.

Alex X-Health.show: 8:55

What are the areas that the platform covers?

Florence von Gunten: 8:58

So with this platform, you can treat patients with depression or anxiety disorder, and also related disorders such as sleep problems, self esteem, mindfulness, and it also has parts of for instance, treatment motivation, etc. So then the therapist can assign exercises or questionnaires or also diaries to the patient that then the patient can practice between sessions on these exercises. And then the therapist gets back the results of these practices from the patient, which informs him then again, like what can I do next, you know, in the session, so we really say our solution is a very nice ping pong in between the onsite session, but also the online treatment and which informs each other mutually and then kind of the process is going on in this ping-pong between these two settings.

Alex X-Health.show: 9:58

So there is, like, a part, I can imagine, for a patient and for therapists.

Florence von Gunten: 10:04

Exactly.

Alex X-Health.show: 10:05

And what's there to choose from, for the therapists? You mentioned, some exercises or like, yeah, could you tell a bit more about that?

Florence von Gunten: 10:16

Yeah, maybe we can make an example, you know.

Alex X-Health.show: 10:18

Yes, that'll be great, thank you.

Florence von Gunten: 10:19

Maybe slightly... maybe a patient with depression comes to a new treatment, and the therapist might on the one hand, maybe assign some activities, about learning, so that the patient can learn about what's actually depression. So we call that psychoeducation. So it is, like, exercises that the patient would learn about what is the depression? How many people do actually suffer from depression? What is the normal prognosis for depression, etc. It's also about learning, why does depression even occure. So how depression can develop? Or how, how might the depression develop? Also, how does depression sustain. you know, why does it not go away? And so the patient would learn a lot, and then also have some interactive exercises. So what is my story of my depression? So why did I develop depression? And then the patient might go back to the next session, maybe in the session, they talk about some problems, like, for instance, the patient says, like, you know, I feel quite depressed because I worked very hard and I almost couldn't sleep anymore, I felt very exhausted, I started getting isolated from my friends, from my social life or leisure. And so maybe that's how I developed my depression. And then, based on that, the therapist would then again assign certain exercises, which maybe support the patient in finding some relaxation, or let's say, build up activities again, so the patient would get back on doing his leisure, like, maybe he was doing something before that helped him a lot to feel, well, like, meeting up with friends or doing some sports. So then you would continue on with this, with this really tailored exercises that the patient needs in his process.

Alex X-Health.show: 12:37

So there is like a library of these kinds of exercises.

Florence von Gunten: 12:43

Exactly. There is like a library with various exercises that you, as a therapist, you can find these exercises based on certain traits. Like I'm searching an exercise now for depression and self esteem, which, yeah, which I can assign to the patient's needs. And then you could assign this exercise. And also you have this questionnaires, for instance, to track symptoms of depression, or also diaries, for instance. There are also diaries which are even having a treatment effect in a sense of... for instance, a gratitude diary, so "what are you grateful for today?" So then you can really tailor to the patient's needs but also what he wishes and what fits to him in this treatment process. You can assign them, these exercises very individually.

Alex X-Health.show: 13:38

Also what works for some people might not work, I can imagine, for others. I can just imagine, like, I tried these gratefulness diaries. I mean, they seem fake, basically, to me at some point, you know. so I started enthusiastically with, you know, after like, a couple of days, or maybe three days really fast. You know, I was like, I was kind of fed up with. It's not that I'm not grateful. It's just the diaries, you know.

Florence von Gunten: 14:06

Yes, exactly. So that's exactly one very important point, you know, like, every patient is an individual And everybody needs slightly something else. And I think with our solution and this technique, we apply.. we have the chance to really fit a tailored intervention to a certain patient. And I think that's a huge strength of us compared also to other solutions where sometimes in apps, you have like, okay, you have depression, so just do this full module on depression, it takes you hours and everybody who has depression should be, let's say, cured afterwards. We believe that it's not so easy, you know, because you have to understand the patient and his individual situation, his challenges, his mental challenges, his goals and his resources, and then to understand, like, what treatment fits the best to this patient, and then being able with this flexible tool to apply the fitting treatment.

Alex X-Health.show: 15:19

What did patients... actually patients and therapists say when you did study using the platform? What was the feedback that you got? Maybe the feedback that, I don't know, made you pivot from the original idea or, you know, made you change certain parts? Or... areas of the platform?

Florence von Gunten: 15:42

Yes, so so far, we can actually only rely on testing based on a prototype. So there is not yet real world data collected because, actually, just now we finished our first application. And we're very soon starting the first tests with patients and therapists, so using it in practice. But we don't have yet this data and this feedback. But what we did the last time, over the last two years, we did almost 200 interviews with therapists, experts in the field, patients, and we showed them our first... it was like sketches of our idea, then it was kind of a concept. Then it was first screens that we that we pivot in as a prototype as a clickable prototype. And we continued, like, in this co-creation process with, mainly, with therapists, I would say, and experts, we then developed this solution. And last year, three months ago, we had our last testing or finished our last testing, and they look... we got really nice feedback, which we're very confident that now we found... we kind of hit a very good solution fitting to the actual needs of practitioners. But now our next challenge is to test and validate them in the field, which will be very exciting. In the next half a year.

Alex X-Health.show: 17:17

What I read you started collaboration with Private Clinic Wyss which sounds really exciting. Like, how did that happen?

Florence von Gunten: 17:26

Yes, actually, we know, the director of the Private Clinic Wyss, Christian Imboden, since quite a while he was one of our very early supporters of this idea. He was there in many interviews and emails and questions we could address, and constantly supporting and engaging us, like, to further develop this idea. And he was always very supportive, and even more, we were super happy that the Private Clinic Wyss also agreed on starting this first pilot trial with us. And we're also very happy that Marcus Wyss, from the family holding of the Private Clinic Wyss, that he also fully supports Ylah, and is now in our board of directors, and, yeah, supports our startup,

Alex X-Health.show: 18:22

How you're gonna test it with Wyss? So what will this collaboration look like?

Florence von Gunten: 18:28

Our plan is that therapists but also patients that they will engage with the application, and in the first step, we will just very closely observe, how do they engage with the application? Is it very clear for them to use? Do they have questions? Do they like it? And that's what we're going to observe in a very close setting in the beginning. And then we also like to investigate more, how do they apply the application over a longer term, over a longer time period, because our hope, obviously, is that they start the application and that the usage of the application will increase and will be stable at some point. Worst case, you know, they would start using the application but at some point, they would stop because they don't like it for certain reasons. So also, these observations in a longer time period will be very interesting for engagement because as we all know the application is only as good as how you can make people engage with it, and that's where we have a close focus on now, the next months, to really support our users in basically engaging with the app.

Alex X-Health.show: 19:47

[MID-ROLL BREAK] This episode is brought to you by the X-Health.show and me. So if you liked this podcast, be generous hit"Follow", leave a review. That'll help me invite more such amazing guests for you. Thank you! I'm just thinking, from your experience, as a psychologist, why would you need to fill this gap between sessions with the digital app?

Florence von Gunten: 20:18

Yes... for the reason that our brain is actually like a muscle. So, you know, training is everything in psychotherapy. And so, training and understanding, obviously, I mean, there are more parts, but, like, it's really important that you train new thinking, you train new habits. And this training cannot only take place during session. Of course, also, now patients train a lot in their daily lives. But the app can support this behaviour very much. Because many times I hear from patients that, Oh, I really wanted to practice that and I know you told me this last time, and I wanted to do it. But you know, I maybe forgot about it or in the end, I figured it was very difficult to apply it in my daily life, I would have needed some support, etc. So... and there to help the patient, again, to engage with this treatment in their daily lives that's super crucial, because life is not happening in session, life is happening outside and there the patient needs to be able to adapt again and find a way of living with the healthy behaviour. To feel better in the end.

Alex X-Health.show: 21:43

So the app will also support motivation, or will motivate patients.

Florence von Gunten: 21:49

Yes, it should. So in the best case it should. And we hope we can prove that, yeah.

Alex X-Health.show: 21:55

We've just talked before we started recording about you starting your new routine.

Florence von Gunten: 22:02

Yes.

Alex X-Health.show: 22:02

How do you go about it? Because it's also about motivation, right? Are you good with routines?

Florence von Gunten: 22:08

Yes, I think maybe a basic thing of motivation I have is like, I'm not questioning certain things at some point anymore. For instance, that at some point in my life, I decided and experienced that to have some physical activities in the morning is good for me. It helps me to wake up to have a good start in the day to, yeah, to kind of feel also more relaxed during the day. So even though now sometimes in the morning when I feel like, okay, do I really really want to get up or should I sleep longer? I kind of try not to even negotiate anymore with my self, so I kind of never regretted getting up and doing this morning activity. So that's why now I I just don't negotiate about it, let's say, and I think that helps for... or let's say, for my motivation but then also now a new routine, you know, I... It's like...

Alex X-Health.show: 23:16

What are you trying to introduce

Florence von Gunten: 23:17

So basically so far I was swimming in the morning but now this location closes and I have to change. So that's why I thought okay, I will try with jogging. But because of my knees and my ankles I cannot do jogging for such a long time so I thought I will do partly jogging or good walking but then also try to do more stretching and some physical activities. Like something for my muscles. And yeah, I mean, this morning I was for the first time. I woke up and I thought okay, let's go. I put for the first time my running shoes and not my swimsuit. And I went and then I mean yeah, you have... I think it's trial and error in the end as well because I wanted to go for instance... I wanted to do jogging on a certain street but it was super dark still and then I start feeling anxious about this street. So I had to turn around I had to find another spot and in the end I found a good spot for doing stretching and some strength exercises and yeah, I went home and I was quite happy about it. At the same time I also thought Okay, tomorrow maybe I should go directly in another direction. So I should choose another street. Or maybe I did not find strength exercises for all body parts, so maybe I have to check on YouTube now some videos on how can I train these parts with not having any training support or, yeah, whatever. So, you know... And then I think it's constantly trial and error and figuring out what, what is fitting for yourself. And that's back, basically, to the concept also, we have within Ylah. Because what you do, is you set yourself goals. Which means, like, What do I actually want to reach with this treatment? What do I actually want to become? When would I say, now the treatment was successful and that's the state I want? Yeah, basically, to reach, to become. And the way how you become, how do you reach that, how you come to that place – it's super individual. For some it might be practising more mindfulness, more relaxation. For others, it's maybe more understanding why certain things are the way they are, it's maybe more on a cognitive base. For others, it's maybe more on the emotional base, like, really feeling how you can, yeah, how you can adapt to certain things, etc. So... and this individual paths, pathway, in the end, it's just... it's a fact of life. I think all of us have this very individual journey and we will, we would like to reflect that within our product.

Alex X-Health.show: 26:29

Where do you take that energy, you know? Because I just figured out that when you started running today, and you said it was dark, I mean, at 6:00 it's not dark

Florence von Gunten: 26:39

You caught me. [laughter]

Alex X-Health.show: 26:41

So it had to be earlier.

Florence von Gunten: 26:44

Yeah [still laughing], I started at 5:30. I

would say, yeah, 5: 26:47

30.

Alex X-Health.show: 26:49

So where do you get that energy from? Because then, you know, yeah, you go to the office and you work. And you've got loads to do, because yeah, we also, you know... it took us some time to basically sit here and talk.

Florence von Gunten: 27:05

Yes. So I'm an early bird. So I just love the mornings. That's why I love getting up very early. And yeah, and then I guess I go to sleep also a bit earlier. I mean, it's

good, we finish at 5: 27:21

00 or 6 o'clock, because afterwards, I'm quite tired. And then I need some rest. I need some leisure. And just, yeah, getting off my head and relaxing, calming down, sleep. And then it goes on. And I also would say this venture with Ylah gives me a lot of energy, you know, it's so fulfilling what we can reach, what change we can create for the patients, for mental health. It gives me a lot of energy, it gives me a lot of good reason why to get up and why to do... to every day continue on.

Alex X-Health.show: 28:03

I found it extremely interesting that you started your career in healthcare as a nurse. How did you... Could you tell me, like, why did you choose healthcare as your profession? Because then you developed, right?

Florence von Gunten: 28:21

Yeah, I guess that was very influenced by my sister and my mother. So my mother, she was a midwife and my sister, she choose to become a nurse. And actually, for quite a while I did not know what should I do after school. And I was always in touch with healthcare, so through my mother, through my sister then, and I think it just, yeah, was kind of... I think it was just kind of a way to go or... But then I realised in nursing... like... what interests me a lot is really mental health. So... and then I started my first job in psychiatry. And when I was there, I really realised Okay, that's the people that interest me. It's, like, this way of working that interests me a lot. So with people with mental health...

Alex X-Health.show: 29:23

Was there anything specific or any specific event that made you think that mental health is something that you'd like to really dive into?

Florence von Gunten: 29:38

I cannot think one specific event, but certainly, humans always interested me a lot and, like, the way they think, the way they act, react, like, feelings... So why do we feel the way we feel? How do we process that? And I think I just always kind of connected quite easy to humans. I remember now, my mother told me once, when I was very young, because I was on a ski slope... You know, I grew up in the mountains, so basically, as soon as I could walk, I was also on ski slopes.

Alex X-Health.show: 30:18

Obviously!

Florence von Gunten: 30:20

And when somebody fell, or like, let's say, another child fell, I sometimes walked back, you know, the slope, just to help these people, or this kid. Normally I was with other kids, you know. And my mother told me, like, you have a very good heart, seeing that and supporting other people. And I think there was maybe a natural sense of liking to help others and what always touched me a lot also, then working in clinics is, like, you know, there is this concept about mental pain. So if you have mental pain, and it really hurts, like physical pain, and this can arise with almost whatever mental disorder you have, at some point, in the end, the core sense of it is kind of a mental pain you feel. And I always thought, it's such a bad feeling this mental pain. It's so painful, actually. And I kind of want to support people that experienced this. This pain. And yeah, if you have headache and you feel pain, you just take a painkiller. And but if you have mental pain, because maybe you feel low, you feel lonely, you're anxious, you experience an addiction, or maybe you experience a loss, you know, it's not so easy to just take a pill, and that's gone, this pain.

Alex X-Health.show: 31:50

Yeah, but some people still believe that. I mean, they can take a happy pill and that will do, basically. But the pills, they can betray us, right?

Florence von Gunten: 31:58

Yeah, I mean, of course, there are pills you can take, you're maybe happy for certain hours. But for a sustainable change, let's say, to get in a sustainable way rid of this pain, I think it needs hard work, and it needs a lot of courage to face and to go through. But I think it's well worth it, you know, because life is easier and nicer, without having constant pain.

Alex X-Health.show: 32:32

With regards to Ylah, what was the biggest challenge so far?

Florence von Gunten: 32:40

I think, a challenge, certainly, and every day is, like, how much we have to learn. So as a team, and, I mean, I was a yeah, as you said, before, you know, I was a nurse by training, then I became a psychologist, I'm in a psychotherapist training now. But like, having a startup is a complete new story, you know.

Alex X-Health.show: 33:04

The thing that I've noticed about you just going... you know, scrolling through your LinkedIn, I mean, there is constant learning, what I love about you.

Florence von Gunten: 33:14

Yeah. I really used the education system of Switzerland, I would say. And no... it's nice. I learned a lot. And I took some curves, let's say in my in my career, but yeah, it was well worth it. Because it brought me to the place I am today. And I think now I can build up on a broad experience on a lot of knowledge. And, yeah, it made me open and let's say I can integrate loads of information from that background, which I think is very beneficial now with Ylah. And, yeah, and now the challenge is to continue on learning every day. And also, we learn also together with our customers, with our team, it's like, it's an everyday growth, and we have to be flexible and to adapt on that. And keep focus. And, yeah, just make it happen. I mean, in the end, we're still quite a young start up. And we still have to prove you know, that we can make it happen. And this will, this will come this year, you know, this year with our first customers with our first pilot trials, we have to make it happen. Now we have to prove we can do what we promise. We are super sure about it but still, there need to be this proof. And we also will for sure learn a lot with this experience. And yeah, I'm just very curious what we will say by the end of the year,

Alex X-Health.show: 34:51

How did you gather your team and partners?

Florence von Gunten: 34:57

So I got to my team through my network. So I was basically, let's say, driven by what does the startup, what does Ylah need. And obviously, it very soon needed somebody else than just me. And so... and then the first person I was seeking was for business. So somebody who supports me with all this business perspective, and helping to really build up Ylah as a startup. And there I was lucky to find Cordelia as a support. And shortly after, we decided we need as a next crucial person a techie. So a tech person who can make the app happen. And this is Marcel, we found him also, last summer. And then we believe that the three of us, we are a great combination. So we have now the business part, we have the tech part and we have the psychology part to combine. And we three as a co-founders, we believe we are a very strong team to make that solution happen. And then obviously we needed more support within the team. And we are very happy we have some very great students from the University of Bern supporting us. And next to that... So since this new, since a couple of months, so since this New Year, we could also now hire our first team members, which is a Regulatory person, it's Rafael and Pia for Customer Success. So now we got like, really this... yeah, we were growing more and more, and also having people supporting us for creating content, etc.

Alex X-Health.show: 36:51

We spoke a bit about who are your clients, so basically therapists and clinics, could you tell us a bit about your business model?

Florence von Gunten: 37:05

Our business model is that we support institutions that offer psychotherapeutic treatments. So that might be clinics, or it might be group practices or even single therapists. So we support them in a first step to adopt to this new methods of blended psychotherapy. That means we support clinics with workshops to integrate blended psychotherapy in their work, in their current work processes. And we also offer workshops to the therapists. And then we sell licences for the patients use.

Alex X-Health.show: 37:44

Is it like on a subscription basis?

Florence von Gunten: 37:46

It is like on subscription basis. But you know, we have one big difficulty which is not solved today, because we develop our product as a medical software. And in Switzerland, this should be reimbursed through the MiGeL lists, or Mittel und Gegenständeliste but to apply for this list, and to get reimbursed through the patient's subscription, it needs your certification as a medical device that takes some time, and then also needs a study so that you prove your effectiveness of the solution. And this is quite a long journey. So as a startup, it's very difficult, like, how can we basically, let's say, sustain financially, develop our solution, get our first customers, and then having a reimbursement only in a couple of years, you know.

Alex X-Health.show: 38:46

A couple of years? Is it that long that it takes?

Florence von Gunten: 38:48

Yes.

Alex X-Health.show: 38:50

That's long.

Florence von Gunten: 38:50

Yeah, that's long. Yeah.

Alex X-Health.show: 38:52

Especially for an app, right.

Florence von Gunten: 38:53

Yes. And the start up. You need a long breath, yeah, right.

Alex X-Health.show: 39:00

Okay, so, how are you going to get there, you know?

Florence von Gunten: 39:06

Yeah, I mean, we just do what is required. So we develop our application as a medical device, we hand in our technical documentation for certification. We also get certified ourself as a company for that we can legally manufacture our product as a medical software. And in the end also we just are very closely linked to the University of Bern, doing research and also we are planning there an effectiveness study to in the end proof the effectiveness of our solution and then having, let's say, the package needed to apply for this list, yes.

Alex X-Health.show: 39:52

I've read that you once heard that "try, do your best" and that somehow stick to you. Could you tell me about like who said that to you?

Florence von Gunten: 40:07

Yes. So my kung fu master, master Pang from Taiwan, told me this because, you know, I was, yeah, I was... When I was younger, you know, I was constantly, let's say, doubting myself or my strength. And when he asked me to do something in training, like, do this or that movement, I was always saying, Okay, I'll try, I'll try. And then he would always have said, like, Don't try, do your best. And, you know, it was like, this constant brainwash, I would say[laughter], during the kung fu training with him, that stick in my brain in the end, and now, even if this thought arise of, Okay, I will try, immediately my brain switches to No, do your best. And I very much believe that just when having in focus on doing a thing the best way you could do it, it automatically kind of gets a good thing out of it. So I care a lot about quality and like to put quality in a thing and I just believe that in the end, makes a good product makes good customer relationships, and, yeah, just helps to form up something really good. So that's, for me a simple principle to follow with nice outcomes, I would say.

Alex X-Health.show: 41:38

How advanced are you in kung fu?

Florence von Gunten: 41:41

Super advanced! [laughter] No, like, I'm... I would say, I'm good, you know.

Alex X-Health.show: 41:49

How long have you been practicing?

Florence von Gunten: 41:52

I would say 10 years, yeah, I believe it's 10 years right now. And now I'm good but I'm not the best. But you know, the thing about kung fu is, and that's why I like it, is you can never end it. So there is not one level that you can reach that you could say, Now I've mastered it. So there's always a next master, let's say. And that's what I like because it gives me the freedom not to hurry up. You know, normally when I see there is a goal or let's say something to reach, I want to reach it as fast as possible. And then it's done and checked and I'm doing the next thing. But with kung fu, there is not something I can reach. Basically, it's a constant learning. It's a constant improvement. And I'm sure even when I'm going to be 90 and lucky enough to still be able to move my body, I... maybe not kung fu but I would do some tai chi and like, you know, there is still a learning about it and still an improvement. And yeah, that's what I basically like in kung fu. So you can actually, yeah, not say how really good you are and there are no belts or something like this to collect. So it's quite, yeah, relaxed and the ongoing journey.

Alex X-Health.show: 43:21

So what's on this ongoing journey for Ylah next?

Florence von Gunten: 43:27

It's the proof of concept on the market in Switzerland. So to really test with our first pilot

customers: 43:34

does it work? And therapists and patients: do you like it? So that's really our next challenge and the next steps. Next. obviously, we constantly need to raise money. We're working on our certification, we're working on research. So there are so many things going on. But our main goal is really this proof of concept in Switzerland in 2023.

Alex X-Health.show: 44:04

So I wish you that! Thank you very much for the conversation. And for you guys listening, if you want to reach out to Ylah, please head to ylah.ch, which is Y L A H dor C H.

Florence von Gunten: 44:23

Thank you so much.

Alex X-Health.show: 44:24

[POST-ROLL] I'm totally impressed by the audacity of researchers turned startup founders, doctors turned entrepreneurs, or ordinary parents turned healthcare innovators. People battling the battles that no one fought before. For the eXtra health of the future. So if you see a startup posting on LinkedIn, show them some love, hit Like, comment, "That's fabulous". If you have a couple drops more of that altruism, follow the X-Health.show, leave a review here. I'll be able to bring more of these visionaries to you. So a big Thank you. You're awesome. See you next week.

SPEAKER: 45:08

The information in this podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered medical advice. If you have any medical questions, please consult your healthcare practitioner. The opinions on the show are Alex's or her guests. The podcast does not make any responsibility or warranties about guests statements or credibility. While the podcast makes every effort to ensure that the information shared is accurate, please let us know if you have any comments, suggestions, or corrections.