Community Highlights: Meet David Franklin of KnowRX

Today we’d like to introduce you to David Franklin.

Hi David, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Passion is a driver that not everyone taps into. For me, I encountered it when my father passed away from a medication induce side-effect while in an ICU. Over the course of 6-weeks, I would commute between Austin and Columbia, Mo., to help care for my father and in his passing, a new passion was kindled in my heart. This was around medication management or adherence.

I took a couple of months off from my current endeavor, a consulting firm that I had started five years prior. It was nearing end of year and the motivation was now gone. I had previously battled some health challenges of my own but now I couldn’t see doing the same work knowing my motivation was gone. I was depressed and searching for answers, too.

I reached out to a former business associate, James H. Powell, M.D., whom is now my co-founder, and we created knowRX or knowledge about prescriptions. I looked at how things could of been different for my father, his support team, his care team and how to tackle a new business venture that sees upwards of 50% of patients not taking their medications as prescribed and over 125,000 deaths annually. I knew I wouldn’t be able to save a life, much like my father’s, but I know we could help improve the quality of life when someone was prescribed a medication.

In 2021, there were over 4.5 Billion prescriptions dispersed in the United States, on average 80% of physician visit results in a medication. The problem is huge but it doesn’t only reside here. As healthcare moves digital, we have to empower patients for better conversations, increase their health literacy, and own their health. This is what we set out to do but it requires one other item, the medication itself, so where do you address that? Clinical Research.

Currently, we have a mobile application that helps patients have better conversations with their physicians improve their adherence, health literacy, and in time their health. On the opposite spectrum, we help pharmaceutical companies identify patients for research opportunities for a better data sample when drugs are being formulated. This way, downstream, upon approval, we have better medications for everyone. It’s a balance where the primary care physician is key and the patient remains the most import aspect of everything we do.

It was passion in my father’s passing that motivated me to change my career path but it was many aspects of my journey that allowed the cutover easier.

I was in the U.S. Navy and served in the Gulf War (USS La Salle) and then transitioned over to sub-surface communications. After eight decorated years, I transited out and started my civilian career as an Application Engineer. From here, I navigate the corporate avenues and participated in two IPO’s (Rackspace, Solarwinds) and then ventured out into Entrepreneurship.

Entrepreneurship has its peaks and valley but with it comes unspeakable experience and fortitude that you normally wouldn’t encounter in a corporate environment. Additionally, the relationships you build and at time the opportunity to share the business growth with others and build a startup is incredible. I’m also grateful for my philanthropic missions that now aligned to my business objectives and being able to give back to the community directly.

Today, my company, knowRX Health, is three years old and has completed accelerators with Founders Institute, MassChallenge Health Tech and Village Capital. Received recognition as a top 100 Startup by the Grazadio Business School (Pepperdine), Austin Top 50 startup, and our own SXSW Health and Life Science Innovation Award Finalist.

We are currently growing while supporting pharmaceutical companies and promoting our patient mobile experience, “The Owl App” as we evaluate new talent within the greater Austin community.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
No, but it’s been a beautiful journey. There’s probably two areas to speak of here. One is personal and the other is foundational business hurdles as an early start-up.

You start with an idea that when applied passion generates momentum. Along the way, that energy can decrease and those supporting your business vision will fall off or their interest can decrease, especially if you only have “equity” contributors and not paid participants. In this scenario, progress slows down and it’s harder to identify “traction”. Cost or financing is always a factor as it’s essentially the pavement you walk on. Here an entrepreneur gives more of themselves that one realizes to reach their dream of bring a product or service to market. For me, I’ve had to take on additional work to stay “boot-strapped” of Founder Funded until certain accomplishments were achieve to even be considered for a funding raise. This brings in the personal side.

Personally, you encounter ebbs and flows of mental health challenges and how you question your ability to perform, maybe encounter “imposter syndrome”, you make choices you wouldn’t normally make that also impacts those around your or in your household. Late nights, poor eating habits, weight gain, lack of exercise and the weight of producing begins to mount.

For me, I’ve taken courses in meditation, conscious awakening, neuroplasticity and even became a certified mindfulness workflow facilitator to help me cope with and endure the pressures of being an entrepreneur. I have incorporated it into my daily routine and it allows me the opportunity to see clearer and perform at a high level.

I have not been without health challenges, a scare with testicular cancer, gout, COVID, gallbladder removal, and stung by a stingray that cut an artery in my foot, all this within three years time.

Most importantly, on the personal challenge is I related the development of “The Owl App” directly to my father’s passing and how I honored him. When there were delays in production, it hurt and I took it personally, as this was a reflection of my memory and relationship with my father.

Everything mentioned is common but unique to an entrepreneur leading a startup and everything can be overcome, much like I have done. This creates resolve, grit, increases your desire to excel, fortifies your leadership style and helps you strength the relationships supporting the mission.

As you know, we’re big fans of knowRX, Inc. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?
We started here in Austin, Texas, on January 15, 2019. These was a few months after my father passed away on October 28, 2018. We are known as a “double sided” market. Here we have a mobile app, “The Owl App” that helps empower patients with their health literacy, physician engagement, and medication adherence. The app is new and we have an exciting roadmap to build out more but the essence here is to improve the quality of life for someone while on a medication and drive better conversations with their care team.

On the other side of the market, our product, “EPCARE”, is a platform where we work with pharmaceutical companies that focuses on diversity, equity and inclusion in clinical research. Although my father, like me is caucasian, that died from a medication side-effect, my family are both African-American and Hispanic and truthfully, medications today are not made for them. They are made for the major population, the caucasian community at-large. We help resolve these challenges in the area of recruitment and retention of participants and site selection, where the trials are conducted. This is a huge challenge as there a plenty of trust and social barriers to this success that has not been address for numerous years. We believe that better knowledge leads to better health which requires better participation in clinical research.

We are a “patient platform” on all fronts. As the industry continues its digital transformation, we have to help bring the patient forward and allow their care team see them as unique individuals and not numbers or codes in billing / EMR/EHR system.

We are headquartered in Austin and have our satellite office in Cincinnati, Ohio. We are very passionate about health care and the healthcare system and look forward to helping millions of people as they engage with medications for themselves or a loved one.

So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
That people begin to take ownership of their health and have more informed conversation with their health providers that result in better health outcomes.

I realized in my father’s passing that I couldn’t of helped then but if I worked hard then I can help someone else later. Before he went into the ICU, we could of had better insights to his adherence, better conversations with his physicians, and encouraged him to do better himself because we were closer to his health challenges.

I strongly believe what we are doing now with technology can help every healthcare consumer whether they are a patient or not.

Contact Info:

• Email: david@knowrxhealth.com
• Website: https://theowlapp.health
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/davidfranklinventures
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/davidfranklinspeaker
• Twitter: www.twitter.com/dsfranklin_atx
• Other: https://knowrxhealth.com