Dear friends, colleagues, and fellow healthcare advocates – 

Today marks a significant milestone for ShiftRx. We're thrilled to announce our $3.5 million seed round, led by Work-Bench with participation from Inflect Health, Tau, and Opal Ventures. This funding is more than just capital; it's a vote of confidence in our vision to re-imagine healthcare staffing through AI.

I’d like to share with you the very real founding story of ShiftRx. The company was formed a year ago but – our founding story is one that has been a lifetime in the making; and why we are so committed to working on this problem. 

My co-founder Leann and I didn't set out to build a tech company. Our journey began with a shared passion for healthcare, born from personal experiences. Her dad had been affected by colon cancer, and passed shortly after graduating high school. My time in the U.S. Navy taught me the importance of support and resourcefulness in challenging situations. Leann's experience as a pharmacy technician gave her firsthand insight into the pressures facing healthcare providers.

We pushed each other towards careers in healthcare, driven by a desire to help others the way we wished someone could have helped us and our families. Leann pursued pharmacy, while I set my sights on becoming a physician after my military service. 

The healthcare system we entered wasn't the one we had envisioned. In the Navy, I learned to "embrace the suck" – facing challenges head-on with your team's support. Yet, as Leann and I embarked on our healthcare careers, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, we found a system where dedicated professionals often faced overwhelming challenges alone. We witnessed burnout not just in ourselves, but in our colleagues, friends, and family on the front lines. The very people who inspired us were now struggling under the weight of staffing shortages, administrative burdens, and a sense of isolation that contradicted the caring nature of their profession. 

During this time, my world was shaken when my mother was diagnosed with a brain tumor. Suddenly, I wasn't just a former military healthcare provider or a consultant – I became a patient advocate. This period stands out as one of the most challenging in my life, as I navigated the healthcare system from an entirely new perspective. The experience was eye-opening and, frankly, often disheartening. I witnessed firsthand the gaps in patient care, the communication breakdowns, and the immense stress placed on both patients and their families. It also highlighted the incredible dedication of healthcare providers working within a system that often seemed to work against them.

This dual role – as a professional involved in cutting-edge research and as a daughter advocating for her mother – provided me with a profound understanding of healthcare's challenges from all angles. It reinforced my commitment to making a difference in this field, but also showed me that the solutions needed to come from outside the traditional structures.

Last spring, an unexpected confluence of events set the stage for ShiftRx's inception. While my husband was in San Francisco for the summer, immersed in the innovative atmosphere of Y Combinator as he built his own company, Leann came to stay with me in Texas. The contrast was stark – my husband was in the world of startups, while Leann and I grappled with our healthcare careers.

Our long conversations during those weeks revealed a shared sentiment: despite our perceived corporate success, we weren't making the impact we had once dreamed of in healthcare. The thought of returning to direct provider roles filled us with apprehension, given the challenges we'd witnessed. We found ourselves caught in a limbo between our passion for healthcare and our disillusionment with its current state. Ironically, it was my husband's entrepreneurial journey that sparked a revelation. If he could build a company to solve problems in his field, why couldn't we do the same in healthcare? 

We asked ourselves: What if we could create a system that truly supported healthcare providers? What if we could use technology to lift the administrative burden, allowing caregivers to focus on patient care? And what if we, as former healthcare providers, were the ones to do it?

This realization sparked the idea for ShiftRx. We envisioned an AI-powered system that could handle the entire workforce staffing operation, freeing healthcare providers to focus on what they do best: caring for patients.

Leaving our comfortable corporate jobs wasn't easy. But we kept coming back to those moments with loved ones suffering from illness, to the faces of exhausted colleagues, to the patients unable to get care due to staffing shortages. We knew we had to try.

Where We Are Now

Today, ShiftRx is more than an idea. It's a growing reality, powered by AI and driven by a deep understanding of healthcare providers' challenges. In just over a year, we've made significant strides:

• Operating in Texas and California, working with over 150 pharmacies and 2,000+ providers
• Developed AI-driven onboarding and workflow integration tools
• Built a waitlist of tens of thousands of facilities and providers across the remaining 48 states

This seed funding will fuel our expansion, starting with Florida. But our vision extends beyond geographical growth. We're committed to evolving our AI capabilities to address the broader healthcare staffing crisis, potentially expanding to roles like x-ray technicians, medical technicians, and lab technicians.

As we grow, we promise to never lose sight of why we started this journey. Every decision we make is rooted in our personal experiences and our commitment to supporting the healthcare community.

A Personal Note (as if this whole post wasn’t deeply personal enough) 

To every healthcare provider reading this: we see you. We understand your challenges because we've faced them too. ShiftRx is built for you, and your voices will always guide our path forward.

And to Leann's dad, who we lost to cancer, and all those affected by it, including my mother: your fights weren't in vain. They inspired a mission that we hope will make a difference in countless lives.

Thank you for being part of this journey with us. Together, we can create a healthcare system where no provider feels alone, where the focus returns to patient care, and where the passion that drives so many to enter this noble profession can thrive.

With heartfelt gratitude and hope for the future,

Autumn-Kyoko Cushman Co-founder and CEO, ShiftRx