I had the opportunity to meet Brian Loew and Amir Lewkowicz, CEO and Vice President of Parnterships, respectively, for Inspire.com.

The company was created 3 years ago with this mission:

We believe no one should have to go it alone, we all need a safe place to talk, and we can help one another.”

Inspire is based here on the East Coast, which is good (Health 2.0 is happening all over the U.S.), and differentiates itself by not accepting advertising, and visibly partnering with nationally known health support organizations. As Brian and Amir explained to me, part of the drive was to improve access to clinical trials, which is handled in a privacy-appropropriate, opt-in, way.

I gave the analogy in our conversation of the patient that leaves an exam room in a medical center, not realizing that the patient going in after or before them might have similar experiences that they would want to share. Communities like this can fill that gap by bridging patient to patient and patient to community organizations like the partners on the Inspire site.

I think there’s a role for communities like this to partner with the greater health ecosystem, not just in the acute phase of a serious illness, but maybe in the acute phase of a manageable illness, like hypertension. Do readers agree? And do they know of Web2/Health2 communities for diagnoses like this?