Menopause is Hot with Joanna Strober, CEO of Midi
about the episode
Where Do Women Go for Menopause Care? Midi Health CEO Joanna Strober on HRT, Symptoms & Midlife Health
Why are so many women struggling to find evidence-based menopause care and what happens when healthcare systems fail to listen?
In this episode of Innovate & Elevate, Sharon Kedar speaks with Joanna Strober, founder and CEO of Midi Health, about her personal journey through severe perimenopause symptoms and the experience that led her to build a company focused on improving care for women in midlife.
Together they discuss hormone replacement therapy, misinformation surrounding the Women's Health Initiative study, insurance-covered menopause care, and why hormones may play a role in protecting long-term bone, brain, and heart health. The conversation also explores healthcare access, women’s advocacy, and the future of menopause treatment.
What You’ll Learn from this Episode:
The Care Crisis and Midi’s Solution: How Joanna's personal experience of being dismissed by doctors for symptoms like brain fog and anxiety led her to create Midi Health, a successful, insurance-covered virtual platform scaling expert care for midlife women.
Dismantling HRT Fear: The truth about the 2002 Women's Health Initiative (WHI) study, revealing that there is zero correlation between taking estrogen and getting breast cancer (unless you have estrogen-positive breast cancer) and that women on the estrogen-only arm had a 30% less likelihood of breast cancer.
Longevity and HRT: Why the golden time to start estrogen is during perimenopause or within 10 years of menopause, and how staying on it may be essential for long-term protection of your bones, brain, and heart.
About joanna strober
Joanna is the founder of Midi Health, a virtual care platform for women, with a focus on perimenopause and menopause. Midi brings expert care, covered by insurance, to women nationwide. Before diving into digital health, Joanna spent more than 20 years in direct private equity and venture capital investing in health and consumer companies, including several notable consumer internet companies, such as Blue Nile, eToys, BabyCenter, HotJobs, and Flycast. Joanna was named to Forbes' 50 over 50 list of top Innovators, the CNBC Changemaker 2025 and Time 100 Healthcare Leaders.
Connect with Joanna on LinkedIn. Learn more about Midi Health here.
Episode Outline
(0:00) Introduction: Sharon's Advocacy and Welcome Joanna Strober, CEO of Midi Health
(2:00) Joanna’s Personal Story: From Brain Fog, Anxiety, and Marriage Problems to Finding a Specialist
(9:00) Finding the Right Care: HRT, Transformed Life, and the Bone Protection Dose
(18:45) Solving the Care Crisis: Founding Midi Health and Scaling Expertise with Insurance Coverage
(25:00) Midi's Word-of-Mouth Success and Dispelling the Breast Cancer Myth
(33:00) Longevity and HRT: The Golden Window for Bones, Brain, and Heart Protection
(36:30) HRT and Stigma: Why We Need to Talk About Hormones and Staying on the Patch Forever
(39:00) The Financial and Family Case: Midi Patients Cost Less for Insurers
(41:30) Midi's Mission, Funding, and the Future of Virtual Care
(45:00) Conclusion and Thank You
-
Welcome back to Innovate and Elevate. I'm Sharon Kedar, your host.
Welcome, the brilliant and amazing Joanna Strober to the podcast. For those that don't know who she is, she is CEO of Midi Health, the virtual care platform for women in perimenopause and menopause. But to me, she's a person who in 2021just decided to literally change the world and level up care for women. There's so much to unpack here.
Can you just share your personal story?
I do love doctors. And this is not about that, but when you did go to your GP, when you were in perimenopause, you were given sleeping pills. So can you just talk about your own journey and then we'll sort of unpack from 2021 to today?
Joanna Strober: Yeah. I was in my mid 40s, like many women handling a job and children. Things started getting off initially, I would say. My husband would say that I was angry a lot. That I was less able to deal with stress. That was probably the first indicator. I was experiencing some brain fog.
I have a friend who started an Alzheimer's company and I wanted to get tested for Alzheimer's. I was forgetting things and I couldn't figure out why I was forgetting things. And I wondered if I was getting early onset Alzheimer's. I also wasn't sleeping, so I was having all the classic perimenopause symptoms. And when I went to my primary care doctor, what did they say? They said, well, if you're not sleeping, maybe you could try some sleeping pills. We can give those to you, but they are addictive, so don't take them very often, but if you need them, you can use them.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Wait, did you realize - what did you realize in that moment, just so that we really bring people along this journey? I mean, as we record this, it's like single digits of women who can be patched are patched. So when you were there, did you realize that you were in perimenopause at that time, or were you simply, so just for the audience, listeners and viewers, you had brain fog, trouble sleeping, and you were handling stress less well, and so...
Joanna Strober: Anxiety and marriage problems. And honestly, okay, I'm wearing this shirt. Menopause is hot. Menopause was not hot. To be clear, it was not hot. No one was talking about it. I was Googling loss of interest in sex. Nothing was coming up saying, have you considered the fact that you are in perimenopause?
Nothing. Like the world is changing, thankfully. Now women are talking about it.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: So to frame it, what year was that? Like, I know Midi was started in 2021 as a result of...
Joanna Strober: Yeah, so this was before Midi was started, right? This was 2018-ish.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Okay. So like seven years ago.
Joanna Strober: I was googling these things and nothing came up. It sent me to, you should get divorced if you're no longer interested in sex because your husband is gonna wanna have sex and you should probably get divorced.
Like, literally that's what the article was saying.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: I'm covered in chills 'cause I, I think people have no idea, by the way, how many divorces are the result of what you're talking about. I mean, this is - it's interesting when people make it a woman's issue, it's a family issue. Anyone who has, like any issue with menopause being hot at this point, I don't even get it. So you're Googling and thinking you should get divorced 'cause you're like, what's wrong with me?
Joanna Strober: Right, and it's true. I was angry and I was forgetting things and I was scared. I actually had a sleep study. I had a $10,000 sleep study. To see if maybe I had a sleep issue. We were going to marriage therapy and every week we were talking about our, you know, and the marriage therapist never said, maybe this is perimenopause.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: I'm restraining myself, but like the fumes, I'm not having a hot flash. I turned 51 this week, but the fumes are coming out. That's crazy.
Joanna Strober: Yeah. So eventually a friend of mine said she had found this doctor in San Francisco who specialized in women's issues. I think it took a few months and I got an appointment and I drove 45 minutes. And this woman has this delightful office in San Francisco and you pay $1,500 to go talk to her.
She prescribed estrogen and progesterone and recommended that after a few months, I think about starting testosterone.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Wait, but so backing up for a second. So you paid $1,500 and when you're sitting in the doctor's office, did they say to you, I think you're in perimenopause? Like, how old were you?
Joanna Strober: Yeah, I was in my late 40s.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Okay.
Joanna Strober: I started to cry sitting in her office. She's like, oh, we can make this all better. And I started to cry. And then I did go and get the right prescriptions, right? I got the hormones and then, of course, started hearing that it was gonna give me cancer.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Today's episode will be all about sort of the fear and what's standing in people's way, just so that the folks understands you in 2018, in your late 40s, were able to find a doctor after being told that you needed maybe sleeping pills, which you said at the White House you couldn't take every night. 'cause they're addictive. So then you're sitting there in this doctor's office and she tells you you're in perimenopause. Did she give you an estrogen patch? Which even the word estrogen patch; for a lot of people, there's so many different forms of estrogen, stuff like that. So did they give you a patch and a progesterone pill? Like what did you get? I just really wanna slow it down 'cause there's so many people who are still missing these basics.
Joanna Strober: So the patch I could show everyone. It's...
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Yeah, please. Show us your patch.
Joanna Strober:
Okay. So mine is right here, if you can see it. It's very little actually. You can't even see it.
I think we should actually make them in blue hearts...
Sharon Kedar, CFA: She gave me progesterone and she gave me an estrogen patch. And actually, what's interesting is she actually gave me a pretty low dose estrogen patch.
Joanna Strober: I was sleeping a little better, but then I did get it increased. I need to add something else. Just in terms of all the fears in my life. I also did persuade my primary care doctor to give me a DEXA scan because I have a long history of osteoporosis in my family.
And, um, I took a lot of persuading to get that because they liked to wait until you're 65. But I was able to get the DEXA scan and it showed that I had osteoporosis, actually. Not even osteo - I was on the border of osteopenia and osteoporosis. So I was scared about that too. I had a lot of things to be scared about.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Which, by the way, that's, that's a huge, huge deal. You, Vonda Wright, Kelly Casperson and Rachel Rubin are the first few episodes. But I went to the FDA in July. I literally was at Coldplay in Boston, and then we were taking our family trip. I went to witness history.
What you're talking about, it's like you say it, and we're not talking about one person. Literally what Vonda said at the FDA is that
if you're born female, one in two women will have an osteoporotic fracture, meaning like you'll break your hip, just standing in the kitchen or whatever.
Not to scare people, but what's crazy about what you're saying is that now the data is clear that estrogen is protective of our bones. There's so much debate, but there's no debate about that.
Joanna Strober: No, that's right. And so, I mean, a lot we need to unpack with this. So I needed to also make sure that the patch was strong enough to make sure it was good for my bones. And when we talk about the lack of women's research, you couldn't even find an article that said what strength patch you needed.
We've been following the data really closely at Midi to understand what dose do you need?
And then, how long do you continue? So getting back to me, what I got was the right patch. I got it eventually, and now actually I'm at a 0.1mg patch, which is the right thing for me, and I'm on 200mg of progesterone. With those two things together, I sleep at night, my brain fog went away.
My DEXA [scans] are now stable. And, um, my marriage is better. So I would say that what I found is that by getting on the right medications for me, my life was transformed. And I kind of turned into an advocate to everyone that I was talking to about why they should be considering this.
I was starting to call myself a pill pusher, right? Like I was like my friends, you're not sleeping at night. You need to try something. You're not sleeping, you're anxious. Stop therapy. Go think about hormones. So I did become quite an advocate of doing the research, of reading the books, of talking to the experts. But at the time I didn't think we could start a company. Because healthcare is mostly local and we couldn't figure out insurance coverage. And so this was prior to COVID. It became really clear to me that in order to make this real, in order to turn into a business, a few things were really important.
One was insurance coverage. You have to get this covered by insurance.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Big time.
Joanna Strober: You just have to, it cannot be a cash pay business. And then you need the expertise. So the biggest thing for us was thinking about how to take the expertise from all the research, all over the world, and share that with women.
So that's what I started really thinking about. And then the COVID laws changed so you could get insurance for this type of care, and that was the reason why we ended up starting the company.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: So COVID allowed you to start a groundbreaking care for women - I always call you One Medical for midlife. I still wanna unpack just sort of what I'm gonna call the care crisis. I've come to the point where, no matter what one thinks about how we got here, we're in a care crisis and it needs to be solved.
Like I don't think anybody debates that when it comes to women in midlife. And I think your experience is what so many of us had. I mean, most people don't go from like, okay, 2018 - pretty dramatic stuff that you talked about. But I think a lot of us talk about that. I mean, Vonda [Wright] said she thought she was gonna die at 47 and she's a doctor - three years later starting something.
I really think that the system means well; this is my personal opinion. I just think that we were so misinformed for a lot of reasons, including 2002, which scared a lot, a lot of people. But to me it's so unacceptable that if I had to go to five doctors and I iterated my protocol and I'm that hypersensitive person, I have the branded patch, I have the compounded progesterone. But it is just downright unacceptable how women in midlife are getting care, and I think the current system will be part of the answer.
So can you talk about how you actually got insurance coverage, how you started the company, and then can you talk about, because I think this is helpful, both your personal story and what Midi can do for people;how do you actually start a company that will succeed?
You know, you're a good example.
Joanna Strober: I think a lot of people try to come mouth at us from innovation and what we didn't do is try to do it like that, quite honestly. What we basically said was, take the best doctor in the world, the best menopause clinic in the world, right? In person. She can see patients covered by insurance, right?
Whether or not she makes enough money or not is a different question. But she can see patients covered by insurance. How do we scale her nationally? So that's how we thought about it. We didn't say we're gonna come up with some new fancy billing codes that haven't been done before.
And we didn't say we're gonna try to make money on membership fees. We just said, what would it take financially to take that person and scale their clinic nationally.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: You basically were trying to, with your deep business expertise, solve a problem in a solvable way.
Joanna Strober: Right. So that's how I think of it. So it was very much around, what would it take to take that expertise, take the best expertise. And then I thought, oh my goodness, well, what if she had a bone person working in her clinic? And what if she had an internal medicine person working in her clinic? And what if she had a sexual health person working in her clinic?
So if they were all there, what would we do to scale their expertise and that's how we have done this, right? So we basically said, okay, we're gonna go out to the best doctors all over the world, have them help us write their protocols. Let's have an anxiety protocol, let's have a bone protocol, let's have a thyroid protocol. Write the best protocols, and then train people to do those protocols.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Online, basically online with COVID giving you the Insurance Highway actually be able to do it remotely.
Joanna Strober: Yeah, that's what we did. That's right. So our job at Midi is to give women the access to the best possible care for all their different body parts with the really best protocols that are out there, the most modern protocols, the most updated protocols.
Using AI, we can scour the world for new research, right? We have all these systems set up so when new research comes out about women, we can then bring it back to our systems and expand that knowledge. So what we really wanna do is get all the best research and then get it to women.
That's how I think of what we're doing. Get the best research, train providers and get that information to women and that's our job. And you know, actually, I don't criticize doctors at all.
There's no way you could do this as an individual person, right? No individual person can keep up with all of the information that is changing, all of the data that's changing and take care of people in the way they want to.
It's just impossible.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Where does perimenopause/menopause, and I'm sure you face this all the time, but where does it fit in the current
medical structure and system. Meaning, it is a whole body thing. So to me it's really, it's not a 10-minute visit usually. It's like a whole thing that hasn't been talked about. So how do you even get people to get to Midi since you didn't know you were in perimenopause? How does one even know they're in it?
Would love to unpack the fear pieces as well.
Joanna Strober: There's two different things. I can talk about how we come in, and then we should talk about fear. I'd love to talk about fear.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Yeah..
Joanna Strober: Starting with the coming to Midi, honestly, what is most beautiful about our company is that while we are growing really fast, word of mouth is the number one way that people come.
So I think what I'm most proud of is that women come, they feel better and they tell their friends. And I couldn't be prouder of that. I mean, honestly, what I market is, are women feeling better? That is the reality. They are really grateful and they're really appreciative, and then they tell their friends.
So that is our number one channel. We're seeing 20,000 women a week right now, and our number one channel is still word of mouth. It's beautiful.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Wow, really is. and by the way, it's shocking because it shouldn't be an outlier, but right now it is an outlier.
Joanna Strober: Right. So we put an enormous amount of work into making sure that our care is fantastic. That is the number one thing. Is my care fantastic? Do they get the right advice? Do we take good care of them? That is what it's about.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: You've created something where it is literally like they're there for you.
None of your symptoms are dismissed.
If you're like me, I have trouble sleeping, anxiety, some brain fog, some fatigue. They're not gonna be like, we can't help you or go get a sleep study. I mean, maybe get a sleep study, but that's not where it starts.
Joanna Strober: Yes. If you need one, we'll get you one, but let's try the hormones first. Or you know, honestly, we have a cortisol manager we built recently that's a ashwagandha, L-theanine, and magnesium, and it actually turns out it's really good for anxiety. And women can use that for sleep. So we have a bunch of different strategies that we can help you with.
I wanna just, I mean, you don't have to take hormones, like we should say that. I wanna talk about the fear of hormones, but we are not a hormone pushing company despite the fact that I joke about being a pill pusher. Our job is to give you all of the information that you need so you can make the decision on what you wanna do and what care you want.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Wait, Joanna, I was gonna send you a pin that I made. I don't know if this is hor- is this hormone pushing?
Joanna Strober: I love it.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: I've sent it to a few people. I'm gonna send it to you, but I think this is just reality.
Joanna Strober: I just wanna say like, and this is, why don't we talk about fear? I think it's actually really important. So we know that less than 5% of women in this country are taking hormones, right?
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Wait, sorry. Less than 5% that qualify. So just to be clear of what you're saying. So if you're a woman who's like over 40 in America, and you actually might be in perimenopause or menopause and not realize it? Right now, not everyone qualifies, but a lot of people qualify for what's called hormone replacement therapy, which is typically estrogen and progesterone.
Testosterone is part of it, we'll bookmark it. But what Joanna's saying right now is that we are taking care of less than 5% of the problem for the women who are responsible for the entire population right now. I mean, to me that's outrageous.
Joanna Strober: It's outrageous and sad. I guess I focus more on the sad. We all know, and you've talked about this on your podcast before, that we had this study that came out over 20 years ago that made women think that taking hormones was related to breast cancer.
All the research, and all your previous guests, have all said the same thing. It's not. It actually is not.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: I don't think people even digest that. Like, just to be clear, I think that's still a huge hurdle, what you just said. And talk about a bunch of fear, but that's one of them. Yeah.
Joanna Strober: This morning, my second cousin emailed me and he said, my wife wants to come to Midi, but she can't because she has a high risk of breast cancer. I was like, wait, she can't come to us because she has a high risk of breast cancer.
That is the saddest thing I have heard. Because number one, there is no correlation between any treatment and breast cancer and to think that it even is in the ether that you can't take care of your perimenopause symptoms because you have a high risk of breast cancer shows that the fear that has spread around this.
The misplaced fear, I'm trying to think of the right word. It's not irrational because it's in the ether. The misinformation is so strong that women believe a lot of things that are just not true, and it means they don't care.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: I mean, Joanna's talking about the 2002 Women's Health Initiative, which was a huge study funded by the government, which whatever one thinks about it, the result was sort of a 20 year gap. A lot of people blame that study in care for perimenopause or menopause.
I wanna be really clear 'cause I wanna not get into misinformation. The increase had nothing to do with estrogen. So there were two arms of study, okay? There was an estrogen-only study and there was an estrogen and an old fashioned type of progesterone arm. There were two arms, okay?
Joanna Strober: If you had a hysterectomy, you were on the estrogen-only study. Okay? Those women had a 30% less likelihood of breast cancer. So estrogen actually appears to be preventative of breast cancer. That is really important. Okay? I wanna pause as we say that. Because there was an arm that had progesterone and estrogen had an increase that was less than if you drink alcohol.
Okay. Let's just put this in perspective. It was less increase than drinking. For all of your audience that hasn't stopped drinking but is not on estrogen or progesterone, think about that. And number two, that is an old fashioned form of progesterone that we don't use anymore. So now we use a micronized form of progesterone.
So there is zero correlation between taking estrogen and breast cancer, unless you have breast cancer. So if you have breast cancer, there's a different thing. If you have estrogen-positive breast cancer, there's a different form of treatment. There are also some other women who should not take estrogen for a variety of reasons.
Having to do with having like an arterial buildup in your arteries calcium. Like there are some other things that can be a risk, but there is no risk of getting breast cancer from estrogen.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: It's crazy how the misinformation happens.
You'll correct me if this is misstated, but I think we share the view that we want women to have the opportunity to have that individual conversation with a capable, informed doctor so that they're not counted out before they consider their options.
Joanna Strober: Yes, that's exactly right. The goal from my vantage point is not to tell you, you have to take hormones. If you don't wanna take hormones, don't take hormones. I don't wanna tell you that you need to take hormones. My goal is to tell you what your options are and to give you the education so that you can choose what you wanna take and have the information.
So if you wanna take hormones, that's great. If you don't wanna take hormones, that's great too. You can take other medications that actually work very well for you. My hope is that you understand what your options are and you're given all of those options, and then you can choose whatever you wanna take.
But suffering silently and having your marriage collapse, and according to many studies, 10% of women leave their jobs because of menopause symptoms that are treatable.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: But, so then how do we even get- how do we solve it and how do we even get people to realize they're in perimenopause and to get to a doctor who's been trained?
Joanna Strober: Yeah. And honestly, the training is complicated, right? Because the truth is we have a massive shortage in this country of primary care doctors and a massive shortage of OBGYNs. One half of all counties don't even have an OBGYN.
And so part of the challenge is the medical system, is that these conversations take time.
Right? Like this is a complicated subject and requires a whole new generation of midlife practitioners who are interested in this and our job at Midi is to train an army of providers who understand women's midlife health. And, you know, it's, honestly, it's all interconnected, right?
After you have a baby, your estrogen goes up when you're pregnant, right? So after you have a baby, your hair kind of starts falling out. And you actually have hot flashes because you wake up in the middle of the night soaking wet.
That's your estrogen. It's all related. It's all our women's bodies and there's never been a specialty of women's bodies not related to fertility or babies.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: This is a specialty in my opinion. I think perimenopause/menopause is a specialty.
So if you had to say like, the biggest top three or top five answers however you want, what are the biggest fear factors for women coming to Midi considering care.
Joanna Strober: So I think a lot of it, I think about kind of in two steps. So first there's the symptoms, right? And women often come to us with symptoms. They're coming to us 'cause they're not sleeping, they're having anxiety, they're angry, they're having painful sex, they're having hot flashes, they're having night sweats, they're having joint pain.
Maybe they have tingly ears, maybe they have vertigo. Who knows, right?
So they come to us for those things, and then what happens is they trust us because they get to know us and they realize that we're providing good medical care. So then they come back and they might say, oh, now I'd like to talk to you about this symptom. Or maybe I'd like to talk to you about what I can do to protect my brain?
Like women, what are we scared of? We're scared of turning into frail, older ladies, we're scared of our bones, so they come talk to us about bones. They come to talk about Alzheimer's prevention. I mean, we are all scared of Alzheimer's, right? We are all very scared of Alzheimer's. What can we be doing in our 30s and 40s and 50s to make it less likely to have Alzheimer's?
There's also a test that we give people by Neurotrack that can show you, are you yet experiencing cognitive decline? If you are, we can make recommendations to you. If you are not, it's actually very helpful to know that the things you're experiencing are related to perimenopause and are not related to dementia.
But if you are worried about dementia prevention, there's emerging evidence that estrogen can be good for that, which is great. But honestly, also, we can talk to you about nutritional things that you might wanna do that can be good for your bones. There are other things that you can do that could be good for your bones, brain, and heart. Those are my three biggies. And I really want women to think proactively. What can I do in my 30s, 40s, and 50s to make sure that in my 70s and 80s I am having a stronger heart, bone, and brain.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Yeah. I mean, that's beautiful. So if someone comes in and they make an appointment for symptoms, if they are indeed a candidate for hormone replacement therapy for things like estrogen and progesterone, is the biggest fear usually about breast cancer? Is it about blood clots? Is it about something else?
Because again, only 5% of women are patched.
Joanna Strober: Yeah, so the biggest fear is always around breast cancer. It just is. Blood clotting is not a big problem with people who are taking the patch. For women who haven't had their period for over 10 years, we do have them take the artery score to make sure they don't have calcification built up in their arteries.
If they don't, even if they haven't had their period for 10 years. But we do wanna just check on that. The golden time to start estrogen is while you're in perimenopause or, within 10 years of having your period. That is when you see the most benefits for your bones, brain and heart.
So we really want women to start taking estrogen in that period of time instead of waiting. But there are some benefits and we will prescribe it to them even if they have waited.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: How do you think we get from like 5% patched to like even 20%? Does the existing system catch up? What's your sort of vision?
Joanna Strober: I feel like we're trying to start a movement. I'll give you a good example. I'm on the airplane, I'm wearing my menopause is hot shirt.
The flight attendant says to me, I'm so grateful I'm over that. And what I wanted, I couldn't say to her, actually you're not over that. Just because you stopped having your period doesn't mean that you're over that. And doesn't mean that you shouldn't be thinking about taking care of your bones, your brains, and your heart, and that is related to menopause.
I couldn't say that to her at the moment, sitting in the airplane, although tempted, but I feel like we need to be yelling this from the rooftops. I feel like we need women to be speaking out and saying these things, because it's powerful for women to talk about it and then to share their stories and to share with each other, because that is where change is going to come.
It's not come top down. It's gonna come, women telling other women and helping each other to realize the benefits of appropriate peri- and menopause care, how it impacts longevity, how it impacts your long-term health, and then telling each other. Honestly, that powerful thing.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: What's interesting too about what you're saying is you're never over it. We're always in either perimenopause or menopause.
We're basically starting a movement where we're telling people, maybe you stay on your patch forever. I just want people to get started, but I think it becomes an interesting discussion about things like, when someone gets older, do we do we want them to stay on forever?
Joanna Strober: We do actually. A research study came out recently that showed that when you go off the patch, within a year you lose the bone protection. So you won't wanna go off. There will be no reason to go off because you want that bone protection.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: So we have to train the technicians for the little old ladies in the nursing home because it basically looks like a bandaid, but every three and a half days, which always gets me. As if I don't have enough with running a company, three kids, our puppy, he's two now. But you know what I mean. When I first heard it, it's like, take this really ugly patch, which is fine that it's ugly for now, and every three and a half days, mark your calendar.
Joanna Strober: First of all, do it every Sunday and Wednesday, it's okay. There's enough in there that you don't have to do exactly three and a half days. Give yourself some grace. But also
I wouldn't think of it as putting something ugly on your body. You barely see it. It's a little thing and it's giving you a lot of wonderful benefits.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Wait, why do you put it in front? I put it in the back, like if you're wearing a bathing suit or something like that. Why doesn't everyone put it like under their underwear in the back where you can't see
Joanna Strober: So I don't know why I prefer it- I prefer it in the front, so it's under my underwear in the front instead of the back. For me, it's more comfortable, I guess. I don't know. That's for me, it's the most comfortable place.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: But as long as people put it on, we're, we're fine with wherever they put it.
Joanna Strober: Yes, exactly.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Okay. Yeah. Think of it as a really important beautiful part of us having a stronger second half and you know, it's a tiny thing in your body.
Honestly, one thing that has changed, right, is a few years ago, no one was talking about weight loss medications.
Joanna Strober: Now people are willing to talk about weight loss medications. We need people in the same way to talk about hormones, right? So we just need everyone to talk about them and say, I'm on them, and not feel anxious, and not feel embarrassed.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Yeah, and just be proud of it. Be proud of it.
I do think part of the conversation, and I think one of the hurdles is, the partners in our lives, for those of us that do have a partner. I think it's a whole education, not just for the people going through it, but for the whole family.
Joanna Strober: So that's one thing that's actually been really interesting to me is when I write about these things on LinkedIn and men slide into my dms, how do I talk to my wife about this? There's a lot of questions for men, do they have the conversation? I was at a party recently and a man came up to me and it was actually very sad.
He said, you know, I didn't have sex with my wife for the last 16 years. We are getting divorced. I think if she had gone to Midi, we wouldn't be here. And he got teary at this party. And this actually, this happens a lot. This is a family issue. It is not just a women's issue.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: I think it's such a pro men issue.
Lucy Perez, she was on the podcast last year.
But she wrote the $1 trillion opportunity in women's health. What she said in the groundbreaking report, calling it a trillion dollar opportunity, is that we women [compared to men] spend 25%, and I had to hear this a few times, but 25% of our lives in poorer health, but it's not our older years.
And that groundbreaking report, they have a follow up in 2025 that talks about like nine areas. But I think personally, data will bear this out, a huge part of it has to do with the hormone health care crisis that we have for women in midlife.
And we're just hypothesizing 'cause we don't have the data, but how could it not be? If women aren't sleeping, they have anxiety, they have brain fog, stress at home. How could that not be like a massive part of it?
Joanna Strober: Well, so the other thing that we are actually working on is the financial argument. So we have been looking at our care and my co-founder Sharon, is giving a presentation next week in DC
and we are looking at the costs of the women who come to Midi versus the costs of those who don't.
And we're doing this study with them. And women who come to Midi are costing the insurance company 21% less than women who are not coming to Midi.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Can you talk about who funds you?
Yeah, I mean, we have a lot of really wonderful investors quite honestly. It started with a bunch of small angel women and also angel funds. So small funds like Muse Ventures in Los Angeles and SteelSky in New York and other small venture funds. And then we evolved to getting funding from a fund called Icon, another fund called SemperVirens. Eventually Google invested. Google Ventures invested and Emerson invested, and then we had some later stage. So we just... we have been finding people who are very aligned in our mission and the opportunity; it's a huge business opportunity. It really is a huge business opportunity. So we're not asking anyone to do this because it's women's health.
Joanna Strober: We're asking them to do it because you can make a lot of money building this company and help a lot of women at the same time. But first and foremost, it's a business, right? Like we are building a company and our mission of the company is to take care of millions of women in this country and make sure they get access to the best high quality medical care.
And my job is to show that you can both provide that incredibly high quality medical care and build a company. And that's what drives us every day. And that really is our goal. And I think we're gonna be able to show that we can do that.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Yeah, the business case to me is pretty clear. Are you gonna open up like physical locations?
Joanna Strober: No, we're not. Instead, what we're gonna do is partner with physical locations around the country. For example, we have a relationship with Mount Sinai in New York City. If you need a mammogram, if you need colonoscopy, if we diagnose cancer for you, which we do, we have a hotline to get you into care at Mount Sinai in New York City. We have a relationship with USC and Los Angeles.
We have a relationship with Memorial Hermann in Houston. So we're gonna have more of these relationships.
Sharon Kedar, CFA: Okay. Well, Joanna, thank you. I think that not only is menopause hot, but you're hot and I just love how you are just remarkably you, you've taken your personal story and you've completely shifted the lens here. And I don't think anyone can ignore what Midi has done and the reality of the lives that have been changed here.
I mean, I have so much respect and
you've got a fan and thank you for the time today.
Joanna Strober: Ah, this was really fun. Thank you.
Additional Resources
About Your Host
Sharon Kedar, CFA, is Co-Founder of Northpond Ventures. Northpond is a multi-billion-dollar science-driven venture capital firm with a portfolio of 60+ companies, along with key academic partnerships at Harvard’s Wyss Institute, MIT’s School of Engineering, and Stanford School of Medicine. Prior to Northpond, Sharon spent 15 years at Sands Capital, where she became their first Chief Financial Officer. Assets under management grew from $1.5 billion to $50 billion over her tenure, achieving more than 30x growth. Sharon is the co-author of two personal finance books for women. Sharon has an MBA from Harvard Business School, a B.A. in Economics from Rice University, and is a CFA charterholder. She lives in the Washington, DC area with her husband, Greg, and their three kids.
Connect with Sharon
Connect with Sharon on LinkedIn: Sharon Kedar
Follow with Sharon on Instagram: @sharonkedarcfa
Learn more about Innovate and Elevate innovateandelevatepodcast.com
Join the newsletter to receive the latest episodes in your inbox: Innovate and Elevate Newsletter
Rate, Review, & Follow on Apple Podcasts
Did you love this episode? Let us know by rating and reviewing the show on Apple Podcasts. It’s easy - click this link, scroll to the bottom of the page, and select “Write a Review.” Let us know what you liked best about the episode. While you’re at it, consider following Innovate and Elevate. Follow now!
This podcast is produced by Brave Moon Podcasts.
Please note: The information on this podcast is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Please consult with a healthcare professional regarding your individual health needs.
FAQs
Why do so many women struggle to find menopause care?
On Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober explains that many women experience delays in diagnosis, limited physician training, and difficulty finding clinicians with expertise in menopause and perimenopause care. Drawing from her experience founding Midi Health, she discusses why access remains a major issue in women’s healthcare.
What is Midi Health?
On Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober explains that Midi Health is a virtual care platform focused on menopause and perimenopause treatment. Midi was designed to provide expert care for midlife women and expand access through insurance-covered services.
Can hormone replacement therapy help protect long-term health?
In this Innovate & Elevate conversation, Joanna Strober discusses how hormone therapy conversations increasingly include topics such as bone health, brain health, cardiovascular health, and healthy aging in addition to symptom relief.
What happened with the Women's Health Initiative study?
On Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober discusses how interpretations of the Women's Health Initiative study shaped fear around hormone therapy and influenced menopause care for decades. The conversation revisits the study's impact and why many experts believe the conversation continues to evolve.
Is hormone replacement therapy linked to breast cancer?
On Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober discusses misconceptions around hormone therapy and breast cancer risk and explains why conversations about HRT should include individual health history, hormone formulation, and evolving scientific evidence.
What symptoms can happen during perimenopause?
Drawing from her own experience discussed on Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober shares how perimenopause symptoms can include brain fog, anxiety, sleep disruption, and other symptoms that can affect quality of life and are sometimes overlooked.
When is the best time to start hormone therapy?
On Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober discusses how some experts describe a potential “window of opportunity” for hormone therapy during perimenopause or within the years surrounding menopause, depending on individual health history and goals.
Why are women demanding better menopause care?
On Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober explains that more women are seeking evidence-based information, better healthcare experiences, and more proactive conversations around hormones, menopause, and long-term health.
How can virtual healthcare improve menopause treatment?
On Innovate & Elevate, Joanna Strober discusses how virtual care models may improve access by connecting women with clinicians trained specifically in menopause and midlife health.