Clinicians, researchers, employers, community programs, advisors and investors

For professionals and partners

A conversational AI companion for mothers, focused on the gap between knowing what supports their health and actually doing it.

Tell Paige how you would like to be involved

Root is choosing its reviewers, advisors and partners now, while it is small enough that being involved still shapes what gets built. Leave your details and this reaches Paige directly.

Sent by: Paige McFarland, operating as Root

Mailing address: Toronto, Ontario

Contact: paige@healthywithroot.com

Rather write your own? paige@healthywithroot.com

Where you fit

  • Clinicians and dietitians

    Root is building a small group of reviewers. What is most useful is a clinician’s read on the content mothers see, on the boundaries Root holds itself to, and on where it should stop and hand back to a professional. If you work with mothers, the gap Root sits in is the stretch between their appointments with you.

    Join the reviewers
  • Advisors and health experts

    Root is building a group of advisors, and looking for research partners. The expertise most useful right now is women’s health, perimenopause, mental health, nutrition and dietetics, behaviour change, and study design. If you would like to follow Root closely and shape it as it is built, or to work on the outcome study with it, that is the sort of involvement this is.

    Join the advisors
  • Employers and insurers

    Root is meant to sit alongside a wellness plan rather than replace part of one, in the space between appointments where most plans have nothing. Whether that changes anything worth measuring in your population is an open question. The way to answer it is a short call, then a scoped cohort with one question and an end date, then a written summary of what was observed, including what was not.

    Talk about a cohort
  • Investors

    Root is at pilot stage with a small cohort of Canadian mothers, and is not raising yet. If you would like to follow what happens between now and then, say so and you will be kept up to date ahead of it. Materials are shared directly rather than published here, so they stay current.

    Follow along

Who we are looking for

Root is choosing its reviewers and advisors now, while it is small enough that being involved still shapes what gets built. These are the areas where a conversation would be most useful.

  • Nutrition and dieteticsUnder wayReview what Root may say about food, and where it must stop.
  • Movement and physical healthOpenReview the exercise and movement content, and the referral path. Women’s health physiotherapy especially.
  • Mental health and the mental loadOpenReview how Root handles isolation, hard weeks, and when to hand back.
  • Medicine, across life stagesOpenPostpartum through perimenopause. Where Root stops, what it must route away, and what it should notice.
  • Behaviour change and study designOpenChallenge the model underneath, and whether the pilot can answer the question it is asking.

This list was longer. It has been grouped, because a page of open roles says more about what is missing than about what is being built. AI and digital health in women’s health, measurement, and anything sitting near these is still worth a message. The list is where we know we have gaps, not the limit of what is useful.

Working together

Root reaches mothers one at a time. Organizations already trusted by mothers reach them differently, and those are the conversations we would like to be having.

  • Research partners and study supportA live cohort, a data set built carefully from the start, and an outcome study being designed now. Co-investigators, help with ethics review and funding routes are all welcome.
  • Prenatal, postnatal and parenting programsSupport that continues after the programme ends, for the parent’s own health.
  • Clinics and community organizations serving mothersSomething to offer between appointments, and follow through between visits.
  • Employers and benefits providersA scoped cohort with one question and an end date.

The ripple

In most two-parent households, mothers report doing the meal preparation and the grocery shopping. When a mother changes her own health behaviour, the change does not stay with her. Household food environments, routines and defaults shift around her, and those defaults are what the rest of the household lives inside.

The unit of change is the household, not the individual, and the mother is the lever.

Who is involved

Root is building its team now. Reviewers and advisors are coming on board across the areas above, starting with nutrition, and the invitations are open.