Cara Care (HiDoc Technologies) Files Prospectus: Pioneering Digital Therapeutics for Gut Health with Over 650,000 App Downloads

“The costs of digital health applications can now be reimbursed by statutory health insurance.” This is the content of a new law enacted in Germany. Its enactment means that 73 million people in Germany will have access to free digital health applications prescribed by physicians.

This decree opens up a larger customer base for digital health applications. The German Minister of Health stated that the aim is to provide better long-term care for the German population, while also promoting the development of domestic digital therapeutics, thereby positioning Germany as a leader in Europe’s digital healthcare transformation.

Cara Care (also known as HiDoc Technologies, hereinafter referred to as Cara), a digital therapeutics startup headquartered in Berlin, was among the first companies to apply for inclusion in this reimbursement program.

Cara is an innovative company focused on the field of gut health, aiming to address gut health issues through innovative solutions. It has launched Cara Care, a flagship application sharing the company’s name, which leverages data tracking and AI analytics to help users manage their gut health.。

In 2016, André Sommer, Jesaja Brinkmann, Orest Tarasiuk, and Dankrad Feist co-founded Cara Care with the aim of establishing effective end-to-end care for every individual with gastrointestinal diseases, enabling them to enjoy healthier lives.

From an operational perspective, Cara has demonstrated the significant potential of its market sector. In the five years since its establishment, Cara has completed five rounds of financing, raising over $9 million in total, as shown in the table below.

Source: Crunchbase

Notably, the $7 million Series A financing secured in 2019 was led by Johnson & Johnson Innovation and Asabys Partners, with participation from Atlantic Labs. The funds were primarily allocated to expanding the U.S. market presence of the Cara Care app.

In 2020, Cara Care entered into a commercial partnership with Sanofi to jointly develop an integrated digestive health therapy program, combining the Cara Care application with Sanofi’s irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) medication, Buscomint. For patients with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), the integration of pharmacological treatment with digital tools for lifestyle management facilitates better identification and control of symptom triggers.

According to the Cara Care app launched by Cara, it has obtained CE certification as a medical device for IBS management and was selected as one of Healthline’s Best Digestive Health Apps in 2020. Currently, the app is available in German and English versions, with over 650,000 downloads.

During the initial phase of application development, Cara’s physicians and data science team discovered that traditional “one-size-fits-all” treatments were inconsistently effective for most patients. In addition to being ineffective in certain cases, such approaches often caused unnecessary side effects. Therefore, more precise therapies are needed to reduce side effects and treatment inefficacy.

Based on this, the Cara team launched the Cara Care app to track and record patients’ symptoms, treatment responses, lifestyle, and living environment, thereby enabling personalized therapeutic interventions.

Symptoms of gastrointestinal disorders, such as bloating, abdominal pain, diarrhea, and constipation, may seem like a taboo and private topic. However, relevant data indicate that nearly 20% of the global population suffers from gut-related issues. For instance, approximately 70 million people in the United States have digestive problems, and 25%–30% of patients with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) experience depression or anxiety. This is indeed an issue that warrants attention.

Cara founder Brinkmann said: “We are making gut digestion issues publicly visible.”

Care currently provides services primarily for four conditions: IBS (irritable bowel syndrome), IBD (including Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis), GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease), and dyspepsia, with its IBS treatment being the most prominent.

Cara encourages users to share personal notes about their daily symptoms in its newly launched app, and to track food, mood, stress, exercise, sleep, and other factors that may contribute to gastrointestinal disorders.

Application Interface Display

Source: Cara Official Website

Through the app’s recording and tracking features, Cara can identify the triggers and patterns of a patient’s condition, enabling personalized treatment management that empowers patients to regain control over their gut health.

Five Steps: Tailored Nursing Care for Patients

Cara integrates gut health research with behavioral design, offering treatment plans that comprise five key components.

Source: Cara Official Website

First, users are required to complete a medical questionnaire.This approach is used to assess an individual’s condition, disease symptoms, and health goals, and to create a personalized treatment plan based on the information provided in the questionnaire.

Second, the specific implementation steps of the treatment plan include three closely linked components: content guidance, user practice, and expert support.

Cara's Digital TherapeuticsProvide daily guidance to users through four personalized content modules: Nutrition, Audio-guided Hypnosis, Essential Knowledge, and Emotions and Behavior.Users also engage in independent practice exercises for each of these four components. During this period, users can access round-the-clock support from personal gut health experts, allowing them to ask any questions related to gut health and receive responses within one day.

For example, in the case of IBS. The Nutrition module focuses on the low-FODMAP diet, helping users identify symptom triggers and alleviate discomfort. Within this module, users can receive dietary guidance, such as food recommendations for each phase and instructions on how to properly read ingredient lists.

The Audio-guided Hypnosis module alleviates symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) through audio-based abdominal hypnosis. Essential Knowledge provides education on fundamental psychological concepts. Emotions and Behavior, based on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), teaches users how to alleviate negative emotions and stress, employ various relaxation techniques, and enhance the mind-body connection.

Finally, track user data to dynamically adjust treatment plans.Cara records users’ dietary intake, symptoms, and other relevant factors through user diaries, and provides graphical feedback on the collected data to help users track their progress. Additionally, Cara adjusts treatment plans weekly based on changes in user data.

Two Distinctive Features: Therapeutic Efficacy Validated

The two most prominent features of the treatment provided by Cara are its holistic and personalized nature. The so-calledHolism refers to the resolution of users’ symptoms from all perspectives, including nutritional and mental health.。

Personalization means that Cara’s therapy is tailored to each user’s individual needs; specifically, Cara regularly prompts users to complete medical questionnaires, and the program periodically collects user data.These data are ultimately integrated into the algorithm that generates therapeutic content for users, thereby deriving a personalized treatment plan for each user.

The therapeutic efficacy of Cara’s digital therapeutics for users has also been validated; according to data from Cara’s official website,Over the first 100 days of using the app, users experienced a 45.4% reduction in overall symptoms; 78.8% of users showed significant improvement in clinical symptoms.Significantly improved users' quality of life.

Since the winter of 2021, German physicians have been able to prescribe Cara Care for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) under the Digital Healthcare Act (DVG) enacted by the government. Patients are also eligible for corresponding reimbursement in accordance with statutory regulations.

Furthermore, as Cara Care conducts detailed, regular medical questionnaires with patients in the early stages, these questionnaires can be exported into summary reports for physician review, thereby saving time for both doctors and patients.

The digital therapeutics sector is currently experiencing significant momentum. Cara Care aims to carve out its own niche and expertise in this field, positioning itself as a leader in “digital therapeutics + gut health.”