ClaimJockey files and manages long term care insurance claims for families and care providers, helping them access funds for needed care. ClaimJockey has a 90% success rate in having claims accepted after the first filing.

Here’s how it works:

1. The consumer, their family member or referral partner contacts ClaimJockey via a submission through the ClaimJockey website. The lead is electronically fed into ClaimJockey’s HIPAA compliant database system.

2. ClaimJockey’s experienced long term care insurance professionals meet with families to assess their needs and claim viability at no charge.

3. Highly trained case management staff then review the case, gather the required medical records, prepare and file the initial claims in the manor required by the various insurance companies.

4. After the initial filing and payment, additional claims must be filed on a monthly basis which can continue for years. The duration of ClaimJockey’s involvement ranges from three months to multiple years.

A highly experienced management team leads this effort, beginning with founder and president Wendy Rinehart. Rinehart is a nationally recognized long term care industry specialist and co-founder of the Long Term Care Guild, an industry association. She is joined by CEO David Rinehart, divisional vice president at LTC Financial Partners, General Electric and John Hancock; CFO Michael Briggs, president of INFINEDI, Inc., a top  medical claims processor; and Bob Miller, senior vice president of business development and sales, formerly with Amex Life, Genworth, CUNA and LTC Financial Partners.

With the help of Digital Sandbox KC, ClaimJockey will build a new website that can be linked to their HIPAA-compliant database.

Aware3 is reinventing brick-and-mortar retail districts through an omni-channel digital experience.  Their platform, AMP, is a cloud-based service that can build and manage an end-to-end digital ecosystem, helping retail districts achieve growth through their digital touch points.  It serves as the “command center” for their digital presence, allowing them to provide a consistent and real-time user experience anytime, anywhere, and from any device.

A family health crisis led to the creation of Heart To Heart Network, a company focused on improving the effectiveness of monitoring patients. As one of the first six companies ready for funding in Digital Sandbox KC, founder Abhi Ray hopes to change the way Type 1 diabetes patients are able to manage their health care.

“We see the Digital Sandbox as a great opportunity to take our technology to the next level,” said Ray. “Support for market research will help us prove the effectiveness in terms of acceptability to care providers, patients and families, resulting in better health.”

A Personal Story, A Public Benefit

The story of Heart To Heart Network begins with Ray’s wife, who had heart surgery at within a year of having her first baby. The surgery and rehabilitation were successful; but that was just the start. With a new heart valve in place, Ray’s wife was required to take anticoagulation therapy to prevent clots from forming. Medication compliance required constant monitoring of the INR level to ensure the blood is within therapeutic range.

Ray could find no good way to monitor the INR on a daily basis, and no easy way to communicate with her primary care physician in a timely manner. This gave Ray the motivation to look at ways to improve everyday monitoring of healthcare. With a background and experience as a software programmer, Ray started looking at approaches to help patients and care givers safely monitor health in their home environments.

After several ideas, Ray focused on a remote monitoring system that can be chronic disease specific, and funding from Digital Sandbox allows for specialization and testing of system for Type 1 diabetes pediatric patients. With the help of the Digital Sandbox, Heart To Heart Network will look at proving the product:

• Is acceptable by patients and family members
• Increases communication between providers and patients
• Improves adherence behavior leading to overall wellness

Playing in the Digital Sandbox

Heart To Heart Network is one of the first six innovative companies to be eligible for funding from Digital Sandbox KC, which provides proof-of-concept resources to support early-stage commercialization processes. Support for each Sandbox participant is customized based on the unique needs of the project as well as the resources required to move the product or service forward.

“Heart To Heart is a great example of an entrepreneur using today’s technology and applying to a real world problem,” said Jeff Shackelford, director of Digital Sandbox KC. “Abhi’s firsthand experience with his wife’s condition and his understanding of information technology led him to finding a more timely and efficient way to handle patient needs.”

Mobility Designed creates mobility devices to improve quality of life for those with mobility challenges. Their first product, the M+D™ Crutch, solves the problem of pain and potential damage to armpits, hands and wrists caused by the use of standard crutches. M+D™ Crutches are designed to provide pain free support and a custom ergonomic fit. 

“We are very excited to have gotten this funding from the Digital Sandbox.  It is incredibly rewarding to have an organization like the Sandbox believe in what we are trying to accomplish because it validates all the work we have done,” said Liliana Younger, CEO, Mobility Designed.  “This grant will get us so much closer to making our product a reality.”

People who have to use crutches know how incredibly uncomfortable it can be.  “Honestly, it can be downright painful,” says Digital Sandbox KC executive director, Jeff Shackelford.  “Liliana and team recognized this problem and created a patent-pending product which includes a high level of IP innovation.”   Pain-free mobility is just a step away.  

Liliana Younger completed  UMKC’s E-Scholars program  an intensive entrepreneurial development program offered through the University of Missouri – Kansas City’s Regnier Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.  The program is designed to provide promising entrepreneurs with the support and resources needed to launch scalable and sustainable ventures.  E-Scholars has helped to launch more than 160 ventures since its first graduating class in 2011, ranging from enterprise software to health care services to consumer products.  

Digital Sandbox KC and UMKC partnered together to fund startups coming out of the program.  

Mag-Vest is the first magnetic tool vest that lets people carry their tools, screws, nuts and bolts from any working position.  Unlike other solutions that have limited compartments or simply get in the way in tight spaces, Mag-Vest(TM) gives complete freedom to move and place tools in any manner.  Founder, Grant Miner, found tool belts were not designed with the user in mind:  “They just don’t hold everything you need so we decided to completely reinvent how you carry your tools.”  Mag-Vest is the first magnetic tool vest. The design gives the wearer complete freedom to place tools wherever they want. “Tools don’t have to get in the way when you are working in a tight space,” Miner says.

The Digital Sandbox funding aided the startup with website development, optimization and other launch-related projects,” says Jeff Shackelford, executive director of Digital Sandbox KC. “This product is for anyone who uses tools so the market is wide open.”

“I am honored, humbled and grateful that Digital Sandbox KC chose to support Mag-Vest(TM) with this incredibly generous grant,” said Grant Miner, inventor/founder.  

Grant Miner completed  UMKC’s E-Scholars program  an intensive entrepreneurial development program offered through the University of Missouri – Kansas City’s Regnier Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.  The program is designed to provide promising entrepreneurs with the support and resources needed to launch scalable and sustainable ventures.  E-Scholars has helped to launch more than 160 ventures since its first graduating class in 2011, ranging from enterprise software to health care services to consumer products.  

Digital Sandbox KC and UMKC partnered together to fund startups coming out of the program.  

 Smart Steps Mobile is a decision-making app designed for teens and adults with cognitive disabilities such as autism or Down syndrome.  It allows the user to solve everyday problems such as a late ride or a lost backpack. Prompts include social skills, safety tips and when to call for help.  “The Digital Sandbox KC helped the initial prototype to complete and launch the Smart Steps Mobile application,” says Jeff Shackelford, executive director of Digital Sandbox KC,  “and to create a portal for user-created decision trees, the top request from parents and professionals. 

“User-created content is one of several planned features to personalize the app,” said Cindy Fisher, Ed. D., President and CEO of Smart Steps, LLC.  “With this feature, Smart Steps Mobile will appeal to a wider age range and in a variety of situations at school, work, home and in the community.”

Opening up the resale market.

Creelio simplifies content marketing for small and medium-sized businesses.  The company tackles the “I know I should be blogging and tweeting regularly, but I don’t have the time” problem faced by many businesses. Creelio helps those businesses take advantage of content marketing as a smart and efficient way to build their brand and engage with a loyal community. 

In less than 20 minutes per month, businesses will have a growing social influence. Creelio removes the hassles of content marketing through a mobile marketing platform that delivers original, targeted, quality content that matches the company’s voice. Creelio regularly delivers content recommendations to a customer’s mobile phone where they can personalize and approve them for delivery to their Twitter, Facebook, and Blog accounts according to a customized schedule.

The market size is significant for custom content. According to the Custom Content Council (April 2013), annual spending on production and distribution of custom content rose 9.2% since 2012 to $43.9 billion. Of the average overall marketing, advertising and communications budget, 39% of funds were dedicated to content marketing. According to Outbrain.com’s Report: State of Content Marketing 2012, 96% of marketers surveyed use social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook to distribute their brand’s digital content, up from 88% in 2011.

Based on 1,000 respondents to a study, “Characteristics Study: A Look at the Volume and Type of Content Marketing in America for 2013,” 40 to 44% expect to increase their output of Web updates, social content and SEO content in 2013. In an infographic built by blogging.org in 2012, there are an estimated 31 million bloggers in the United States with 42 million blog sites and 329 million people viewing blog content. Sixty-percent of businesses have a company blog, however, their rates of updating the blog are weak with 35% blogging once per month and 65% blogging once a year or less. In the micro-blog space, Twitter has more than 200 million active users sending more than 400 million tweets per day with 60% tweeting via mobile devices according to an article published in September 2013 in The Guardian.

Co-founders Steve Stava and Julie Edge bring industry experience to this new venture. Stava has 25 years of experience designing technology solutions. Edge has worked for more than two decades as a strategic communications and policy expert. Together, they have created the new “easy button” for content marketing. 

Digital Sandbox funding will help Creelio build the web interface and data analytics components for the platform.

Motavera is an online platform that enables small to medium-sized businesses to find and hire college students for internships and entry-level employment.  Motavera is a combination of informative profiles similar to those on LinkedIn and Indeed’s job posting functionality but exclusively for college students solving the problem of connecting college students with job opportunities in their field of study. 

Support from Digital Sandbox KC will be used to further design and develop the existing minimum viable product of the platform. “This product was developed to solve a problem the founders were experiencing as college students. These are young entrepreneurs who jumped in and solved it,” said Jeff Shackelford, director, Digital Sandbox KC.

 “I am ecstatic that Motavera has received support from Digital Sandbox KC and look forward to establishing ourselves in the Kansas City ecosystem,” said Nep Orshiso, co-founder of Motavera. They plan to relocate later this year to Kansas City from Truman State University.