Personal struggle inspires launch of innovative healthcare platform

Rimads redefines healthcare through advanced computer science techniques and AI

By Mohammad Hammoud
Founder and CEO of Rimads QSTP-LLC
Assistant Teaching Professor of Computer Science, CMU-Q

Originally published by Qatar Science and Technology Park (QSTP)

Facing a personal struggle when my six-year-old son suddenly fell sick with a serious chronic disease marked a turning point for me and my wife. This incident drove us, without any prelude, to found an unplanned venture, which we named Rimads.

Drawing on my extensive experience in computer science, I embarked on a mission to redefine healthcare using technology, after experiencing first-hand major challenges in the health industry. To address this, I put together a talented team and began designing a new end-to-end medical ecosystem aimed at transforming peoples’ healthcare experiences.

Rimads’ ecosystem leverages Artificial Intelligence (AI) to enable patients to obtain immediate and accurate initial assessments of their conditions, at any time and from any location. Alongside, it continuously ‘learns’ specific features and parameters about doctors which helps matching them automatically with the right cases. If a match leads to a necessary physical checkup for a patient, the ecosystem attempts to reduce the waiting time of the patient at the hospital or clinic through advanced algorithmic techniques. Lastly, if a checkup leads to a prescription, it ensures quick and safe medicine dispensing using AI and distributed systems approaches.

A large part of our ecosystem is research-based and still in the experimental stage. Hence, we decided to start rolling out its components incrementally, beginning with the one pertaining to medicine ordering and dispensing. This, however, proved to be a challenging move, especially when it came to licensing the product.

A strong belief in the mission as well as the dedication and determination from our team, combined with the unwavering support from Qatar Science and Technology Park (QSTP), proved instrumental. After two years, we managed to obtain the proper licenses to usher our third component of the ecosystem to the market, namely, a health and wellness e-commerce and consultation platform.

This platform is now in the rollout phase and QSTP has graciously extended its support for Rimads beyond the licensing phase. The platform puts at the fingertips of all people in Qatar over-the-counter (OTC) medicines and healthy-living products from many pharmacies and wellness stores in the country.

Another interesting and very useful feature of the platform is that it allows each user to obtain immediate consultations and product recommendations from pharmacists, health trainers, and dietitians, among others.

We continue to partner with leading health and wellness providers and pharmacies across Qatar, giving users special access to domain experts and a vast collection of OTC medications, supplements, vitamins, organic food, and subscriptions to fitness clubs, to mention just a few.

As our platform is adopted more widely, we will proceed with the integration of the remaining components of our end-to-end ecosystem. We believe that this ecosystem will change the lives of patients by offering them easier, faster, and safer healthcare services, while simultaneously empowering health and wellness stakeholders and providers.

Although our journey has just begun, I must admit that the project passed through many excruciating challenges, leading to an epiphany: ‘startups do not fail; it is founders who give up’! Despite the challenges encountered, the only fact that has persisted with me is to never give up. This stems from within my soul, since I deeply feel that I am not only a technologist, but also a humanist, with an ethical responsibility to enhance the quality of life for my son and people through computer science. Rimads is proving that this is possible.

The reality is that beautiful things take time to materialize and the path to success is bursting with challenges and failures. In fact, life dictates that it cannot be otherwise. If this is so, then challenges should be regarded as drivers and failures not perceived as fatal. What matters is within us; belief, passion, vision, grit, and the audacity to never stop. So, my message to my dear entrepreneurs is: “Get what matters out of you and show the world what you can do!”