Portrait No. 001
Sarah Porter
CEO & Founder
Boardwalk Health
Raised — $170k
I started Boardwalk Health after spending five years being dismissed, misdiagnosed, and repeatedly told I “just” had anxiety. I saw 35+ specialists and frequently ended up in the ER searching for answers, with no one seeing the full picture of what I was experiencing. When I was finally diagnosed with POTS, I learned that nearly 60% of Americans live with a chronic condition, but diagnosis takes 5+ years, especially for women and minorities. I was then told the hospital system that diagnosed me did not provide ongoing care, leaving me feeling helpless. At the same time, patients were beginning to speak out online, forming communities to support one another and demand to be heard. Having built startups for nearly a decade, I realized the timing and tools finally existed to change how patient experiences are captured, understood, and acted on, so I built Boardwalk Health.
In her words
“I built Boardwalk Health while managing a chronic condition, requiring resilience most founders never have to account for, so no patient has to go through the same experience I did.”
Chapter I
The toughest challenges you've faced as a founder.
One of the toughest challenges I’ve faced as a founder is being taken seriously in a system that often reduces patients to symptoms and founders to credentials. While I had experience building successful startups, I quickly learned that healthcare required an entirely new pedigree to be seen as credible. I entered this space as a patient first, after years of being dismissed, and had to prove that lived experience is not a liability but a qualification, especially as a woman showing that patients can build meaningful solutions. I built Boardwalk Health while managing a chronic condition, requiring resilience most founders never have to account for. There were moments when my health and company duties collided, forcing discipline, creativity, and intentionality. That patient first perspective has become our greatest strength. I’ve been invited to speak at the inaugural Women’s Health Summit in California, HIMSS, universities, and national conferences. We’ve launched three enterprise pilots in development, tested our platform in a closed, non friends & family beta with 200+ patients and a 100% satisfaction rating, partnered with NVIDIA, and raised funding from Minerva Fund, Techstars, JPMorgan Chase, and physician angels who believe in our mission.
Chapter II
Your vision.
I’m obsessed with solving the problem of patients being misunderstood. Healthcare today is built around short visits, fragmented data, and systems that prioritize efficiency over understanding, especially for women, who are too often told their symptoms are “all in their head.” As a result, complex patients are mislabeled, delayed, or dismissed, and clinicians are forced to make decisions without the full context they need. My vision is a healthcare system where the patient story is not invisible or anecdotal, but structured, trusted, and central to care. Where clinicians walk into visits already understanding the patient in front of them, and where the data collected over time continues to matter after diagnosis. The change we enable is finally treating chronic and autoimmune patients with the care they deserve, both before and after diagnosis, so no one is dismissed, and support doesn’t end when a diagnosis is finally given.
Chapter III
The impact you want to leave behind — for your industry, your community, and the women who come next.
I want a world where women aren’t afraid to go to the doctor, where they are believed, where they are heard, understood, and treated with care. A world where medical gaslighting is eliminated, not expected.