Adam Torres and Matt Mitcho discuss Gemelli Biotech.
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Show Notes:
Get a clear diagnosis on small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO), intestinal methanogenic overgrowth (IMO), and excess hydrogen sulfide with Gemellio Biotech’s at-home testing kit. In this episode, Adam Torres and Matt Mitcho, CEO of Gemelli Biotech, explore Gemelli Biotech and its at-home testing kits.
About Matt Mitcho
Over the past twenty years in the pharmaceutical industry, Matt launched and grown three billion dollar brands, won numerous awards for innovative marketing initiatives, and built and led highly engaged teams committed to success but grounded in ethical decision making.
Now, as CEO of Gemelli Biotech,He works with a dedicated team to support the discovery of novel diagnostics and therapeutics for the human microbiome by bringing biotechnology innovations to market in a fiscally responsible and socially conscious way.
About Gemelli Biotech
Gemelli Biotech leverages leading biological discoveries related to the microbiome to provide non-invasive precision diagnostics which enable clinicians to definitively detect scientifically validated biomarkers and optimally treat GI diseases including SIBO, IMO, excess hydrogen sulfide and post-infectious IBS.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to missionmatters. com and click on be our guest to apply. All right. So today’s guest is Matt Mitchell, and he is the CEO over at Gemelli Biotech.
Matt, welcome to the show. Thanks, Adam. All right, Matt. So excited to learn more about Gemelli Biotech today. And just to get us kicked off here, we’ll start this episode the way that we start them all with what we like to call our Mission Matters Minute. So Matt, we at Mission Matters, we amplify stories for entrepreneurs, executives, and experts.
That’s our mission. Matt, what mission matters to you? Sure, Adam, thank you for the opportunity 1st of all, and I really appreciate your colleague connecting us. So, at bio tech, what we’re trying to do is connect patients and physicians to our diagnostic screening tests. For irritable bowel syndrome and SIBO, which is small intestinal bacterial overgrowth.
So we have a couple of assets that were developed by a few gastroenterologists and 1 endocrinologist at Cedars Sinai in Los Angeles. Dr. Mark Pimentel, Dr. Ali Rezai. Dr. Pel Gupta and Dr. Rucci Meor the four of them and, myself. So the five of us co-founded Gelli in 2018 with the mission to help patients that have diarrhea.
Constipation, bloating, abdominal pain, these, these undiagnosed GI symptoms and problems get an answer more quickly through our diagnostic tests so that they can get resolution more quickly and go about their life feeling better. Yeah, I love bringing mission based individuals on the line to share, you know, why they do what they do, how they do it, and really what we can all learn from that.
So we can all grow together. So I’m curious. So were you always an entrepreneur or like, when you, when you decided to go this route, was that always in you? feel like it’s in my DNA, but no, to answer your question, I spent the 1st 10 years of my career at a major pharma company during that time went to business school at Chapel Hill.
Subsequently went to a smaller pharmaceutical company here in Raleigh, North Carolina, where I ended up meeting Dr. Mark Pimentel at Cedars where we worked on one of his first inventions together. That exited in 2015, from 2015 to 2018 I helped a variety of folks commercialize assets, and that really is where I got to a place where Mark and I decided to start this company together in 2018.
And I’ll never look back. it’s been an absolutely amazing experience and I’m very grateful. So entrepreneurs, inventors, I mean you know, lots of ideas, lots of things that come our way. I’m sure this wasn’t the first idea, right? How did you know this was going to be the one, the one that you were going to spend like a significant amount of your, you know, time and energy on.
Yeah, almost the last 6 years and I’m not the inventor. So let’s be clear what I kind of put myself in the position of helping the inventors commercialize their assets. So really comes down to a lot of trust with the other people that we started the company with knowing their you know, reputation within the industry.
And then signing on for, for that. And it’s turned out to be a very successful initiative. And I think we’re helping a lot of people along the way. Yeah. Can you talk about the, like the importance of diagnostics and maybe just the, and in your field and maybe just you know, how people are suffering from this, like, and why it’s so important.
Yeah, and on a more macro basis, not even just in gastroenterology, but I feel like diagnostics are playing an even bigger role with precision medicine. So we position our company as a precision diagnostic company. Right? So. There are a lot of people that are suffering from a lot of different problems in the U.
S. and beyond. and for years and years and years, I feel like, and I think the data proves this is that, you know, folks were throwing therapeutics at these folks are. You know, drugs for lack of a better description at folks to see if they would feel better. And with the increased I would say efficiency of diagnostic testing, both from a health, economic perspective, and just just helping people get on the right medicine.
think that’s been a really positive trend across not only gastroenterology, but a lot of different disease categories. Yeah, completely agree with that. When I think about so, and I’m okay sharing this, my mother’s fine with me sharing her story, but I remember growing up and she suffered from Crohn’s disease before they knew what it was, really.
I mean, we’re talking, you know, 30 some years ago. She’s in the medical books for it, and they were studying her from, like, the beginning. Maybe it’s, like, 30 some years ago. And, you know, filling out, like, these huge amounts of paperwork, stacks and stacks, just to, like, you know, because she’s, She had that skill set.
So she also wanted to help others, right? So she was that type of individual and all these years of like seeing what she went through and now obviously they know what it is And now obviously, you know 30 years later medicine’s different But thinking about like for those that were in her situation, you know 30 years ago to be able to have something that can diagnose or to be able to Like not have to go through as much pain or things like that Like I remember when Like being pretty young and she went from a, you know, you know, well endowed, let’s just say, you know, healthy woman to like skeleton pretty much overnight.
It was like seeing that and I’m like, wow, we didn’t know what was going on. So when you’re talking about, gastroenterology and IBS and all these other things, maybe go a little bit further into kind of how people are suffering in these areas because it’s, it’s more and more. And I feel like, especially with things like IBS or other things, like some of the people suffering from it don’t want to talk about it or other things like that, like This thing there’s like layers on how it kind of takes over your life, and I know that because I just seen the Crohn’s disease and what my mother suffered through it, but maybe talk about the problem a little bit overall sure I’m sorry that your mother and you and your family had to go through that and that’s that’s brutal so it really inspires us to work even harder to, get these solutions to, folks.
So to talk about the problem. So we have 2 assets. 1 is called trio smart, and it’s a breath test for small intestinal bacteria overgrowth where we measure gases that come from. Bacteria in someone’s small intestine that are then produced in their breath and we can measure that. The 2nd is a product called smart.
Which is a blood test for post infectious IBS, where we call levels of antibodies in folks that most likely had a previous event of food poisoning that have you know, the long term consequence of irritable bowel syndrome with diarrhea. So, to talk about the problem, right? And it is embarrassing for many folks to talk about this now, having worked in the space for a long time.
You know, it’s. It’s kind of dinner conversation at our house with our three kids, you know, to talk about diarrhea and constipation, bloating, abdominal pain, et cetera, which is weird. I know, but it is what it is. are people that are suffering in silence, and then when they speak up, they end up going for unnecessary colonoscopy, CT scans, and all of these other things that potentially could be avoided and therapeutics that they might not even need.
Could be avoided by doing these diagnostic tests up front. And why I think that’s even more important is we, you know, colonoscopy is incredibly important for, you know, folks, probably younger, but it’s approved for 45 and above to get screened for colorectal cancer. And instead we have a lot of. Otherwise healthy folks you know, tons of negative colonoscopies that are taking away capacity for colorectal cancer screening.
So just my bias, but I think there’s a great opportunity for us to push these types of diagnostic upstream so that we can help folks get an answer or a correct answer more quickly. I hope that’s helpful. Yeah, and I think the, one of the main things that you said there was the whole suffering and silence thing, especially for young people, like I remember like having some friends in college, like more than one, that were pretty young and were suffering from this and we didn’t know for a long time.
Like we didn’t know for a long time just because that was one of those things where like, I guess they didn’t want to talk about, especially in American culture. I feel like using the bathroom in American culture is, Very different than some Asian cultures or some other cultures to where we don’t, we don’t talk about it, where if you travel quite a bit or otherwise, like, it’s just a whole different thing.
Right. That’s right. always wondered about that one. So, and so that suffering and silence thing, especially for young people. And I wasn’t aware of that, by the way, like the stress it can even cause on the system for for people that are, you know, going for these screenings that maybe aren’t quite.
So necessary or, or maybe they could be prevented if this, if a diagnostic systems like this, I should say was, you know, or if our test come back negative, maybe that’s the perfect next step. Right. So, yeah. is the market receiving this? Like, tell me a little bit about the plans for rolling this out and next steps with the company.
Sure, so we launched the company a little over 5 years ago brought the products to market shortly after the blood test 1st, and then subsequently the breath test. We have a very small team and we’ve feel like we’ve done really well penetrating the market and helping a lot of people. You 45 million or so folks in the U.
S. That have some sort of G. I. Condition that could benefit from tests like these. I’m not saying every single 1 of them could, but the market size is absolutely enormous. So there’s tons of opportunity for additional growth. That said, I’m very proud of what we’ve built, what the team’s accomplished what the future looks like.
how’s the medical community receiving this? Like, How’s that turned out? I know sometimes that can be a little tricky in terms of getting people to, to see your idea. Sure, incredibly well, so we’ve stuck to our core competency of working with gastroenterologists right off the bat now that it’s been adopted by major institutions and key opinion leaders within the gastroenterology space.
Yeah. I believe we’ve earned the right to go to the primary care physician. We had a call last night with a major capitated system. That is looking to run a run a economic analysis to see if this testing would help in the primary care setting, which is just, I think, wonderful step forward, not only for the company, but for for, for, for, for healthcare in this space.
We’ve also earned the right to go to the patient directly inform them or educate them. About these assets giving them the information to allow them to go help, to go ask their physicians for, for help. So it’s been received really well, but I think the key there was starting within the gastroenterology community where we have a lot of trust and relationship and then kind of working our way outward from there.
Now is this something that, you know, like, take me through kind of the user journey of this. So, you know, I listen to this podcast, I’m at home, I’m like, oh, okay, well, you know what, I have been having this pain and okay, yeah, maybe I am suffering in silence, unfortunately, and maybe I just don’t want to go to the doctor.
stereotype, a lot of guys don’t like to go to the doctor, so maybe they don’t want to go to the doctor. So, you know, I’m listening to this podcast, I’m thinking about it. And then like, do you have to go to the doctor first? Can you just go to the website? Like, give me a feel for kind of the user journey.
Both, right. So serendipitously April is IBS awareness month and we’re recording this in mid April. So, you know, there’s, there are a lot of folks out in the world you know, working on solutions. For this patient population that is, you know, as we’ve discussed, been suffering in silence.
So let’s talk about the patient journey when it comes to either one of our particular tests, TRIO Smart or IBS Smart. You can go to the website, either gemellibiodex. com and then get to the, TRIO Smart. To the product sites, or go directly to the product sites, either trio smart breath dot com or smart dot com.
You can either download information to bring into your doctor to inform them, or have a discussion with them about whether or not the tests are right for you. Or you can work through our telehealth. Network, where there are physicians, licensed physicians that have the autonomy to work with the patient directly.
Via the website through a screening process in order to order the test directly. So are multiple ways in order for a patient to get the test. It’s really depending upon your preference. I see on the website, there’s an app and some other things that go with it.
Like talk to me about how, how they actually use it. Sure. do you know what Cologuard is for colorectal cancer screening? I don’t. Okay. So Cologuard is manufactured by a company called Exact Sciences is a really good test for colorectal cancer screening. Kind of, you know, for folks that don’t want to have a colonoscopy or can’t have a colonoscopy for some particular reason a fantastic offering.
I’ve known the folks there for a long time and I think they do a really nice job. So so essentially, what what we do is a very similar process, but with a, with a different specimen. So, with cold guard, the patient gets a kit, so the physician orders the test and the kit gets sent to the patient’s home so that they can collect the sample at home and send it to the central lab.
We do the same exact thing. difference is when your physician orders the test, we send the test directly to the patient’s home and you’re collecting a breath specimen that is collected In this really, I would say, unique and interesting collection system that is allows us to capture breath that that has the gases in it from the bacteria in your small intestine.
And it makes its way to our central laboratory. Within a very quick period of time so that we can accurately result the patient with their gas levels. And then we also do the same exact thing where you can do the blood test at home with a capillary blood draw. That’s part of the kit.
And then the blood is sent to our central laboratory where we process the sample. So it’s very convenient for the patient and flawless. Absolutely flawless. And how long does it take to get the results back? Sure. would say within seven days, but really within 24 hours upon receipt of the sample.
So. what happens is your doctor orders the kit. We send the kit to your home. There’s a 3 day return shipping label that allows specimen to get to the central lab in a very quick period of time, 2 to 3 days. then once we receive the sample, we turn it around in 24 hours to the ordering provider.
so very quickly that is quick. And so now when somebody, you know, somebody that’s suffering, they can, you know, get some knowledge 1st and know if they need what next steps they have to take and get it done pretty quickly. So that’s I mean, it’s super convenient. how does healthcare plan to all this or does it?
So insurance is that we’re talking about? Yeah. Yeah, insurance sorry. I said healthcare. Yeah, insurance. No, no, no, no, no worries. So both of our tests are out of network almost everywhere. They’re at a really, I would say, approachable price point. so what we do is collect the patient’s insurance. We build the patient’s insurance, whatever they pay, they pay.
And then the patient gets the remainder of the bill up to up to the dollar amount of the of the of the price of the test. That said, you know, we also work with Medicare and Medicaid and follow their rules to a T that’s great. Well 1st off, I just want to say this is this is great. I’m a big fan of the work you’re doing.
Obviously. of stuff has affected my household growing up and my mom’s good now, she’s good. But you know, after all those years of everything else, I mean, I think of the early years, if she, you know, some of them like this existed, wow, that’s amazing. So maybe others don’t have to suffer as much hopefully, and they can get diagnosed faster and then go on whatever, you know, treatment plan that’s they’re supposed to be on.
So, but yeah, it’s, Thank you for your work here. You said it once earlier, but I’ll ask you to say it again. What is the website and like, how do people follow up and get kits or learn more? Sure. Yep. the company name is Gemelli biotech. It means twins in Italian. The two product websites are the first one for the breath test for SIBO that we were talking about.
Is Trio smart breath.com. And then the other test IBS Smart for Post-Infectious, IBS is ibs smart.com. So folks can go to either website in order to find additional information. Amazing. And for everybody listening, just so you know, we’ll put the links in the website or in the show notes so that you can just click on the links and head right on over.
And speaking of the audience, if this is your first time with Mission Matters and you haven’t hit the subscribe button yet, Hey, hit that subscribe button. This is a daily show each and every day. We’re bringing you new entrepreneurs new executives, new ideas, and we don’t want you to miss a thing. Matt, really, this has been a pleasure.
Thank you so much again for coming on the show. Adam, thank you so much. Thanks for the opportunity to share our story. hope we have the opportunity to help more people and hope you have a great rest of the week.
