27:51 to watch
In this episode of the Claim to Fame podcast, hosts Wayne and Alex sit down with Morgan Mancada, CEO of Neru Health, to talk about his unique dual role as both a sleep apnea patient and a health tech entrepreneur.
What’s Covered?
Morgan breaks down Neru Health’s mission to reinvent healthcare through AI, including how their virtual employee “Nora” is automating and elevating patient care across the DME industry. He shares how his personal experience with sleep disorders shaped his journey, why creativity drives his leadership style, and what it takes to integrate AI into healthcare. The conversation wraps with a rapid fire round and an honest look at the future of sleep health and where Neru’s technology is headed next.
Podcast Transcription
Podcast: Claim to Fame – The #1 DME Podcast
Guest: Morgan Moncada, CEO & Co-Founder, Neru Health
Hosts: Alex and Wayne (NikoHealth)
[00:00] Introduction
Alex and Wayne welcome Morgan Moncada, the CEO of Neru Health, to discuss Nora, the company’s AI-powered virtual employee designed to support DME providers and transform the sleep therapy experience. Morgan thanks them and sets the stage for an in-depth look at how automation and personal experience converged to build Neru.
[00:46] A Founder Who’s Also a Patient
Alex begins by noting how unique Morgan’s story is — she is both an entrepreneur and a patient living with sleep apnea and insomnia.
Morgan explains that her entry into sleep health wasn’t intentional. She spent her academic and early career years focused on biotechnology, therapeutic development, and life science entrepreneurship, all while silently struggling with severe sleep issues.
In undergrad, her untreated sleep apnea caused her to fail organic chemistry and sleep through exams. She waited six months for a Stanford Sleep Clinic polysomnography test and was finally diagnosed with sleep apnea stemming from anatomical traits (“a fat tongue and a thin airway”).
Throughout her career, she loved building startups — the creativity, the cross-functional teamwork, the orchestration of talent. Eventually, her personal struggle and professional passion converged, leading to Neru’s founding.
[03:20] Early Research and the Shift Toward Sleep
After graduate school, Morgan and her co-founders researched behavioral indicators related to stress and depression. Sleep consistently surfaced as the strongest predictor of next-day mental health.
They first explored insomnia coaching, selling direct-to-consumer offerings and experimenting with different markets before realizing that DME and CPAP therapy offered a clearer path, stronger economics, and a real operational gap.
[04:45] What Neru Health Does: The Elevator Pitch
Morgan describes Neru as an automation platform that scales clinical and resupply workflows for DME providers.
At the heart of the system is Nora, a virtual AI employee that manages the entire patient journey:
- Lead generation
- Screening
- Diagnostics coordination
- CPAP education
- Troubleshooting
- Adherence coaching
- Resupply guidance
Nora delivers a unified, continuous patient experience modeled after Morgan’s own journey of “falling through the cracks.”
For DME providers, Nora alleviates margin pressure caused by decreasing reimbursement, adherence-linked payment structures, and staffing shortages.
[07:14] How Patients Interact With Nora
Neru started with the simplest modality: SMS texting. Over time, they added voice AI and email, giving patients multiple channels to interact naturally — calling Nora, texting, or sending emails as if communicating with a human.
Morgan says patients tend to forget they’re interacting with AI within 30 seconds. Many treat Nora like a trusted confidant, sharing nightly sleep quality, mask preferences, and frustrations. This emotional connection informs Neru’s mission to build a “magical, next-gen patient experience.”
[10:13] Scale and Clinical Validation
Morgan shares that Neru’s products have been tested on thousands of patients across multiple DME providers and integrated sleep clinics.
Their offerings include:
- Inbound AI-driven call support (10,000+ patients with hotline access)
- AI adherence coaching linked directly to CPAP usage data
- Resupply facilitation
In large patient comparisons, Nora demonstrated improved adherence outcomes and reduced the volume of human-supported calls.
[11:17] What Happens When a Patient Says, “Nora, I slept terribly”?
Today, Nora focuses on CPAP troubleshooting, with strict guardrails on what she can and cannot educate about.
Earlier versions offered insomnia guidance and sleep hygiene coaching, but currently, complex issues or non-CPAP topics escalate to a human clinical professional.
[12:08] The Hardest Parts of Building a Healthcare Startup
Morgan describes healthcare as both rewarding and grueling.
Neru benefits from being an “educational tool,” not a medical device, avoiding the heaviest layers of FDA regulation — but they face unique challenges:
- Strict HIPAA requirements
- AI disclosure obligations (in some states, legally required upfront)
- Managing sensitive patient disclosures sent to Nora
- Maintaining rigorous data partitioning and security
- Ensuring information routed back to DMEs remains compliant
Despite the complexity, this structure enables scalable, safe patient communication.
[14:06] How Nora Integrates Into Existing Resupply Programs
Nora is fully modular. Morgan likens her to “hiring a new employee that supercharges the team.”
Because every DME’s resupply setup is different (in-house, outsourced, or hybrid) Nora fills workflow gaps rather than replacing existing systems.
Common use cases include:
- Handling inbound resupply calls
- Pre-qualifying orders
- Ensuring patient compliance logic is met
- Gathering missing data before humans intervene
Nora complements the existing ecosystem rather than competing with it.
[16:17] Sleep as a Trojan Horse for Healthcare
Morgan explains that sleep influences nearly every dimension of health — mental, metabolic, cardiovascular, behavioral.
Her expanded view now includes home healthcare more broadly. Advances in CGM, home diagnostics, and wearable technology signal a shift toward continuous, home-based monitoring.
Neru aims to participate in that transformation: bridging patient care across multiple chronic conditions, delivered seamlessly within the home.
[18:41] Navigating a Massive Market: Where to Focus First?
Morgan shares Neru’s path through various markets:
- Direct-to-consumer insomnia coaching → unsustainable demand & pricing.
- Employers (truck drivers, shift workers, pilots) → saturated benefits market.
- DMEs → strong product-market fit, clear ROI, large installed patient base, limited EMR complexity (mostly two platforms), and significant operational pain.
DME wasn’t the original target, but it became the most natural, scalable market.
[21:47] Creativity’s Influence on Neru’s Culture
Morgan is a creative writer and former filmmaker. She and her co-founders intentionally bring creativity into product and company design.
Their goal is to create experiences that make people react with:
“Wow — I didn’t know healthcare could feel like this.”
They want to eliminate friction for patients and providers while strengthening the connection between them.
[23:52] The Future of Sleep Care and AI
Morgan envisions Nora evolving far beyond CPAP:
- Integrating CGM and other DME categories
- Deepening AI-human hybrid care
- Managing multiple conditions through one intelligent interface
- Potential Alexa-style voice integrations
- Creating continuity of care across devices, providers, and patient lifetimes
- Humans will always anchor the top 20–30% of complex care needs, but AI will handle the repetitive operational load.
[25:43] Rapid-Fire Round
The hosts end the episode with a playful, fast-paced Q&A:
- Sleep in or early riser?
Morgan: Sleep in (“for someone with insomnia, of course”). - Eight hours of sleep nightly or raise $100M tomorrow?
She chooses eight hours — longevity matters. - Biotech lab coat or startup hoodie?
Startup hoodie. - Meditation app or espresso shot?
Meditation — ideally without an app. - Change healthcare from inside or disrupt from outside?
Morgan says both — insiders and revolutionaries must work together. - Superpower: never need sleep or instantly put anyone to sleep?
Never need sleep — the other option feels creepy, she jokes.
[27:17] Closing
Morgan invites listeners to connect via morgan@neruhealth.com or visit neruhealth.com to explore Nora and schedule a demo.
Alex and Wayne thank her for an insightful conversation and close the episode.
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