Entrepreneur
“The healthcare system is inherently designed to treat us all the same”
As many mixed-race women, Noelle Acosta was let down by the American healthcare system. Here she tells FemTech World why it’s time for a change.
Systemic racism is risking the safety of thousands of women from Black, Asian and mixed ethnicity backgrounds across the US.
According to the Office on Women’s Health (OWH), minority women continue to lag behind white women in a number of areas, including quality of care, access to care, timeliness, and outcomes.
Noelle Acosta was one of them. After struggling with painful, unexplained chronic health issues, she was dismissed by doctors and was sent home with no answers.
“I started menstruating for seven months straight,” Acosta remembers. “I was in constant pain, I would have migraines, but when I would go to the doctor’s office, I would find that my experience was incredibly transactional and dismissive.
“I was the one in five women in the US who felt ignored by their care providers.”
Like 70 per cent millennials, she turned to Google and started doing her own research in an attempt to understand her symptoms. A few months later she went back to her doctor for an ultrasound. It turned out she had 45 cysts on her left ovary.
“I was angry. I was frustrated that my health didn’t matter until I was ready to become pregnant and give birth and I felt ignored. I can’t imagine what other women who look like me and don’t have access to high quality healthcare go through.”
Current data shows notable differences in health status between white women and women of colour, with African American women and Latinas more likely to report fair or poor health.
“I’m half Mexican, half Filipino,” says Acosta. “And surprisingly, I learned in a conference that Mexican women with PCOS have the highest risk for infertility, based on their phenotype. My doctor never told me that.”
Following her own experience, she founded Noula Health to help women better understand and take care of their bodies through at-home testing, personalised care plans, nutrition and wellness recommendations and one-on-one virtual support.
The test kits measure micronutrients and wellness biomarkers to provide customised results that can then be shared with care providers.
“The healthcare system is inherently designed to treat us all the same,” says Acosta. “While we share similarities in our frustrations, we’re all unique individuals.
“By centring the individual, we can really truly deliver personalised care for each individual. Our goal is to empower women and birthing people to proactively take care of their bodies and be fearless advocates for themselves.”
While Noula offers personalised recommendations, it is not intended to provide a diagnosis, treat a disease, or replace the physician’s advice.
Instead, the platform aims to connect women with their physicians and help them detect potential health conditions early on.
“We want to help people take control of their health and feel that they’re in the driver’s seat,” says Acosta. “As we build out our clinical strategy, we hope to offer early support to women rather than just them having to wait until they have infertility issues later on in their life.
“We want to be a proactive, personalised partner for all women and birthing people, regardless of their stage or condition.”
As a woman of colour, Acosta wanted to create an inclusive platform. That’s why Noula is the first platform of its kind to launch in Spanish.
“Our goal is to create a safe and familiar space for Spanish speakers, because Hispanic and black birthing people in the US are three to four times more likely to die from childbirth-related causes than their white counterparts,” she explains.
“Reducing racial disparities was very important for us. We have OBGYNs who span across different racial backgrounds and sexual orientations so we can understand how to best support our members. We welcome all sexual orientations, genders and races.”
She is concerned about the impact of Roe v Wade’s reversal. Experts predict that increased barriers to abortion may widen the already existing large health disparities, disproportionately impacting women of colour.
“We were angry with the state of the healthcare system in the US before we started Noula. Now we’re even angrier with the decisions on Roe v. Wade,” says Acosta.
To help women across the US, Noula is hosting roundtable discussions around how to have courageous conversations in and out of medical settings and make informed decisions.
In an ever-changing health system, Acosta remains optimistic. “It’s unacceptable to be in a position where we have this attack on our bodies, but we will do everything in our power to change that.”
You have until Friday to nominate your femtech company of the year.
The award is one of 10 featuring at Femtech World’s third annual awards event, which attracts entries from across the UK, EU and Europe.
The Company of the Year Award is for companies that have demonstrated exceptional leadership in tackling women’s health needs through groundbreaking products, services or platforms that are shaping the future of global femtech.
If your company is driving innovation, impact and growth in this space, this award was made for you.
About the sponsor: Femovate
The category is backed by Femovate, the global femtech incubator using design to fuel innovation across every stage of a woman’s health journey, from proactive prevention through to personalised treatment.
Femovate has invested over US$2 million in design capital, working side-by-side with founding teams to bring market-ready solutions to life.
The startups it supports have collectively raised US$120 million, launched 30 products, and secured seven FDA clearances.
Why enter?
The Femtech World Awards are free to enter.
Winners and shortlisted companies receive extensive coverage across all Femtech World platforms.
Winners will also receive a trophy and the opportunity to be featured in an interview for the publication.
Find out more about the Femtech World Award and enter here by 4pm BST on Friday 17.
By Chaitra Vedullapalli, founder and president, Women in Cloud
Today’s leaders are carrying more than responsibilities.
They are carrying caregiving roles, financial pressures, legal complexities, and the quiet emotional weight of sustaining performance in unpredictable times.
And yet, most leadership forums still focus on productivity, growth, and scale, rarely addressing the human systems that enable sustained leadership.
At Women in Cloud, we believe the next generation of leadership will not be defined by endurance alone, but by discipline, preparation, and self-respect.
That is why we are proud to announce the #WICxWellness Summit 2026: The Disciplined Advantage.
This is a wellness summit focused on leadership preparedness.
Why This Summit Matters Now
Across our global community, a clear pattern has emerged.
- More professionals and executives are quietly navigating:
- Life-threatening health crises, personally or within their families
- Financial stress caused by medical, caregiving, or business shocks
- Legal and healthcare decisions with long-term consequences
- Career interruptions due to caregiving responsibilities
- Chronic exhaustion, grief, and emotional isolation
These experiences are widespread, yet rarely discussed in executive settings.
#WICxWellness 2026 brings these realities into the open with compassion, clarity, and practical guidance, so leaders can prepare, adapt, and continue forward without breaking.
This is wellness as a leadership discipline.
What We Will Explore
This year’s summit is designed to provide grounded, immediately applicable insights for founders, executives, and senior leaders.
Executive Function Under Chronic Stress
Keynote with Jennifer Brown
Focus Areas:
- Understand how chronic stress alters judgment, focus, and emotional regulation
- Identify early warning signs of cognitive overload in leadership roles
- Adaptability as a Cognitive Anchor: Navigating rapid change without compromising decision-making.
- Resilience Through Connection: Building human-centric teams to mitigate the stress of uncertainty.
- Navigating Change with Emotional Intelligence: Regulating stress responses to maintain clarity and empathy.
- Systemic Agility in High-Pressure Environments: Creating foundations of psychological safety that protect organizational function
Labs That Matter (And What to Do With Them)
Fireside Chat with Chelsey Galipeau and Chaitra Vedullapalli
Focus Areas:
- Which health tests are worth the time and investment
- Interpreting results without panic
- Preventive strategies for executive longevity
- Avoiding unnecessary medical spending
Caretaking Without Collapse
Panel With Karen Fassio, Anca Platon Trifan, Scilla Andreen, Clara Schroeder, Sheena Yap Chan
Focus Areas:
- Managing family and professional demands without burnout
- Setting humane boundaries
- Building sustainable support systems
- Ending silent sacrifice in leadership
Food as a Stability System (Not a Diet)
Fireside Chat with Nancy Watt and Meagan T. Copelin
Focus Areas:
- Nutrition for sustained energy and clarity
- Blood sugar and decision-making
- Realistic eating during travel and stress
- Food as operational resilience
Autoimmunity, Hormones & Cardiac Risk in Real Life
Fireside Chat with Dr. Linda Bing
Focus Areas:
- Managing invisible health risks
- Hormonal transitions and stamina
- Flare prevention at work
- Energy mapping for leadership performance
A Different Kind of Leadership Conversation
At Women in Cloud, we have learned something fundamental:
Performance is visible. Discipline is invisible.
Yet discipline determines whether leaders can serve, build, and lead over decades, not just quarters.
The Disciplined Advantage is about building that resilience intentionally.
Through science, lived experience, and practical frameworks, this summit equips leaders to:
- Anticipate strain instead of reacting to a crisis Design sustainable work rhythms
- Protect cognitive and emotional capital
- Lead from grounded strength
This is leadership infrastructure for the next decade.
Join Us
If you are a founder, executive, technologist, or senior professional navigating complexity and determined to lead well without sacrificing your health, clarity, or longevity, this summit is for you.
The #WICxWellness Summit 2026 is where performance meets preservation. Where ambition meets sustainability. Where leadership becomes truly durable.
We look forward to welcoming you. The Disciplined Advantage begins here.
Secure your spot: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/wicxwellness-summit-2026-tickets-1981616382945?aff=oddtdtcreator
Femtech World is continuing the search for a company to be crowned Startup of the Year.
The award is one of 10 to feature at the third annual Femtech World Awards.
The Startup of the Year Award celebrates an early-stage company making a bold impact in women’s health through innovation, vision and execution.
The winning startup will have demonstrated strong potential to transform care, accessibility, or awareness in women’s health with a scalable solution.
Consideration will be given to innovation, market traction, inclusivity, impact and the ability to address unmet needs.
The award is sponsored by Future Fertility.
The company is transforming fertility care with AI-powered solutions that close critical information gaps along the IVF journey.
Its clinically validated, non-invasive tools analyse oocyte images to predict each egg’s reproductive potential, supporting decision-making across key pathways: VIOLET™ for egg freezing, MAGENTA™ for IVF-ICSI, and ROSE™ for donor programmes and egg banks.
These reports deliver personalised insights into egg quality and ploidy potential, empowering patients and clinicians to make more informed decisions regarding next steps.
Today, Future Fertility’s technology is used in more than 300 clinics across 35+ countries.
Developed with the world’s largest oocyte image dataset linked to reproductive outcomes, Future Fertility’s AI models generate quality scores that not only guide treatment planning and manage expectations, but also serve as objective, actionable KPIs for labs—driving improved outcomes and transparency in fertility care worldwide.
The awards are free to enter, with winners receiving a trophy and an interview with Femtech World.
Find out more about the awards and enter for free here.
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