Elena Rueda is the founder and CEO of Dama Health, on a mission to end the trial-and-error method of prescribing hormone therapies — from contraception through to menopause and HRT. She completed a Master's in Entrepreneurship at Imperial, built the company while working full-time at Merck, and draws her resilience from her mother — one of the only female detectives in 1980s Madrid.
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Dama Health uses pharmacogenetic and epigenetic research to personalise contraception and ob-gyn decisions for clinicians and patients. Backed by Illumina for Start-ups and KQ Labs, they've built a biobank of 1,200+ women and are now live across US clinic sites. Clinicians can try Dama Assist free for 14 days.
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The origin story — A one-minute GP appointment and a bag of pills she knew nothing about sent Elena down a research rabbit hole. A PubMed-powered spreadsheet she used to advise housemates was v1 of Dama Health — six years before it became a business.
Business plans in women's health — In a space where commercialisation is harder and investor scrutiny is higher, Elena makes the case for putting numbers on paper early. Numbers can defend you in the room in a way words can't.
Building on the side — Elena worked full-time at Merck while fundraising for Dama. Her co-founder Paulina was completing F1 rotations. Neither went all in before the money arrived — and you don't have to either.
Skipping the VCs — Strategic angels — doctors, biotech founders, academics — opened clinical doors and gave product feedback no VC could at that stage. Family offices followed. She's now a year and a half without a raise, focused on clean unit economics before going back to market.
Going to market in the US — Their Yale-based CMO was the anchor. The NHS's post-COVID constraints made the decision easy. Within months they had five pilot sites in Philadelphia. Elena describes the US as a \"yes culture\" — faster introductions, faster momentum.
The EMMA Consortium — Dama joined two other companies to apply for a $3M US grant to build a shared precision medicine platform for endometriosis. Elena explains why collaboration is rare, how grant funding unlocks it, and how they've structured IP so the platform survives even if one company doesn't.
🌐 damahealth.com · 🤖 damaassist.com · 🤝 EMMA Consortium
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