Michelle Chaffee is the founder and CEO of alska, a comprehensive technology solution to support and empower caregivers. Her journey as the sole female founder of a technology company is an unlikely one. She became a caregiver overnight, in 2007 when her mother had a stroke at the age of 58, that left her with significant deficits including vision loss. It was this event and the frustrations she encountered, even as a healthcare professional herself, that lead her to create a professional patient advocacy service and ultimately, a technology based solution to help caregivers on the overwhelming caregiving journey. Hundreds of companies nationwide now offer alska Connected Caregiving to support the working caregivers in their organizations.
Michelle encountered many obstacles, some anticipated and others life altering, such as a diagnosis of ovarian cancer, during the early stages of building her company. In 2018 she was accepted into the second cohort of Founders Program at Station F in Paris, where she collaborated with technology entrepreneurs from around the globe. She also spent time in Rwanda where her technology was utilized to help connect patients in rural areas with health experts and to earlier detect those with diabetes. It was this experience that was the basis for a rural health initiative she is implementing in the American South with a focus on improving maternal and infant mortality.
She has spoken extensively on the impact of caregiving and the important role caregivers play in the health outcomes of patients. Her candid, heartfelt accounts of her own experience as a patient, caregiver, and technology entrepreneur, have been read widely and featured in Linkedin Pulse, Executive Vine, MedCity News as well as international technology publications. Customer experience expert, Jeanne Bliss, host of The Human Duct Tape Show featured her in the book “Would You Do That to Your Mother.” She was named Linkedin Top Voice in Healthcare in 2015, 2016 and 2017.
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