Care2Talk opens controversial healthcare clinic

Plus, join the YYJ Tech Slack, and plan your December events.

Author

Kate Wilson
November 27, 2024

In partnership with

Welcome to this week’s Midweek Memo. In this issue, join the YYJ Tech Slack and become a channel steward, learn about a visit to VoxCell BioInnovation from the NRC, and plan your December event calendar.

Now on to today’s briefing. It’s 871 words: a three-minute read.

By the way, if you're not already subscribed, you can fix that here.

Care2Talk CEO Jordan Schley. Photo: Joshua Lawrence.

Care2Talk opens controversial new clinic

Care2Talk Health Technologies, a Victoria-based video healthtech app, opened its first in-person clinic last week, in Oak Bay.

The new clinic is located along the 1900-block of Oak Bay Avenue, and offers subscription-based private healthcare. Members can take advantage of unlimited virtual calls to a healthcare team for $67 a month, and can enjoy in-person visits with a nurse-practitioner for $208. For families, the cost is $100 per person, per month.

“We just charge, basically, what we call a healthcare network,” Care2Talk CEO Jordan Schley told CHEK news. “It comes with virtual care, comes with a patient navigator, it comes with a dedicated health assistant. So you kind of get that full support around that individual or family plan.”

The article also points out that the opening of the clinic has proven controversial. Discussions over private healthcare featured in all party platforms for the B.C. election last month, with the Conservatives supporting private care, and the NDP and Greens suggesting reservations. Significantly, Diana Gibson — the newly appointed Minister for Jobs, Economic Development, and Innovation — was quoted in the CHEK article as being critical of for-profit healthcare.

Care2Talk has also announced that it’s in the process of building out a secondary a private primary care clinic in Qualicum Beach.

As well as its new physical clinics, the company will continue to offer its tech product, which makes it easy for older adults to connect through conversations with their families and care providers. Its platform is an iOS and Android application which uses a specially designed interface on mobile or tablet devices to create an easy-to-use video chat tool for those with cognitive impairments or other limitations.

Hands Down Some Of The Best 0% Interest Credit Cards

Pay no interest until nearly 2026 with some of the best hand-picked credit cards this year. They are perfect for anyone looking to pay down their debt, and not add to it!

Click here to see what all of the hype is about.

📰 More Victoria innovation news

🫁 All I want tissue: Voxcell BioInnovation hosted Lakshmi Krishnan, VP of Life Sciences at the National Research Council Canada, along with members of the NRC team, at their facility. The company showcased the groundbreaking advancements VoxCell is making in the field of tissue engineering.

⭐ Sign-up sheet: The YYJ Tech Slack is recruiting Channel Stewards. The long-time and popular Slack workspace is dedicated to announcements and career chat in Victoria tech, and you can help shape the conversation.

💉 Long-term help: Eupraxia, a local clinical-stage biotech company, has released its DiffuSphere technology, which allows targeted drug release for a period of more than six months.

🕴️ Tech jobs of the week

Find your next career:

Hiring in Victoria? Reply to this email and let us know!

📅 Upcoming events

When: Wednesday, December 11, 6:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
Where: Board with Friends, 705 Johnson St, Victoria
What: Join fellow product professionals for an evening of meaningful connections over board games and shop talk. Limited to just 20 seats to ensure genuine conversations that matter. What makes this different? No presentations, no pitches — just real conversations with other product leaders in a relaxed setting.

Does your organization collect diversity data? If so, how does your data compare to the wider Canadian tech community? If not, how do you get started in collecting diversity data? And once you have data collected, how do you conduct a pay equity analysis to identify pay gaps and create action plans to close these gaps?

Join TAP Network for a special tech community webinar where they’ll be:

  • Sharing data from TAP Network’s 2024 Diversity Dashboard

  • Connecting you with free diversity benchmarking resources

  • Hearing from compensation experts on how to conduct a pay equity analysis

Victoria Tech Nachos… a covert group at the intersection of Nachos and Technology. A no-speaker, social-only, no-sponsor, nacho-friendly event. 

Have an upcoming event? Reply to let us know.

🙋 I need a…

We at Victoria Tech Journal know you, our community, pretty well. Are you searching for someone in your field to have coffee with, a hiring hookup, a lead on local investors, or suggestion for a great Victoria tech tool? Whatever you’re hunting for, let us know. We’ll post it in this section and make it happen.

Email your requests to [email protected].

THIS WEEK IN VICTORIA

Have something or someone we should know about?

Reply or email [email protected] so we can work together to spotlight the lesser-known stories of Victoria's tech ecosystem.

What did you think of today's newsleter?

Login or Subscribe to participate in polls.