Circly Fights Cancer With Community: Building A Support System With Twilio
Time to read: 2 minutes
October 01, 2015
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If cancer were a person, I’d punch it in the face. But, it turns out that’s neither a viable method of treatment, or a fight that has any chance of actually taking place.
One thing that does help people struggling with cancer is emotional support from friends and family. A simple text or call goes a long way. A friendly reminder to perform self-checks for cancer, or adopt a healthier lifestyle goes even further. This past weekend at the Coders vs Cancer hackathon, a few developers built an app that helps bring friends and family together to form a support network powered by communication called Circly.
For their efforts, Mike, Madelena, Kennedy, and Sarah won $10,000 and are now taking Circly to the next level, this Monday at It Never Was A Dress: STEAM, Social Justice, and Radical Gestures.
Madelena says it plainly – cancer has a stigma. A majority of the conversations surrounding it are negative. But the folks behind Circly believe it doesn’t have to be that way. By giving people a systematic way to support each other to work through or prevent cancer, Circly is hoping to eliminate that stigma.
Here’s how the service works. You sign up, fill out a profile, and invite a few friends. You’ll get Twilio SMS, email, or Twilio Voice alerts reminding you to preform self checks, or change certain habits from your friends.
Mike Caprio, one of the developers behind the service gave us a rundown. “As an example: you get an SMS text saying you should call/contact your mom and ask her if she’s performed her regular breast self-exam. You reply to the text to confirm that you received the message and will contact your mom – otherwise if you don’t reply within a period of time, the system picks the next person in the circle and asks them to contact your mom.”
The crux of Circly’s philosophy is to make the reminders more than an alert or automated prompt – each reminder should feel personal, because it’s from a friend.
We’ll keep you posted on Circly’s news and announcement coming this Monday.
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