Inclusive+ Builds Platform to Elevate LGBTQ+ Health Care with Support from the Polsky Accelerator (and a Collaboratorium Assist)

Inclusive+ cofounder Monika Lach, left, speaks with Booth student Anna Jacobs at the Fall 2021 Collaboratorium. (Photo credit: eClarke Photo)

As a medical student, Anna Jacobs often encounters LGBTQ+ patients who aren’t getting their health-care needs met. Many are afraid to share information with their providers. Others have providers who don’t know how to fully care for them and aren’t asking the right questions.

Jacobs, who’s on track to graduate from Booth’s Full Time MBA Program next year and the NYU Long Island School of Medicine in 2024, started business school with the intent to improve the health-care system. When, at the Polsky Center’s fall 2021 Collaboratorium, she heard Monika Lach, SM ’21, present her idea for a venture that would make health care better and more accessible for the LGBTQ+ population, Jacobs was so inspired that she joined forces with Lach to cofound Inclusive+.

Inclusive+ is developing a platform that will connect LGBTQ+ individuals with vetted health-care providers who have gone through its proprietary training. This year, the startup was accepted into the Polsky Accelerator, a 10-week summer program that provides mentorship and entrepreneurship education to help Booth and UChicago students and alumni grow their ventures.

“We have a vision of what we want to accomplish,” says Lach, who’s a former manager over specialty pharmacy and biotech infusion at University of Chicago Medicine. “The Accelerator has helped us narrow our focus.”

Read more about Inclusive+ and its experience in the Polsky Accelerator in Chicago Booth Stories.