Startup Repurposes Sports Tech For Israeli Soldiers In Battle

An electrically-powered sleeve that’s designed to enhance performance and accelerate recovery among athletes is now being repurposed for the Israeli soldiers readying to battle the Palestinian terror group Hamas that rules the Gaza Strip. 

Startup Healables embeds electrodes into an elasticated sleeve controlled by a smartphone app, which generate microcurrents of electricity to stimulate affected cells into repairing themselves – all without the need for medication.

Units of its ElectroGear device were intended to be used in a new pilot with a professional soccer team abroad. But the massive terror attacks in Israel on October 7, in which at least 1,300 people were murdered in their homes and communities by Hamas terrorists, led to the startup finding a different – and more personal – use for them. 

“Those units are now going to be repurposed for our soldiers, because the types of needs that soldiers have in the field are very similar to the types of needs that athletes have,” Healables founder and CEO Moshe Lebowitz tells NoCamels. 

One sniper in the Israel Defense Forces’ elite Duvdevan Unit, which works to prevent terrorist activities, was experiencing knee pain and had difficulty getting into positions that required him to kneel or lay down, resulting in him being unable to aim accurately. 

“After using ElectroGear, he was able to move freely without any problem in his range of motion,” says Lebowitz. “The pain was gone.”

Another soldier from a communications unit had pain in his legs and could not keep up with his brothers-in-arms when transporting heavy specialist equipment.

“With our product he was able to get back and to keep up with everyone,” says Lebowitz.

Each treatment session using the ElectroGear lasts for an hour. The user attaches the patented device to their knee, ankle or shoulder, and activates it using the accompanying app. The ElectroGear device then uses electrodes to send microcurrents of electricity directly to the affected area.

Lebowitz explains that the electricity stimulates the body’s cells to produce more adenosine triphosphate (ATP), its main source of energy. When cells have higher levels of ATP, they have more energy to repair themselves, leading to quicker recovery time. 

Using electric currents is already well-established and widely implemented as a therapy for chronic pain. For example, the TENS (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) is a small, battery-operated device used to relieve pain during labor and by people suffering from arthritis, period pain, knee pain and sports injuries.

But Lebowitz says these kinds of devices overload the nervous system with electricity so that the brain is unable to process pain signals, but does not actually help the body recover.

Additionally, electrotherapy is mostly a complicated procedure involving multiple wires and adhesive electrodes, and is better suited to use in clinics rather than in homes or on the go.

The ElectroGear device, on the other hand, is lightweight and flexible. The sleeves are made of washable, stretchable sports fabric, and the electrodes are dry, rather than sticky. It also uses 1,000 times less electricity than a TENS unit, which Lebowitz says is not optimized to recharge the body the way his device does. 

The device is also embedded with sensors that measure the body’s response to the treatment – like heart rate variability, range of motion and respiration – and it uses that information to determine whether the treatment the user is receiving could be improved. 

Smart algorithms within the accompanying app analyze this information and adjust the treatment accordingly. Lebowitz, however, cannot specify how the treatment is optimized.

“There are a lot of different qualities of how electricity interacts with the body,” he says. 

“We’re able to adjust the different settings to be able to go and make sure the user is getting exactly what’s right for them. There are millions of different variables.”

The device had to undergo a couple of alterations before being combat ready, with the way in which it is used to treat soreness and injuries first optimized for soldiers. 

Additionally, the Healables team created an offline mode for the smartphone app to ensure that the security of the soldiers was not compromised – meaning their data is saved on the phone itself and is not uploaded to the cloud. 

“But it’s pretty much the same,” says Lebowitz. “People need to rest and recover, whether they are playing soccer or are on the battlefield.”

The Jerusalem-based startup, too, has been affected by the ongoing war, with members of its team drafted into the army. And one of the startup’s facilities, in the area surrounding Gaza, was affected during the October 7 terror attack.

Healables is now accepting donations on the ElectroGear website for people wishing to purchase the device for Israeli soldiers.  

“When you’re deployed in the field, you don’t have the same access to medical care that you would have otherwise,” Lebowitz says. “A product like this can really be a game-changer for having soldiers that are combat ready.”

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