About

Why Hey Susan exists

Hey Susan exists because our founders, Warren and Joanna, almost missed their son's jaundice.

We were discharged from the hospital on day 3. Our son was a “good baby” those first days — he slept a lot, nursed but not for long, and had fewer diapers than the books suggested. No one at discharge told us to watch for yellowing skin. We were watching anyway, on instinct, and by day 4 he was noticeably more yellow. At 3 a.m. that night, not sure who else to call at that hour, we described what we were seeing to an AI chatbot. It flagged the pattern as jaundice and told us to get him checked.

We brought him in that day. An emergency-room nurse confirmed it looked like jaundice, and his bilirubin was high enough that he was admitted for about 12 hours of phototherapy — time under a blue-spectrum light that helps a newborn's body break down bilirubin through the skin. He was fine. But sitting in that hospital chair, it was clear that nobody had actually verified he was getting enough to eat in those first days — including us. A nurse on that phototherapy shift was the first person to plainly say: feed him more, and supplement with formula if breastfeeding alone isn't enough.

The only reason we caught it in time was a 3 a.m. conversation with a chatbot that didn't even remember our baby between sessions. That gap — a tool that could have looked at what was actually happening with our son, night or day, and nudged us sooner — is a direct reason Hey Susan is built the way she is. The fuller, more personal version of this story is on our Safety page and in the blog post The 3 A.M. Chat That Caught His Jaundice.

What Hey Susan is

Hey Susan is an AI assistant for the early-parenting years, built to take the mental load off your plate, not add to it. You can just tell her things in your own words — a feed, a nap, a worry — and she keeps track, notices patterns against your own baby's history, and reaches out when something's worth a nudge instead of waiting for you to open an app.

She is not a doctor, nurse, therapist, midwife, lactation consultant, or other licensed health professional, and her responses are not medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Every health-adjacent nudge she sends carries a version of the same disclaimer: she's not a doctor, this is what she'd suggest if it were her, and your pediatrician (or 911, or your local emergency number, in an emergency) always comes first. The full breakdown of how that works lives on our Safety page.

Who's behind Hey Susan

Hey Susan was founded by Warren and Joanna. Their son's jaundice — and the gap it exposed in a very tired 3 a.m. — is the origin story above.

Neither has a healthcare or childcare background. Warren's professional background is in cybersecurity; Joanna's is in the nonprofit sector. What drove them to build Hey Susan is simpler: they're parents who lived the story above. Hey Susan is built by people who needed this tool, not people studying the market from the outside.

Get in touch

Questions, feedback, or something that didn't work the way it should have? Email hi@heysusan.app.