CEO of ALPS Georgia Krehbiel, MBA, shares:  

“At ALPS, we believe it is important to create opportunities for emerging innovators to connect with the broader limb preservation community. Eshaan’s innovative work in diabetic foot care, combined with the fact that he is doing this alongside finishing 9th grade, makes this contribution particularly impressive. We look forward to welcoming Eshaan to the DFCon 2026 Exhibition Hall and providing him an opportunity to share this work with our global audience. Who knows what the future may hold for a mind like this?” 

“The gap between detectable and detected is the entire reason SoleIQ exists.”

ALPS: What inspired you to pursue this path?

Eshaan Naik: “My grandfather lived with diabetes, and I watched him go through a severe foot ulcer and eventually lose part of his leg to amputation. Losing a limb is not just a medical event. It changes how a person moves through the world, how independent they feel, and how they see themselves.”

As he began exploring the research surrounding diabetic foot disease, the scale of the problem became impossible to ignore.

“Years later I started reading the literature, and what I found genuinely shocked me. I could not reconcile those numbers with how little attention this gets. If cancer carried that mortality and that recurrence rate, it would be a household conversation.”

That led him to question why monitoring occurs so infrequently for people at high risk.

“The question I kept coming back to was about frequency. What if a patient could capture images of their own feet regularly, using a device almost everyone already owns, and receive a recommendation on whether something warrants clinical attention?”

For Naik, the mission is straightforward:
“The goal is simple even if the work is not: catch risk while the skin is still intact and get people to care before the window closes. I want to help save limbs and lives.”

ALPS: Why is a preventive approach so important?

Eshaan Naik: “By the time you can see an ulcer, the damage has usually been built quietly for weeks.”

While clinical guidelines recommend more frequent monitoring for high-risk patients, Naik believes many people are not receiving the follow-up they need.

“Someone with nerve damage, a foot deformity, a past ulcer, or a past amputation is supposed to be seen every one to three months. The problem is that the healthcare system cannot deliver a specialist visit every one to three months for millions of people.”

Rather than replacing clinicians, SoleIQ is designed to help patients perform regular monitoring between appointments.

“Preventive technology, such as SoleIQ, is not trying to replace the clinician. It is trying to make the schedule clinicians already recommend something patients can do by themselves on a routine basis, without overwhelming the healthcare system.”

Ultimately, he sees prevention as an opportunity to intervene before a wound develops.

“Treatment is doing its best at the worst possible moment. SoleIQ is an attempt to move that moment earlier, flagging a problem while the skin is still intact and better footwear and pressure relief can still change what happens next.”

ALPS: What excites you most about the future of these technologies?

Eshaan Naik: “The reason the AI matters so much here is that it can learn what normal looks like for one specific person.”

Unlike traditional assessments that may occur only a few times a year, continuous monitoring creates a much richer picture of change over time.

“A model that sees the same two feet every day is comparing them to themselves. That is a completely different kind of signal.”

Even so, he is careful to position the technology as a support tool rather than a substitute for clinical care.

“The app never diagnoses anything and never replaces a visit. It produces a recommendation about whether something warrants clinical attention, and it gives the clinician better information when that visit happens.”

Looking ahead, Naik envisions a connected ecosystem of technologies working together.

“My honest picture of the future is a system where the phone handles daily monitoring for everyone, sensors add continuous data for the highest-risk patients, and light-based therapy responds automatically when risk climbs. AI is what ties those three together.”

ALPS: What are you looking forward to at DFCon 2026?

Eshaan Naik: “The people who write the guidelines, run the trials, and publish the papers I have been reading all year are the same people walking the exhibit hall. That is not normal access for anyone, let alone someone my age.”

“The goal is simple even if the work is not: catch risk while the skin is still intact and get people to care before the window closes.”