First Stop Health has raised $2.2 million from angel investors to scale up and expand its reach to more employers, according to a company statement. Its CEO Patrick Spain believes that the future of healthcare, the convenience of having access to a doctor when they need one will be a valued supplement to a primary care physician.
Its goal is to reduce companies healthcare costs and increase the use of telehealth services by their employees.
The Chicago-based healthcare startup’s non-emergency services are aimed at employers with staff numbering 50 to 2,000. It seeks to capitalize on two trends in healthcare: improving access to physicians while reducing unnecessary visits to the doctor by responding to queries by phone. Users leave a message summarizing their health problem and the call is returned within a few minutes.
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Doctors can also renew prescription medications or order more needles for diabetics if they’re on vacation and they left them at home. It avoids prescribing new meds.
Companies with self-funded plans make up 40 percent of its base, and it wants to boost that to 60 percent. Its services are also available to individuals who pay a monthly subscription fee.
There are loads of healthcare startups seeking to tap the demand for telehealth. Some include Practice Fusion Consult-a Doc, AmeriDoc, SNAPMD, PhoneDoctoRX, 1-800MD, iTerpret, iSelectMD Ring-a-Doc, Advantage Home Telehealth.
With so many telehealth companies competing with each other, as well as with health systems and insurers that are offering these services as well, it will be interesting to watch this space and see which companies have staying power.
