Symptom checker K Health strikes partnership with Mayo Clinic - MedCity News

In a sea of symptom checkers, startup K Health takes a slightly different approach. In addition to asking questions to try to narrow down a user's symptoms, it also compares their results to similar patient cases.

For example, it could compare people who went to the doctor for a headache with a similar medical history, who were ultimately diagnosed with a migraine, co-founder and chief product officer Ran Shaul explained in an interview.

"You are narrowing down your condition to a group of people, and we provide a way for you to look at those cohorts of people and their experience," he said.

This information is based on a large dataset the company acquired from Israel-based managed care organization Maccabi Health Care. Now, K Health has struck another partnership with Mayo Clinic's Data Analytics Platform.

Through this partnership, K Health will provide support tools to Mayo Clinic's patients and physicians. It will also have access to de-identified data on assessments and treatments to make its triage tool more accurate.

"Mayo has accumulated a vast amount of medical insight over the years. They may be able to help us understand the progression of diseases," Shaul said. "We can teach our AI from that insight. We can accumulate that knowledge and incorporate it in front of our users."

The company also raised $42 million in series D funding from Valor Equity Partners and Marcy Venture Partners, a venture capital firm founded by Jay Z that is focused on consumer products. In February, it raised a separate, $48 million round, led by 14W and Mangrove Capital. It plans to use the funds to further develop its technology, as well as the telehealth component of its platform that It has been building.

After users go through K Health's symptom checker, they can chat with a doctor for a $20 flat fee or a $9 per month subscription. The on-demand service connects users to whichever physician is available at that time. They currently treat most acute conditions and can write prescriptions.

K Health more recently rolled out a telehealth program for anxiety and depression, at $20 per month. The company does not currently offer cognitive behavioral therapy, so users would be paying for access to a physician who can prescribe medication or refer them out to a specialist.

"We are very much contemplating bringing the therapist component on our platform so things become more integrated with that respect," Shaul said.

Since the start of the pandemic, more users have downloaded K Health's app and paid for its telehealth services. Shaul said the number of users for its symptom checker has increased by 300%, and the number of physician consultations grew slightly higher.

Photo credit: K Health