Myca

Primary care is a frustrating experience for most patients as well as physicians. Patients find the experience inconvenient, borderline impersonal and hardly get access to any of their resulting information from the visit. Physicians are hard-pressed for time since they are mostly drowned in paperwork. Considering the rise in HSA, high-deductibles, and no-insurance it’s logical that out-of-pocket payments for primary healthcare will keep increasing.

Myca plans to ride that wave. It’s an outpatient EMR and Practice Management system built with a social networking perspective. Its core emphasis is on enhancing the physician-patient communication and provide a shared ‘dashboard’ that both can utilize. As a patient, one can schedule appointments (or cancel) online, pay with credit card, setup email/video consults, access your record, etc. The service is based on a $35 monthly fee with physician charging $100-$200 depending on the complexity of complaint (see breakdown here).

Using Myca platform, any PCP can setup a subscription-based, consumer-oriented primary care practice. The first such practice is called HelloHealth, located in couple of neighborhoods of New York city. HelloHealth is co-founded by Myca’s Chief Concept Officer (what??) Jay Parkinson who attained fame with his unconventional anti-establishment practice approach couple of years back.

I like the concept. It empowers PCPs to get off the hamster wheel of insurance and invest time in patients. Given enough competition and market acceptance, tools like these can make the old ‘Boutique Medicine’ concept more affordable and efficient. If nothing else, its a sign of service innovation in an orthodox industry.

PS: I’ve been running into a lot of these niche medical practices based on Boutique/Concierge Medicine. They dont have a direct relation to Healthcare IT, but point to an important trend that will utilize IT at its core. Here is an ongoing list of such practices: Qliance in Seattle, Crossover Healthcare in Southern California, MD2 (NYC, Chicago, Portland, Bellevue, San Francisco, Seattle),…