CLEVELAND: Warren Buffett famously said it’s best to invest in what you know.
Anthony Stedillie has done just that in creating the Cleveland-based startup medical data company CompassMD.
Several years back, Stedilllie faced a cancer diagnosis. Working from a list provided by his HMO at the time, he discovered it was a hit-or-miss proposition to find a compatible doctor, because listings included little more than the doctors’ specialties and locations.
After a series of meetings and wasted fees, he finally found an internist to refer him to a specialist. Then the process repeated itself, as he searched for a specialist who suited his beliefs about treatment. Again, there was no useful data, so the only solution was “to go out on lots of dates,” Stedillie joked, referring to the many appointments required to stumble into a doctor who was a fit.
As it turned out, the cancer diagnosis was only a scare. But that horrendous experience brought about Stedillie’s eureka moment. He imagined he couldn’t be the only one to find himself in that predicament.
He decided to create a new company, “a sort of Match.com for putting doctors together with patients,” he said.
His first thought was to provide a subscription service for individual patients like him, based on a model such as Angie’s List, where information is made available to members. But through a workshop process with the Shaker LaunchHouse, Stedillie discovered that most patients begin the process by searching lists provided by HMOs or insurance policies.
“I realized that creating a separate list that might not have the same doctors as the insurance companies would provide little value for individual patients,” he said.
“That’s when we made the adjustment that made the business viable,” Stedillie said. “We decided to license the software program to insurance companies, hospitals and HMOs instead of directly to patients.”
That way, he said, “When patients comb through lists of doctors on a particular plan, the institutions can provide useful information right there to help create better patient doctor fits. That in turn makes the patients happier and saves the institution money and energy and creates a more positive experience for customers.”
The CompassMD program creates quantifiable data points by asking patients and doctors a series of 14 questions with responses that rate aspects of the doctor-patient relationship.
“In our extensive research in the market, we discovered that doctors are overwhelmed and strapped for time. So we made the questions short and simple,” Stedillie said.
“And we partnered with Doximity — which is a site like LinkedIn for doctors.”
CompassMD is developing customer relationships with various health-care institutions and raising capital through venture capitalists and angel investors.
“We’re picking up our first customer relationship and simultaneously raising $1.5 million in first-round financing,” Stedillie said.
For more information, visit www.compassmd.com.
Daryl Rowland can be reached at darylvrowland@gmail.com.