When a person is sick and needs immediate care, many people consider going to the emergency room. That’s where 24/7 care is provided, and if the ER doesn’t fix the problem right away, the whole hospital can.
But emergency rooms are also full of problems. It can be expensive, wait times can be long, and people are surrounded by other patients.
Co-founder and CEO Keith Algozzine said Troy, New York-based UCM Digital Health is trying to create the ER experience through a digitally integrated platform. This means patients don’t need to go to the emergency room, but start through UCM’s app, website or phone. Based on the initial interaction, patients will be directed to the type of care they need. For example, if someone needs mental health care, they will connect with a mental health clinician.
“Soon, we’re sending patients to clinicians, our clinicians,” Algozzine said. “We hire them, we train them. We’re a full 50-state, 24/7 medical facility.”
Clinicians can then provide the care the patient needs, such as a prescription.If clinicians are unable to provide the care they need right away, they will connect the patient to another part UCM Digital Healthecosystems where they can receive this care, just like emergency rooms do in hospitals. Patients will be referred here if in-person care is required.
UCM sells its solutions to at-risk employers, health plans and providers. Algozzine said it charges customers in a variety of models, such as per-service or per-capita.
Algozzine claims that the company’s competitors include other telehealth platforms such as Teladoc, but the company differs by integrating beyond the ER and primary care domains to provide holistic care.
The company was founded in 2016, but revenue soared when the pandemic began, Algozzine said. Before the pandemic, it had a few hundred customers serving about 1 million people, and now it has more than 650 customers serving about 5 million people.company received In 2021, $5.5 million in Series A funding came from Armory Square Ventures along with Contour Ventures and River Park Ventures.
The increase in clients is due to Covid-19 prompting many employers to add multi-point solutions to their employee benefit packages, but ultimately it is difficult for employers to manage the disparate solutions in a cost-effective manner, Algozzine said. This needs to be merged.
“That was our best option,” Algozzine said. Employers can use UCM Digital Health to create a package that integrates these solutions in one place, rather than having multiple different solutions together, he said.
One of UCM Digital Health’s long-time employer clients is MarineMax, a Clearwater, Florida-based ship and yacht retailer. Ray Bowman, senior vice president of talent and team development, said the company has provided UCM digital health services to its employees for seven years, and since 2019, about 65 percent of employees have used the platform.
Bowman said the platform is useful for the company because it’s cost-effective, and employees say it’s fast and easy to use. He added that one of the areas where UCM has benefited MarineMax most since the pandemic has been mental health.
“Mental health is a godsend during a pandemic,” Bowman said. “I like the fact that…our team members work with the same people many times.”
Algozzine also said mental health benefits are an area of increased demand compared to the pre-pandemic period.
“Mental health is great for virtual care,” Algozzine said. “Mental health providers will never actually have stitches or surgery, so it fits nicely.”
Photo: verbaska_studio, Getty Images
