Dive Brief:
- Atlanta-based telehealth company ExamMed, which is being utilized by about 250 healthcare providers after launching last year, is promoting its use of a new healthcare currency called MedCoins.
- The company's co-founders claim that the specialized currency "gives providers more insight into what they charge for online and after-hours service—also known as concierge care—while enabling consumers to more easily separate and classify their healthcare costs," reports mHealth News.
- The currency is said to function much like a health savings account, because its value is for a specific purpose. Each coin worth $5.
Dive Insight:
ExamMed co-founders Faraz Zubairi and Jeremy Trabucco suggest MedCoins provide more transparency to the telehealth process and separate the company from its field of competitors.
While the currency's designated use certainly makes it intriguing, will providers and consumers care to adopt it?
Zubairi tells mHealth News that physicians can use MedCoins to capture lost revenue, particularly from telehealth services that don't get reimbursed. He says it allows providers to bundle services together—for example, to create family packages—and to easily determine what part of their revenue is tied to telehealth.
The proposed perks for patients are that they too can easily see their health expenses apart from the rest of their accounting, and that when making donations, they can be assured the money will specifically be used for healthcare.