When you’re looking for a nice restaurant or a new car, the first thing you do is probably check independent reviews to get unbiased information. In healthcare, that’s almost never the case.
Seattle-area startup Mpirica Health is trying to change that with an AI-fueled platform that ranks health care providers, and today, the company announced a big new partnership with global professional services company Aon to further that work.
Aon is partnering with Mpirica and San-Francisco based startup Amino to offer its clients more information when choosing a healthcare provider. Through the partnership, Aon customers and their employees will have access to Mpirica’s platform, which uses artificial intelligence and data from hospitals to rank surgeons based on the quality of their patients’ outcomes.
“Employers want to basically partner with their employees to help them make the decision that is going to deliver the best quality of care and also the most cost-efficient care,” Mpirica Co-founder and CEO Shakil Haroon told GeekWire.
“MPIRICA fills the quality of care information gap” while Amino offers information on the relative cost of healthcare at different providers, he said.
No money is changing hands as part of the deal. Instead, Haroon said, Aon wanted to “offer up an unbiased and independent source of information that was free of any conflict of interest, and in so doing help get the employees and patients themselves to engage.”
Mpirica’s platform combines a ranking system developed by cardiologist and entrepreneur Dr. Michael Pine with health insurance claims data gathered from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. It then ranks hospitals on their quality of care, broken out by different procedures — like knee replacements or C-sections — and region.
The idea is to help patients make a more informed decision about major healthcare events. Instead of going to whatever hospital they are used to
Mpirica was founded in 2014 by Haroon, Chief Marketing Officer Chris Diede and VP of Business Development Bob Piper. It now employs 19 after a recent hiring push towards artificial intelligence and is based in the Bellevue, Wash., coworking space WeWork Lincoln Square with remote employees around the country.
