Medix: Democratising Healthcare Through Shared Value

Company Overview

Medix is a leading healthcare management solutions company providing a range of services including personal medical case management, disease prevention, advanced digital health solutions, rehabilitation, and clinical consultancy services. Established in 2006, Medix has a large global footprint with 12 offices worldwide, including London, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Mumbai and Tel Aviv, serving over 7 million customers across 90 different countries. As a company conceived with Shared Value at the core of its philosophy, Medix has the purpose to improve people’s lives by enabling greater accessibility to healthcare services and the implementation of quality medical care.

The Social Issue

Global healthcare is undergoing major changes. With advanced digital technologies and new and improved medical equipment, the quality of medical care available globally significantly improved. Nevertheless, access to quality healthcare remains an issue, particularly in developing countries, where the social infrastructure and healthcare systems are not as evolved, but not only there. Statistics show for example that the richer people in the US (top 1%) live between 10-15 years longer than the bottom 1%! There are significant variations in both the price and quality of healthcare services available in different countries, which leave consumers spending vast proportions of their incomes on unwarranted and sometimes unnecessary treatments. Indeed, when comparing healthcare services available within certain regions, cities and neighbouring hospitals, and even doctors the differences can be quite stark. Studies* have shown that if undue variations in healthcare are reduced in the population, the quality of care would rise dramatically as a consequence of less stretched resources, and costs could be lowered by as much as 30%!

This problem of accessibility and inequality in medical standards, both globally and domestically, is precisely what Medix set out to address. Having previously served as an executive in various large financial institutions, Sigal Atzmon (CEO) founded Medix in a bid to reconceive the traditional relationship between Patients, Providers and Payers within the healthcare ecosystem and to create lasting social impact at scale. Pursuing her longstanding passion for healthcare, Sigal established Medix to ensure that anyone and everyone could access quality healthcare regardless of income or geographic limitations, but also to make healthcare more sustainable by providing the right treatment for the right diagnostic. Her true mission is to reduce unwarranted healthcare variations and democratise healthcare.

Business Value

In its earliest days, Medix identified the lack of standardised healthcare as a business opportunity. Recognising that quality services were often inaccessible to a significant proportion of health consumers, Medix sought to meet the needs of this underserved market. Their solution – Medix’ Personal Medical Case Management Service – aims to better manage the relationship between the stakeholders involved in the healthcare ecosystem, namely the Patients, Providers and Payers, to create better health outcomes.

The Case Management service implements a personalised and tailored medical journey for the patient, ensuring the best medical outcome for the individual and avoiding overuse or misuse of medical treatments thanks to a multidisciplinary and patient-centric, objective process with support and medical advice from a network of world-leading medical experts. This leads to a more sustainable and efficient healthcare system, thanks to the implementation of a more personalised care journey. The reduction in unwarranted treatments also leads to decreased expenses for patients, freeing a higher proportion of their income. Moreover, from an economic perspective, improving medical outcomes while at the same time reducing unnecessary procedures leads to a better loss ratio. It also means that employees can recover quicker and return to the workplace to continue earning, which in turn saves costs for the insurer’s corporate clients. The economic Impact of the service is secondary and the focus is on ensuring personalised and optimised medical journeys. In some cases, the treatment suggested to the individual patient may actually cost more but when looking at it on a population or portfolio basis, the economics are clear.

This disruptive business model involved partnering with large insurers and corporate institutions to provide value-added healthcare services to a wide customer base through employer insurance or directly with large corporates. Medix views these large corporates as live ‘partners’ in their goal to create better health outcomes rather than pure transactional ‘Payers’. Through these collaborations, Medix ensures mass accessibility to quality medical care within a region. The model is also scalable at a macro level by expanding to other countries. Core to this approach is the creation of Shared Value. For Medix, CSV represents a way to combine social value and economic growth, ultimately improving livelihoods.

The Shared Value Strategy

As a Shared Value company, Medix aims to play a leading role in improving the healthcare landscape globally. This means driving sustainable economic and social growth and enabling people around the world to receive the best medical care possible to make a real difference in their lives. The Case Management model also ensures a more efficient use of medical resources for better productivity, which can in turn allow for better care to more people. Recognising that patients often lack a single focal point to help them navigate through a maze of medical treatments and expert opinions (or lack thereof), Medix provides unique services that facilitate better understanding of a patients choices, as well as greater accessibility and implementation of international standard healthcare. Ultimately, the model aims to overcome local healthcare disparities, flatten the inequality-of-care curve and reduce unwarranted healthcare variations.

A key part to addressing this structural gap in the healthcare landscape is Medix’ flagship Personal Medical Case Management Service (PMCM). Comprising of dedicated teams to support patients and their family members during the course of their treatment, specialist case doctors conduct a review of all the relevant medical information and perform any necessary tests to inform a thorough diagnostic of the patient’s condition. They then consult with the world’s leading specialists on their patient’s behalf, providing actionable insights that enable Medix to collaborate with local doctors to determine the optimal course of action for their patient regardless of their context. Indeed, PMCM provides a thorough assessment of the medical case, planning, coordination, implementation and on-going supervision in order and patients can be reassured that they are getting the best quality care.

We should always strive as business owners and business leaders to drive economic and social growth.
Sigal Atzmon, President and CEO, The Medix Group

By seeking to standardise the quality of medical care in different cities, regions and countries, Medix is able to democratise healthcare, and improve the way people consume care in the process. Rather than promoting medical tourism, Medix aims to improve local healthcare infrastructure and health literacy in more vulnerable societies by facilitating a better understanding of healthcare through knowledge sharing.

As a Shared Value company, Medix measures both the social and economic impact of their services on communities and the markets they operate in. One key metric is clinical impact and the added value that Medix provides their customers, measured in terms of better health outcomes and the avoidance of unnecessary medical resources. Since its conception, Medix has achieved a 25% change (on average) in patient cases managed by Medix across Asia. Likewise, 55% of Medix’ patients received improved treatments. Most significant though is that in 22% of all cases reviewed, Medix prevented unnecessary medications, treatments, procedures and major surgeries, subsequently optimising patient healthcare expenditures. This led to an increase of Medix’ bottom line year-on-year while growing its customer base from 2 million customers to over 7 million in less than five years.

Future Outlook

Challenges remain in achieving equitable access to quality healthcare due to underdeveloped healthcare infrastructure and a shortage of local expertise in some countries. Nevertheless, Medix is expanding in several markets. As part of their ‘Asia first’ strategy, the company will expand its footprint significantly across the region, facilitated by its partnership with AIA, a leading insurer in Asia with a presence in 18 countries. Indeed, Medix will focus heavily on India in 2021, investing in several promising start-ups specialising in digital and AI-driven healthcare solutions, while working with local institutions and the government to enhance greater accessibility to quality healthcare. Similarly, Medix plans to expand its services across the US and the Middle East and also enter the South American market.

The pandemic has expedited the shift to digital health solutions with new care models coming to the fore. Medix has been active in advancing digital health solutions for many years and with its venture capital arm ‘Medix Ventures’, Medix is eager to continue to play a pioneering role in what they see as a ‘re-evolution’ of the healthcare landscape. As part of their effort to lead the way in digital healthcare, Medix will soon be launching the Medix App – a healthcare platform providing a one-stop-shop for people’s healthcare needs including a variety of digital prevention measures.

Hear more about The Medix Group