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PatientPartner, a startup that matches patients with mentors who’ve gone through similar medical treatments, just raised $7 million in seed funding.
The round led by venture firm LionBird with participation from existing investor FCA Venture Partners, consists of $3.5 million in new equity financing and the conversion of $3.5 million in convertible debt, the company told Endpoints News exclusively.
PatientPartner, based in San Diego and founded in 2017, works with pharmaceutical and medical device companies to connect volunteer mentors to prospective patients. Patients discover the service through drugmakers’ and medical device companies’ websites and other promotional materials, such as pamphlets in the doctor’s office.
The goal is to help the companies attract patients, kind of like how reading reviews on Amazon or Yelp helps people make decisions, co-founder and CEO George Kramb told Endpoints in an interview. And having a mentor check in on patients can also help improve medication adherence rates, as they’re more likely to finish a treatment plan, he said.
PatientPartner is tapping into the movement among pharmaceutical companies to connect more directly with patients. Last week, Pfizer unveiled a direct-to-patient website to connect patients with doctors who can prescribe its migraine and COVID treatments. Eli Lilly launched a similar service for obesity, diabetes and migraine in January.
“We’re seeing this huge shift where pharma companies are going, how can we make the relationship between a pharma and their customer, meaning the patient, closer together?” Kramb said. “That to me is what’s exciting, and that’s why I think what we’re building here is really complimentary with everything that they’re trying to do and what I think they’re going to be doing in the future.”
Kramb, whose background is in medical device sales, co-founded PatientPartner with his childhood friend Patrick Frank, also from a sales background, after the pair discovered how comforting it was for their sick loved ones to speak to someone who had been through a similar procedure. The company originally launched as RightDevice, focused on recommending medical devices to patients. It was rebranded to PatientPartner in 2020 when the pair realized it was more impactful to focus on connecting patients with each other.
With the new funding, Frank said the company plans to explore how its model can be applied to new areas, like clinical trials and insurance claims.
It’s begun researching how it can help pharma with clinical trial recruitment by matching potential participants with people who’ve been in trials before, helping to put patients’ minds at ease. It’s also exploring opportunities with insurance providers to connect their members with people who have previously had to navigate complex claims processes.