Meet MediFind: Q&A with Founder Patrick Howie

Now available through Phreesia, MediFind uses cutting-edge technology to connect high-intent patients with the right doctors and treatments based on the patient’s condition.  

Patrick Howie, Founder of MediFind and Vice President, Product Management at Phreesia, spoke with us about how MediFind builds on Phreesia’s legacy of engaging with patients while they’re in a healthcare state of mind and activating them at critical moments along the patient journey.  

See below for a lightly edited summary of our discussion. 

Phreesia: Why is MediFind a great fit with Phreesia’s portfolio? How does it advance Phreesia’s mission to activate patients in order to improve their healthcare outcomes? 

Patrick Howie: MediFind’s mission has always been to reduce time in the treatment journey for patients. One of our core focuses is helping patients find the right doctor or specialist for their condition. However, we haven’t always had direct relationships with those doctors, so we couldn’t help patients easily connect with them to make appointments.  

“Now that MediFind is part of Phreesia, we have access to Phreesia’s provider network and can help close the loop: Patients can look for a doctor, book their appointment and check-in for their visit in a streamlined, user-friendly way.”

Now that MediFind is part of Phreesia, we have access to Phreesia’s provider network and can help close the loop: Patients can look for a doctor, book their appointment and check-in for their visit in a streamlined, user-friendly way. MediFind is also helping to enhance Phreesia’s mission of patient activation and driving better health outcomes by expanding Phreesia’s ability to connect with patients beyond those who have already chosen their doctor, as well as helping more doctors get new patients who may not have found them when searching for care on their own. 

Phreesia: What makes MediFind different from other consumer websites that help you find healthcare providers? 

Patrick Howie: The biggest difference by far is the way we’ve thought about patients, particularly those who are looking for a doctor. There are clearly other websites offering to help patients find a doctor, but they almost always exclusively prioritize patients who are searching for a specialist, without regard to the patient’s specific condition. If you have a challenging condition or a rare disease, and you already know or suspect what your problem is, MediFind believes the next step is to bring in an expert to address your issue. However, not every doctor is an expert in every condition or disease. Our rankings are based on a variety of data sources such as the number of articles a doctor has published in medical journals, prescribing and referral patterns, as well as the number of patients a doctor sees for a given condition. Our database is not based on user reviews, and doctors do not pay to be included.  

Our Doctor Finder starts with all the specific conditions and diseases that a patient might have and shares the best doctors in the world so the patient can see what care is available to them. Generally, if you talk with patients who have an issue finding the right specialist, it could take days, weeks, months or maybe even years for them to get connected with experts, which can have a negative impact on their health. MediFind’s ability to cut that time short is by far our biggest distinction and why we’ve been able to grow so rapidly compared with these incumbent sites that have been around for 20 years.  

Phreesia: How has MediFind joining Phreesia expanded the number of patients we can reach?  

Patrick Howie: Phreesia’s patient base comprises patients whose providers use Phreesia’s technology, whereas MediFind’s patient pool is broader. Now, as part of Phreesia, MediFind opens the aperture to any patient who is not satisfied with their current provider or who needs to find another doctor, which may be necessary for various reasons, such as receiving a new diagnosis or because their doctor has retired. Phreesia is perfectly positioned right at the point of care, and MediFind is a great extension for engagement as our patient base is individuals seeking to get to the point of care. 

Phreesia: Why is it so important to connect with patients across every stage of their care journey?  

Patrick Howie: MediFind is designed to match the patient journey, which realistically is very episodic. Finding a doctor is the number one most important action, but the reality of the patient journey is that you frequently find multiple doctors, whether you want to get a second opinion or have side effects that require another specialist to help manage.  

Patients typically don’t think about their health until they have to, so when they come to MediFind, they’re looking for a solution to solve their problem. They’re constantly going through the journey of considering what their condition could be, so we built a symptom checker for patients to assess factors such as which type of doctor they should see, and we have a clinical trial finder to help patients who may be much further along in their journey find a novel treatment. Now, with the ability to integrate with Phreesia, we can engage these individuals who are actively seeking out critical health information and effectively guide them to action.  

Phreesia: How can MediFind help life sciences companies connect with patients during critical moments of their healthcare journey? 

Patrick Howie: MediFind is the only digital platform that empowers brands to engage with patients when they’re actively searching for the best doctors and treatments. Our platform reaches more patients in the moment they are actively searching for care than any other website, which is why we’re the No. 1 organic Google search result for patients seeking the best doctors across the thousands of health conditions that we cover. This closely aligns MediFind with Phreesia’s reach, as both platforms are rooted in interacting with patients when they are in a healthcare state of mind.  

With MediFind, brands can reach high-intent patients who are much more likely to listen to messaging at the moment in their healthcare journey when it feels personal to them and the care they are searching for, versus seeing brand messaging on TV, social media or a different consumer website during a more general time in their life.

Learn how MediFind and Phreesia can connect you with highly engaged patients and help them find better care, faster. 

• Share on Facebook
• Share on Twitter
• Share on LinkedIn
• Email