Seven years after selling online pharmacy startup pillpacks to Amazon for about $1 billion, TJ Parker and Elliot Cohen are back with new ideas. This time we are following a broader healthcare experience.
They just launched general medicine. The platform they call it aims to get medical care “as easy as shopping online.” They were joined by Ashwin Muralidharan, who had previously worked closely with Amazon’s top healthcare executive Neil Lindsay.
General Medicine: The Second Law of the Pill Pack Founders to Revolutionize the Ways of Americans Access Care
General medicine functions as a medical market. Users can match their provider based on their specific needs, or chat with someone about their symptoms. Even if you are considering refilling your prescription or finding a specialist, your goal is to simplify the process. The platform supports both insurance payments (which are accepted by most major providers) and cash.
To provide care, startups draw from a combination of their own medical groups, local clinics, networks of experts, and labs. It’s more than just telehealth. They aim to connect the dots between digital access and physical care.
Pillpack co-founder and CEO TJ Parker literally grew up in medicine. The pharmacist’s son, Parker spent his teen years at his father’s drugstore, often supplying medicines to in-home patients. He later registered with the University of Massachusetts Pharmacy, but was disillusioned with where the industry headed. That frustration helped to promote the idea of Pillpack, which is currently licensed in 47 states and has a team of over 66 employees.
New healthcare markets for accessing healthcare “as easy as online shopping”
General Medicine said it hopes to “create access to the horrific experience of American healthcare and excellent care.”
They left Amazon in 2022. They founded general medicine in 2023 and quietly began serving patients earlier this year. The company is currently open to the public.
Their pitch is direct: health care in the US is a disruption and they believe it doesn’t have to be so painful to get good care.
For years, Amazon has been doing its own healthcare push. The company has shut down its in-house telehealth services and fitness wearables, but it still runs Amazon Pharmacy (born from the PillPack deal), and owns one healthcare after it acquired it in 2022 for $3.9 billion.
General Medicine is not trying to change doctors or become the next major healthcare provider overnight. However, with the two Pillpack founders at the helm and a clear mission, it is another serious attempt to fix some of the system, with many feeling it stopped working a long time ago.
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