Aligned with Epic, KeyCare raises $24 million

Telehealth startup KeyCare, based in Chicago, has raised $24 million from investors to expand its virtual care network, which integrates with electronic health record provider Epic, the company announced today.

Founded less than a year ago, KeyCare raised the Series A round from 8VC, LRVHealth, Bold Capital and Spectrum Health Ventures, bringing its total amount raised to about $27 million, said founder and CEO, Dr. Lyle Berkowitz.

KeyCare, a service sold directly to healthcare systems, allows caregivers the ability to access patient history and records across hospital systems if each uses Epic’s electronic health record system. Epic, based in Verona, Wis., is among the nation’s largest providers of electronic health records, holding more than 250 million patient records.

KeyCare’s software integrates with Epic, allowing nurses and doctors outside of a patient’s hospital system to view and maintain patients’ health records, creating a comprehensive and efficient experience for both parties, Berkowitz said. On the patient side, users are able to virtually connect with doctors across KeyCare’s network of health systems without leaving their primary health system’s patient portal.

“Epic’s built-in interoperability to share full records improves quality and experience for the patient,” Berkowitz said. “It decreases the cognitive dissonance of having to jump into a whole other system and increases the trust that their care is being done in a symbiotic way.”

KeyCare is designed to aid health systems, many of which are overwhelmed by the ongoing physician shortage brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic—though Berkowitz said the stress on systems is more a matter of managing resources.

“We don't have a shortage of physicians, we have a shortage of using them efficiently,” Berkowitz said. “The long-term concept is not how we simply replace a 15-minute office visit with a 15-minute video visit. We need to think about how we can support and help (physicians) take care of people as efficiently as possible.”

KeyCare soft-launched in early July with its first client and investor, Grand Rapids, Mich.-based Spectrum Health System, an operator of 14 hospitals in western Michigan. Patients across the Spectrum network are already booking appointments at providers outside Michigan, said Mandy Reed, Spectrum Health’s director of virtual health operations.

Reed said she chose to partner with KeyCare after exploring other telehealth options because of its compatibility with Spectrum’s existing health portal and the Epic system. KeyCare allows Spectrum to preserve brand loyalty across state lines while providing unparalleled “experience, clinical quality and technology workflow,” she said.

While KeyCare’s business model is still “evolving,” Berkowitz said he plans to generate revenue by charging patients and hospital system providers fees based on how many virtual visits they set up using KeyCare, and possibly charging hospital systems a small subscription fee on top of that.

Berkowitz has long worked in healthcare. He spent more than 20 years as a doctor and founding director at Northwestern Medicine’s Department of Innovation. Later, he co-founded Healthfinch, a prescription renewal software business, which was sold to Health Catalyst for more than $40 million in 2020. From 2018 to 2020, Berkowitz was also chief medical officer and executive vice president of product strategy for MDLive, one of the nation’s largest telehealth providers. Berkowitz is on the board of Oneview Healthcare, a patient engagement technology company based in Ireland.

At KeyCare, Berkowitz plans to use the new funding to expand the company’s network, starting with urgent care and therapy providers. He said the company is “rapidly hiring,” but declined to disclose revenue and headcount figures. The company’s LinkedIn page shows five people list themselves as working for the company.

KeyCare’s announcement comes as venture capital investors have slowed investments amid fears of a recession.  

However, Berkowitz said there was plenty of investor interest in KeyCare, adding that the round was oversubscribed.

“We have a very logical solution to a very real problem,” he said. “Health systems want to offer more virtual care, but they want to do it on the systems that they work on. We're just we're filling that need.”