Telemedicine For All Your Women’s Health Needs

Telehealth usage in the last year has increased by 6,000%. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, health care providers and patients rapidly shifted to virtual visits from traditional office care to reduce infection rates. There are other fantastic benefits for patients: appointments when you want them, no travel time, and no paper gowns. The data are clear that we’ve reached a tipping point in both patient satisfaction and demand for telehealth visits.

Beyond the shifting of traditional healthcare to virtual platforms, the world of Direct to Consumer (D2C) Telehealth has expanded, particularly in the area of women’s health.

D2C companies connect people with healthcare providers directly via their app or website without a referral or relationship with an existing health system. Some are offered as part of a covered benefits package from an employer. Women can now quickly connect with a healthcare provider for pregnancy care, birth control prescriptions, mental health, lactation support and more. With women controlling 80% of healthcare spending and being 33% more likely to see a doctor than men it’s an obvious opportunity for investment and has seen a significant growth curve.

I spoke with Megan Zweig, COO of Rock Health, and Jasmine DeSilva, Research Manager at Rock Health about trends they are seeing in the funding of women’s telehealth companies.

According to the Rock Health team, “Between 2011 and 2015, women+ focused telemedicine startups did not raise any venture funding. In 2015, these startups raised $17M across just four deals. Fast forward to 2018, that number increased to $265M across eight deals. So far in 2021, women+ focused telemedicine startups raised $548M in funding across just five deals with an average deal size of $109.6M (triple that of 2018’s $33.1M average); this was spearheaded by Ro’s $500M mega-deal in March 2021.”