KeyCare wants to change how health care is delivered, and closed on $24M to make it happen

KeyCare wants to change the fabric of health care in the United States.

The virtual care platform closed on $24 million in Series A funding this week, and founder and CEO Lyle Berkowitz thinks the company has the potential to help health systems expand and take care of more patients while also closing some of the gaps that exist in health care access.

“People say that there’s a shortage of physicians in the country. I’d argue that we don’t have a shortage of physicians — we have a shortage of using them efficiently,” he told the Chicago Business Journal.

“People say that there’s a shortage of physicians in the country. I’d argue that we don’t have a shortage of physicians — we have a shortage of using them efficiently,” said founder and CEO Lyle Berkowitz.

Courtesy of KeyCare

The funding was backed by key players in the health care investment space such as 8VC, LRVHealth, Bold Capital and Spectrum Health Ventures.

Berkowitz expects the funding to be used to help the company execute its plan to work with more health systems over the coming year.

“We hope to be live with five health systems this year,” he added. “We went live with Spectrum Health already, and our plan is go live with five more.”

KeyCare, a remote-only, Covid-born company, is built to help health systems schedule patient appointments with a nationwide network of virtual care groups and uses electronic health record software by a company called Epic to ensure a seamless experience and accurate records.

Spurred by the pandemic, telehealth has seen a massive surge over the past few years. The American Hospital Association reports that overall telehealth use has stabilized at 38 times higher than before Covid-19 hit, ranging from 13% to 17% of visits across all specialties.

With a medical background that includes spending time as a physician and a health system executive, including 20 years at Northwestern, Berkowitz has wanted to find ways to better use technology to take care of patients and make life easier for doctors his entire career.

He helped launch Healthfinch, a workflow integration engine, that sold to Health Catalyst Inc. in 2020, and thinks that the sky is the limit for KeyCare with the potential to expand its virtual care capabilities beyond urgent care and behavioral health moving forward.