SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Pair Team, the first operational platform and tech-enabled care teams for community health centers, announced today it has closed a $7.3 million round of funding backed by NTTVC, Newark Venture Partners and 8VC. This new financing enables Pair Team to accelerate the company’s mission to build the digital infrastructure for the nation’s most underserved communities. To date, Pair Team has raised nearly $10 million total in venture capital funding.
Founded in 2019 by Neil Batlivala, a healthcare technologist, and Cassie Choi, a registered nurse (RN), Pair Team provides tech-enabled care teams and digital assistants that act as a virtual extension of community health centers to improve access and clinical outcomes for their communities. The company offers a comprehensive solution that provides a personalized, high-touch care experience while addressing barriers to care such as lack of transportation, housing/food insecurity and mobile phone access. Pair Team also offers a unique care delivery platform leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to implement clinical best practices, integrate care with community-based organizations and automate workflows so that clinicians can focus their time on patients.
Pair Team's transformative approach has attracted the backing of more than 60 healthcare leaders including Dr. Andrey Ostrovsky, the former chief medical officer of Medicaid, Dr. Shantanu Nundy, chief medical officer of Accolade and Drew Crenshaw, chief population health officer at Oak Street Health.
Improving Health Outcomes
“Community health centers are the backbone and unsung heroes of our safety-net primary care system, yet they are systemically understaffed and under-resourced,” said Neil Batlivala, CEO and co-founder of Pair Team. “Medicaid is finally seeing the regulatory and payment model innovation needed for patients with complex clinical and social health needs. We empower our clinics with the technology and operational support to better meet their community needs and ultimately build patient trust.”
With the transition to value-based care, Batlivala and Choi seized an opportunity to modernize community health centers across the country to help them thrive financially within new payment models that are tied to improved health outcomes. Despite the pandemic, which caused patients to avoid medical offices and healthcare, Pair Team’s wrap-around technology tripled the rate of annual wellness visits and amplified revenue by more than 40% for clinics in 2021.
“The staff at community health centers are constantly underwater and clinicians are burning out to provide care for more than 40 patients a day. Yet our Medicaid system relies on these clinics to function,” says Dr. Ostrovsky. “Pair Team has built the clinical and operational model to not only improve the lives of patients, but also front-line healthcare workers.”
Rapid Growth and Expansion
COVID-19 has been an important catalyst to shine a spotlight on the glaring health inequity within the nation’s healthcare system, and government leaders are responding at both a federal and state level. These regulatory tailwinds are propelling Pair Team to expand nationally with a purpose built to tackle the fundamental challenges of staffing access, and social health barriers at the root of health inequity within Medicaid. Pair Team’s unique mix of an operations platform, automation and digital assistants creates a foundation from which to scale.
“Founders Cassie and Neil make an exceptional team to go after an important mission, putting technology to work for vulnerable populations,” says Vab Goel, Founding Partner at NTTVC. “A staggering 75 million people in the U.S. are dependent on Medicaid benefits for their healthcare, and we are looking forward to working alongside Pair Team to expand support for the community-based providers who make it their mission to care for these patients.”
Population health management places an enormous burden on primary care providers. The complexity of healthcare calls for additional support and services to manage the influx of data from patients, providers and payers, which is where Pair Team’s solutions are focused. Choi says the additional funding will support Pair Team’s ability to grow their team, help broaden partnerships with more clinics and continue building next-generation care solutions for our underserved communities that address not only their clinical needs but also their social health needs.
To date, Pair Team manages care for thousands of Medicaid patients and has closed thousands of care gaps with its remote care team. For more information about Pair Team, visit www.pairteam.com.
About Pair Team
Pair Team is the first tech-enabled care team that empowers community health centers to better meet the needs of their Medicaid and underserved communities. The company acts as an extension of the clinical staff to provide a personalized, high-touch care experience while addressing patients' barriers to care such as lack of transportation, housing/food insecurity and mobile phone access. Internally, Pair Team is building a unique care delivery platform to ensure clinical best practices integrate care with community-based organizations, and to automate administrative work so that clinicians can focus on their patients. For more information, please visit www.pairteam.com.
