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Abridge’s foray into life sciences		Read in browser

Tuesday, 16 June 2026

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Telehealth-in-a-box

Want to prescribe GLP-1s online? OpenLoop Health says it can get your virtual care company up and running in as little as 24 hours.

OpenLoop provides the behind-the-scenes medical group powering a bunch of prescription-writing telehealth businesses, like eMed and Remedy Meds (according to a recent lawsuit against OpenLoop) and Grindr (yes, Grindr has a telehealth site). Its new offering, Launchpad, is a sort of website builder meant to help “health and wellness brands and creators” stand up every other component of telehealth as well, from the virtual storefront to the patient portal to tools for scheduling and other administrative work.

“What used to require development, compliance teams, countless tools, months of build time, significant upfront capital, Launchpad does in a single AI-guided flow,” Chris Aker, OpenLoop’s chief commercial officer, told us.

Easy-peasy. But should standing up a telehealth company be this easy?

OpenLoop was the target of some criticism in April when The New York Times profiled a two-person company it powered. The company, MEDVi, claimed it will generate nearly $2 billion in sales in its second year selling cheap weight loss drugs. The FDA had sent a warning letter to MEDVi earlier in the year over the way it labeled its compounded drugs. Other reports claimed MEDVi ran ads featuring AI-generated doctors; MEDVi blamed marketing affiliates.

When asked how OpenLoop vets who it works with — and if the plan is to help launch more MEDVis — Aker didn’t directly answer the question. He said OpenLoop’s focus is on the patient experience, safety and quality, while partners handle their own customer relationships and marketing. If it becomes aware of "inappropriate activity,” it’ll review and potentially terminate contracts, he said. He declined to say what constitutes inappropriate behavior. OpenLoop, too, has been sued over its compounded oral tirzepatide products.

The way Launchpad is positioned makes clear OpenLoop is looking to partner with folks that may not have any healthcare expertise, but do have big audiences ready to buy what they recommend. In the most generous interpretation, it could be said that this could expand access to care and prescription treatments that people clearly want. But it also erodes that sacred doctor-patient relationship in favor of an experience that feels transactional and impersonal.

Telehealth, welcome to the last stage of internet marketing.

- Shelby

Here’s what’s new

Eli Lilly invests in startup Abridge for clinical trial recruitment

Eli Lilly has invested in Abridge as the health tech startup expands into clinical trial recruitment and broadens its reach into the life sciences.

The investment, made through Lilly’s venture arm, is meant to help the biopharma company more precisely identify patients who may qualify for specific clinical trials, CEO Shiv Rao told Endpoints News at an Abridge event Thursday. No dollar amount was disclosed.

Quote of the week

The core thesis is conversations. And from the conversation, what use cases can we extend to? ... On the biopharma side, clinical trial recruitment is the way.

Abridge CEO Shiv Rao

This week in health Тech

The American Medical Association has come out against autonomous and semiautonomous AI in healthcare. At its annual meeting last week, the organization adopted a new policy saying it will push for legislation and regulation that requires AI tools used for diagnostics, prescriptions, care management and other purposes to be integrated with doctor-led teams and used at the direction of the treating doctor; respect the continuity of care; and have transparent, auditable data that demonstrates safety and efficacy.

The AMA also adopted policies opposing the use of AI as a substitute for physician review when health plans make coverage decisions.

A Nature paper found that general LLMs such as ChatGPT and Claude performed better than specialized AI clinical search tools made by OpenEvidence and UpToDate on medical knowledge tests and answering clinicians' questions. OpenEvidence in return said the study is poorly designed and biased, as the authors run a competing AI tool.

Centene is offering most of its employees buyouts after facing shrinking membership across its health plan business, especially in the individual market, Bloomberg reports.

Matt Holt’s Thoreau, the firm that once was trying to combine five health tech companies into one, bought revenue cycle management company Ensemble Health, Axios reports. The reported deal is worth $12 billion.

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