Sponsored by: First Step Growth
Ernest Tavares III is a 3x Head of Growth, Wharton Alum and the founder of First Step Growth:
"After scaling Mochi Health's ARR by 10x and reducing Commure’s AI Scribe CAC by 75%, I’m bringing that same operator-first mindset to ambitious DTC health organizations."
We’ve successfully deployed over $250M in paid spend, and now, we’re ready to extend our expertise to your brand. 👉 Click here to book an intro call!
Now, let’s get to it:
ACCESS model update
OpenAI + OpenClaw
Google’s new engine for drug discovery
18 new tools/partnerships, 4 funding updates, new AI jobs & link-worthy content
Read time: 5 minutes
Our Picks ✨
Highlights if you’ve only got 2 minutes…
1/
ACCESS model update
CMMI just released the long awaited payment rates for its new ACCESS model and the debate started immediately. Many called the rates too low and questioned whether traditional digital health players can make the math work. The model is meant to pay providers to use tech enabled tools like telehealth, wearables, and digital coaching to manage chronic conditions for Medicare patients. But the published rates are widely viewed as lean, raising real questions about who can operate profitably under this structure.
That tension may be intentional. ACCESS seems to favor AI first, lower cost care models and new entrants that can rethink their cost base from the ground up. Meanwhile, several major commercial payers have pledged to align with ACCESS style outcomes based payments, potentially extending the framework beyond Medicare. If CMS is betting that technology can bend the cost curve for seniors, ACCESS could be a calculated move to reshape chronic care at national scale. (link)
2/
OpenAI + OpenClaw
Peter Steinberger, the Austrian developer behind the viral AI agent framework OpenClaw, is joining OpenAI after a reported bidding war with Meta that valued offers in the billions. OpenClaw, built on Anthropic’s Claude models, quickly became one of the clearest signals that consumers are ready for AI agents, pulling in nearly 200,000 GitHub stars, millions of weekly visitors, and explosive grassroots adoption in just a few months. As an open source project, the real asset was never just the code. It was distribution, trust, and proof of demand.
The move reflects a broader shift. As foundation models commoditize, the competitive edge moves to the doing layer. In healthcare, where administrative waste is a systems problem, agents are built to operate across fragmented workflows. That could mean handling prior auths, fighting claim denials, coordinating appointments, and resolving billing disputes. On the consumer side, OpenAI’s reach positions it to also build agents that could help orchestrate an entire care journey. All in all, this feels like a meaningful step toward OpenAI’s agent driven future. (link)
3/
Google’s new engine for drug discovery
Isomorphic Labs just unveiled its next leap beyond AlphaFold with the new Drug Design Engine, IsoDDE, and the implications for drug discovery are significant. While AlphaFold 3 transformed structure prediction, IsoDDE moves further into real world drug design by dramatically improving accuracy across protein ligand modeling, antibody interactions, and binding affinity prediction.
On challenging benchmarks designed to test truly novel systems, IsoDDE more than doubled AlphaFold 3’s accuracy. It can predict how tightly a drug binds to its target better than leading physics based simulations, but at a fraction of the time and cost. Even more striking, it can identify hidden and cryptic binding pockets from amino acid sequence alone, tasks that can take months of lab work.
The result is a shift toward designing and optimizing medicines entirely in silico, accelerating timelines and expanding the number of viable shots on goal for hard to treat diseases. Demis Hassabis said most diseases could be cured within 10 years — let’s hope he’s right! (link)(tweet)
Tools & Partnerships 🔧
Latest on business, consumer, and clinical healthcare AI tools and partnerships…
TOOLS
HHS releases Medicaid spending data by provider: HHS and DOGE published Medicaid spending by provider from 2018 to 2024, sparking mixed reactions across platforms and raising fresh debate about transparency, growth patterns, and fraud scrutiny. (link)
Amazon One Medical adds AI lab result insights: Amazon One Medical launched Health Insights, an AI-powered feature that helps patients better understand lab results and recommended next steps. (link)
Wolters Kluwer expands agentic AI for medication workflows: Wolters Kluwer Health is deepening its use of agentic AI to streamline medication management, clinical decision support, and prescribing workflows. (link)
Commure launches unified Commure Pro platform: Commure introduced Commure Pro, a clinical intelligence platform combining ambient AI, autonomous coding, charge capture, and CDS within a single data layer. (link)
Study finds limited AI scribe guidance for residents: Research shows medical residents often lack structured guidance when using AI scribes, raising concerns about training and documentation standards. (link)
Hinge Health projects $732M revenue with AI growth: Hinge Health forecasted 2026 revenue of $732M, citing continued growth and expanded investment in AI-powered musculoskeletal care. (link)
Mount Sinai study warns AI can amplify misinformation: Researchers found healthcare AI tools without strong safeguards may repeat false claims, particularly when misinformation appears authoritative. (link)
Oxford study warns chatbots may give unsafe medical advice: A new study cautioned that AI chatbots can provide unsafe or misleading medical guidance, especially in high-risk scenarios. (link)
Authoritative medical misinformation more likely to fool AI: Researchers found medical AI systems are more prone to incorrect advice when false information appears to come from credible sources. (link)
Keragon launches plain-English HIPAA automation builder: Keragon introduced Keragon AI, a conversational tool that lets healthcare teams create HIPAA-compliant automations using natural language instead of code. (link)
Michigan Health AI scans brain MRIs in seconds: Michigan Medicine developed an AI model that rapidly analyzes brain MRIs, aiming to accelerate diagnosis and clinical workflows. (link)
Best in KLAS 2026 highlights AI and EHR leaders: The Best in KLAS 2026 report named top vendors across ambient AI, EHRs, revenue cycle, and other healthcare IT categories. (link)
PARTNERSHIPS
Sutter Health + OpenEvidence: Sutter Health partnered with OpenEvidence to integrate its clinical search and guideline tool directly into Epic workflows for physicians. (link)
CommonSpirit Health + Midstream Health: CommonSpirit is expanding AI use into financial operations to automate workflows and improve revenue cycle performance. (link)
Sierra + Cedar: Sierra partnered with Cedar to build Kora, an AI voice agent designed to support patient billing and revenue cycle communications. (link)
Mayo Clinic + Siemens Healthineers: Mayo Clinic and Siemens expanded their AI and digital twin collaboration to advance imaging, diagnostics, and precision medicine research. (link)
Eight Health Systems + AI Patient Messaging: Eight health system leaders are standardizing AI-generated patient messages to improve consistency, efficiency, and governance across digital communications. (link)
Hillsboro Health + Oracle Health: The Illinois health system will adopt Oracle Health’s EHR and AI tools to modernize clinical and operational workflows. (link)
Deal Desk 💰
Spotlight on latest capital raises, M&A, and investments…
FUNDING
Talkiatry, an NYC-based psychiatrist employer, raised $210M in Series D funding. Perceptive Advisors led the round and was joined by Sofina and existing investors. (link)
Garner, an NYC-based healthcare navigation company, raised $118M at a $1.35B valuation led by Kleiner Perkins with participation from Redpoint, Maverick Capital, Kaiser Permanente Ventures, Mercy, and Plus Capital. (link)
Anterior, an NYC-based AI platform designed for health plans, raised $40M in funding from NEA, Sequoia Capital, FPV, and Kinnevik. (link)
Take2, an NYC-based agentic AI platform designed for healthcare recruiting, raised $14M in Series A funding. Human Capital led the round. (link)
Stay on top of the healthcare AI market and track our portfolio 📈
as of 2/14/25
Other Relevant News 🔍
News, podcasts, blogs, tweets, resources, etc…
AI Job Opportunities 💼
Explore our AI Job Board or contact us to feature roles in our newsletter…
Business Development Rep at Stedi, a healthcare clearing house company
$110 - $125k | Remote (link)
Head of Engineering at Rockland, an AI-native back-office platform for Medicaid
$180 - $220k | SF (link)
Customer AI Strategist at Valerie Health, a health AI infrastructure startup
$120 - $180k | SF (link)
Visuals of the Week 📸
Funny memes, cool pics, and interesting data from around the web…
That’s it for this week friends! Back to reading — I’ll see you next week.
Stay classy,
PS. I write this newsletter for you. So if you have any suggestions or questions, feel free to reply to this email and let me know
How was this week's newsletter? Tap your choice below👇
