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2021 in review: HealthHero reflects on a milestone year

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5 minute read

It’s been another transformational year for HealthHero We’ve come a long way, growing our business to over 800 people, operating in four countries and serving over 30 million lives. But that’s not all we’ve achieved this year. Take a look back at some of our key moments from 2021. 

Rocket ship launching into a dark blue sky with clouds at the base. The text depicts the achievements of health hero during the milestone year of 2021

January 12th 

HealthHero acquires MyClinic.ie 

In early 2021, we joined forces with Ireland’s leading, holistic telehealth service, MyClinic.ie. Since then, we’ve gone from strength to strength, partnering up with some of Irelands biggest pharmacies to deliver on-demand prescriptions, travel vaccinations and remote GP access.  

April 9th 

Silent Sufferers report launches 

One year on from the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, we wanted to understand the effect of the pandemic on peoples’ attitudes to accessing healthcare. “Protect the NHS” was the message delivered, and our research showed that close to half (45%) of those avoiding the GP surgery cited ‘not wanting to burden the NHS’ as their main reason for not booking appointments. Furthermore, almost four in ten (39%) determined that their condition was not serious enough to warrant seeing their GP, or cited fears about catching the virus (32%) at the surgery as reasons for not booking an appointment. See what else we discovered by downloading the Silent Sufferers report, here.   

April 12th 

HealthHero acquires French telehealth provider, Qare. 

Broadening our reach into Europe, our acquisition of Qare was a huge milestone in April 2021. Cementing our lead as the largest telehealth provider in Europe, Qare played a key part in helping us simplify healthcare and improve lives for 30 million people.    

May 17th 

HealthHero defines a new business purpose: Simplifying healthcare. Improving lives. 

Everything we do at HealthHero is guided by our strong belief that by simplifying healthcare, we can improve billions of lives. In May, we made it official by announcing our new business purpose to act as our guiding principle: Simplifying healthcare. Improving lives.  

June 21st 

Path to Wellbeing Revolution: eBook launches with COVER Magazine 

In June, we teamed up with COVER to explore the key changes taking place in healthcare services today. We analysed the effects of the revolutionary COVID period and addressed the need for adaptation, evolution, and education, across all areas of the sector – including advisers and employers too. Read the eBook here  

June 23rd 

New Validium website launches 

Last year, we acquired Validium, a holistic mental health service that supports over 2 million people. True to our mission, we wanted to simplify the Validium experience, so in June we launched a brand new website with bespoke illustrations and a more intuitive customer journey.  

June 24th 

Ranjan Singh, our CEO, supports the Guardian’s Sustainable Healthcare Campaign 

In June, the Guardian launched their Sustainable Healthcare Campaign, showing how COVID-19 has been a powerful catalyst for change, with patients and doctors switching to virtual consultations. We were delighted to take part in the campaign, with Ranjan Singh, our CEO, discussing the impact, learnings and changes in the industry in this article.   

August 16th 

We launch our company values: Simplify, Own, Aspire, Respect  

The pandemic accelerated our growth, acquisitions and offerings significantly – and with so many new people joining the team, we knew it was time as well to begin to articulate and codify the things we stand for. 

In August we shared with the world four new values:  

  • Simplify – We look for ways to remove complexity and make life easier for our patients, clients and colleagues. Simplicity creates clarity, so we can focus on what is critical and adds value. 
  • Own – We take accountability, honour our commitments and get things done with a focus on outcomes. We’re proactive, removing barriers and proposing solutions for concerns that impact patients, clients and colleagues. 
  • Aspire – We aim high, and take pride in our work. After all, we’re here because we want to deliver the best in what we do, creating impact and blazing a trail in healthcare. Motivated by results and opportunities, we strive to create a great place to work and give our people room to grow. 
  • Respect – We value diverse talent, experiences and perspectives, creating supportive environments where people can be themselves. We show empathy to patients, clients and colleagues and empower our people to do the right thing. 

September 16th 

Doctorlink marked as the most accurate and safe symptom checker in peer-reviewed research 

 Recent studies have shown that more of us than ever before are turning to online and digital tools to manage and improve our health. But we wanted to know how accurate the tools we’re using truly are. In a peer-reviewed study, researchers ran a series of 50 clinical cases through twelve publicly available symptom checkers to test their efficacy. The overall result showed significant room for improvement, with the correct diagnosis, listed first in just 38% of cases. 

Our online symptom checker from Doctorlink, part of the HealthHero family of companies, was one of only two symptom checkers that proved to be consistently accurate – with the correct diagnosis listed first in 68% of cases and in the top 5 diagnoses in 86% of cases, versus the average of 51%. Read the full findings, here.  

 November 2nd 

HealthHero recognised as a ‘Highly Commended’ company at the COVER Awards.  

In November we were thrilled to have been nominated for a cover award in the Outstanding Added Value (Provider) award category and the Outstanding Mental Health & Wellbeing Support award.  

Although we didn’t win, we were recognised as a ‘Highly Commended’ company in the Outstanding Added Value (Provider) award category which was a fantastic achievement! 

November 24th 

HealthHero partners with online pharmacy, Phlo 

 November also saw us partner with Phlo, which rounded off our milestone year. Health Hero adopted the Phlo Connect platform to allow patients to receive prescriptions more quickly and efficiently, staying true to our mission to simplify healthcare.   

Phlo Connect is an API driven pharmacy infrastructure platform which enables HealthHero to digitally send private prescriptions to a pharmacy. Phlo Connect integrates directly with our clinical management systems and provides patients with a simple checkout process to order and pay for their medication.   

2021 certainly wasn’t short on achievements and we can’t wait to see what 2022 brings. Why not follow our journey? Keep up to date on LinkedIn and Twitter. And don’t forget, we’re hiring. If you want to be a part of the digital health tech revolution, why not join the team? Check out our open HealthHero Jobs.