Well: Transforming Swiss healthcare

Switzerland boasts an abundance of healthcare providers and services. While that might be perceived as a good thing, it often causes difficulty for customers as they attempt to sort through the plethora of available options to find what’s right for them.

Well Gesundheit AG is a Swiss digital-health startup backed by CSS Holding AG, Allianz Care, Visana AG and Zur Rose Group. These entities contribute not only capital to the startup venture but also technical tools and telemedicine expertise.

Well wanted to enable better access to quality healthcare treatment and transparency through a platform that would allow all customers, regardless of their health insurer, to easily navigate Switzerland’s healthcare offerings, conveniently connect with the right providers and efficiently select the services they need. Leveraging the capabilities of its founding companies along with technology and strategic consulting support from Accenture, Well set out to develop an innovative insurance-led digital healthcare platform.

In a mere six months, the company developed a minimum viable product (MVP) in the form of an initial platform and a corresponding application. We provided technical support to the venture by assisting with the design of integrated journeys and leveraging the Zur Rose interoperability platform for orchestrating the digital services—many of which are on Google Cloud. We also provided strategic support in the form of hiring key personnel and assisting with brand build, communication and go-to-market planning and execution, and operational setup.

The platform is designed to allow customers easy, convenient, around-the-clock access to personalized healthcare services through a few touches to their digital device. For example, a digital symptom checker enables an initial diagnosis while using geolocation technology. The application then proposes the nearest experienced healthcare provider to the customer.

With this platform, customers can directly request medical support through phone, video and chat, book appointments, and order medications and additional services. The platform also allows for secure, customer-directed sharing of personal medical information.

The Well platform promises Switzerland’s people and healthcare community a customer experience transformation. The platform is available to all healthcare sector participants, including practitioners, medical facilities, pharmacies, insurers and related service providers―with benefits to the entire healthcare ecosystem.

Customers can securely control and organize their healthcare at all stages of the treatment lifecycle. Information access and sharing capabilities enhance and support diagnostic speed and decision making. Data transparency helps reduce insurance costs and avoid unnecessary testing.

Well also enables new connections between players across industry boundaries. Insurers and other ecosystem partners will now have access to a much larger client base, creating new business opportunities that benefit service providers and their customers.

Accenture’s goal is to humanize healthcare—providing people with access to care where they live and experiences that are personalized and convenient, to ultimately yield more positive outcomes. Platforms like this one by Well are leading the way and illustrating what’s possible when stakeholders collaborate.