Meet The Entrepreneur Whose Startup Offering Medication For Quitting Opioids Just Raised $50 Million

In early 2019 Zack Grey was on the point of graduate enterprise college from Wharton when his girlfriend died of an opioid overdose.

“That is any individual who had each cause to get entry to high quality insurance coverage, had a superb job, was a extremely motivated, had the monetary sources to afford therapy and she or he was a really personal individual, she didn’t need anybody figuring out about her downside, however she knew that with a purpose to cease utilizing she would wish the assistance of medicines to at the least get by way of withdrawal interval,” Grey says. “She discovered it simpler to get it simpler this remedy by way of a drug vendor than a health care provider, grew to become dependent upon the black marketplace for persistent remedy, finally began utilizing once more and overdosed.”

Grey determined he wished to do one thing to resolve downside although he was skeptical that he’d have the ability to as a result of he had beforehand majored in philosophy and astrophysics at Columbia, and didn’t have background in healthcare. Nevertheless, he began speaking to medical professionals and realized that the gold commonplace therapy is named remedy assisted therapy (MAT), and it seemed just like the therapy one would possibly get for melancholy or anxiousness.

So, simply after graduating from Wharton Grey began Ophelia, a digital supplier of medication-assisted therapy which helps sufferers by way of telemedicine and infrequently treats them within the privateness of their houses. Earlier this month, Ophelia raised a $50 Million Collection B Led by Tiger International.

“A number of therapy facilities don’t prescribe any remedy and with out that 90% of individuals will relapse inside the first 3 months and which level they’ve destroyed their tolerance and are actually at a better danger of overdose and demise in comparison with earlier than getting into therapy,” Gray says. “There’s large demand for remedies that work, which are already lined by insurance coverage, however there are tons of obstacles that get in the best way of individuals accessing therapy and your entire mission of Ophelia is to make that therapy extra accessible by bringing down obstacles for sufferers and clinicians.”

In response to Gray, a really small variety of clinicians in America have the license to prescribe drugs for quitting opioids and there’s an enormous lack of eligible prescribers for what the CDC considers a chronic disease.

“Many counties in America wouldn’t have a single prescriber, so if you wish to go you’d be driving perhaps an hour in every approach, and if you’re involved about privateness you’re going to have a tough time staying personal if you need to attend group remedy,” Gray says. “The opposite choices is to name up somebody on the black market and infrequently folks choose to purchase this illegally and spend money fairly than use their insurance coverage.”

The best way Ophelia determined to deal with this downside was by permitting anybody with a license to apply from residence for 8 hours per week from residence evenings and weekends, and has created a team-based scientific mannequin in order that prescribers are paired with nurse and care coordinator accountable for managing their sufferers.

As soon as a possible affected person decides to hitch Ophelia they undergo a screening questionnaire to find out their eligibility, what insurance coverage they’ve (or whether or not they wish to pay in money), reply some questions in regard to medical severity (as some individuals are too sever to be handled simply by way of telemedicine) after which they might have a cellphone name with one of many care coordinators who educate them about this system. After that the sufferers fill out a medical kind, and finally meet over video chat with a licensed prescribing clinician. 

So far as income mannequin, Ophelia operates like a medical doctors workplace, the place they supply medical companies to sufferers and invoice the insurance coverage corporations.

Simply after beginning Ophelia, Gray was accepted into Y Combinator and he determined to deliver on Mattan Griffel, an outdated pal who serves as a school member at Columbia’s Enterprise Faculty, as a cofounder.

The corporate they’ve cofounded handled its first affected person in April of 2020. Since then, it has grown 6-7x YoY and doubled its income in the previous few months. It has insurance coverage contracts overlaying ¼ of US inhabitants, and is licensed to function in 27 states. 

Ophelia, which is headquartered in Brooklyn, and employs almost 100 folks, had beforehand raised a mixed $3 million pre-seed and seed spherical in April of final 12 months, and a $15 million Collection A in April of this 12 months. With the $50 million Collection B, the overall quantity of fairness funding within the firm has grown to $68 million.