Wellster was founded in Munich in 2018 by Dr. Manuel Nothelfer and Nico Hribernik. Its vision is to build the largest and most caring healthcare company in Europe. Including in the Wellster stable of brands are gospring.de (intimate health), myspring.com (hair loss), helloeasy.de (mental health), easyderma.de (skin health) and easytesten.de (medical self-tests).
Wellster began their partnership with Medihive in March 2021.
The Challenge
German legislation made offering a fully virtual prescription service impossible from within the country. Wellster needed a partner who was regulated to offer clinical services online and could do so from outside of Germany. They needed a partner with a track record of delivery in this space.
Wellster knew their service would be perceived as a disruptor amongst the German medical community. Therefore, they needed a partner who put clinical governance at the heart of any solution, and it was vital that their chosen partners’ QMS would stand up to the most stringent clinical scrutiny. With our proven track record, that’s where we came in.
Our Solution
For over ten years, Medihive has offered clinical services online via our digital platform, Webdoctor.ie. Because of this, our team has an unparalleled depth of experience in virtual health.
Medihive is clinically led, spearheaded by our co-founder and Chief Medical Officer, Dr Sylvester Mooney. Dr Mooney holds a wealth of knowledge with a Biochemistry degree, a Medicine Degree from RCSI, a Research Fellow in endocrinology, and over 40 years of experience as a General Practitioner. At the start of our engagement, Wellster’s CMO did a full clinical audit of our processes. This included reviewing our 2 month-long onboarding process for GPs which follows a rigid training and assessment programme, including roleplay and shadowing by Medical Directors.
Wellster was particularly impressed and reassured by our employment arrangement. Our GPs are directly employed by Webdoctor ltd, which gave greater stability and quality to Wellster patients.
All of our doctors are registered with the Irish Medical Council and work under a comprehensive QMS system. This includes standard operating procedures (SOPs) for all tasks, such as prescribing, adverse events, antibiotic usage, complaints, clinical notes, performance management, QC, video consultations etc. Our ethos in not prescribing controlled drugs, such as opiates, is shared by Wellster and they were very impressed by our use of artificial intelligence to detect patients fraudulently looking for “drugs of abuse”, such as codeine.
The Results
- We now provide over 5,000 consultations per month for Wellster patients
- Increased indications from 1 to 5
- Zero patient complaints since launch
- Facilitated the launch of new brands aimed at different market segments
“Medihive is not only a trustworthy partner serving our patients but they are a centre of competence for realised our shared vision to digitalise healthcare services in Europe, combining professionalism with the agility needed in a fast-moving business.”
Markus Haug, COO, Wellster
