Prescription savings website GoodRx just acquired telemedicine startup HeyDoctor and plans to use the service to connect those scanning its website with doctors who can prescribe them medications virtually.

To start, GoodRx will offer visits for 18 conditions, including birth control, smoking cessation, urinary tract infections and erectile dysfunction.

Healthcare businesses are increasingly incorporating online visits with doctors.

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Patients turn to GoodRx's website for coupons to make their prescription medicines cheaper.

Now GoodRx wants to do the prescribing, too. On Thursday, GoodRx announced that it had acquired a telemedicine startup, and will start offering online doctor visits for about $20.

The new service complements GoodRx's main offering, which helps consumers shop around for lower prices on their prescription meds. GoodRx CEO Doug Hirsch declined to disclose the size of the deal. HeyDoctor, the startup GoodRx acquired, was valued at about $1.7 million as of mid-2018, according to PitchBook.

"We just thought we need to fill that gap," Hirsch said. "If you want to make it affordable, you have to take more control of the process."

The deal is the latest signal that digital doctor consults are taking on a larger role in US healthcare, as patients shop for care the same way they would mattresses or televisions. Prescription drug discount company Blink Health recently started offering telemedicine visits, and virtual care has also been an integral part of new healthcare businesses promising to diagnose and treat erectile dysfunction or hair loss, provide birth control, or straighten your teeth — all without leaving your home.

Telemedicine is taking off, from health insurers to Amazon

To start, GoodRx will offer online visits for 18 conditions, including birth control, smoking cessation, urinary tract infections, and erectile dysfunction. Patients connect with doctors either through secure chat or on the phone, rather than live video, which some other telemedicine platforms use.

Telemedicine today is taking off, with major health insurers rolling out their own services, too. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 82% of companies that have more than 200 employees covered telemedicine in 2019, up from the 39% of companies that size that covered the service in 2016.

Earlier this week, Amazon signaled a major interest in virtual healthcare, launching a pilot telemedicine service for its workers in Seattle. The company acquired the online pharmacy PillPack in 2018. Amazon acquired the online pharmacy PillPack in 2018. Hollis Johnson/Business Insider

Hirsch said it's likely a large share of healthcare will one day happen remotely.

"And again, I see us as sort of right smack in the middle there," he told Business Insider. "Having used it myself, it's one of those 'Aha' moments, 'Why didn't this exist before?'"

This isn't the first time GoodRx has experimented with helping customers get access to doctors who can prescribe medications. In March, the company quietly started listing startups like Hims and Roman that prescribe and ship pills alongside traditional pharmacies such as CVS and Walmart.

That experience led to the company's relationship with HeyDoctor, GoodRx's Hirsch told Business Insider.

The new business line is a profitable one, Hirsch said, but he described the revenue it could bring in as "on the smaller side, mostly because Americans right now are just waking up to this idea of online medical visits."

Others describe telemedicine and pharmacy services as a clear match

Blink Health, a competing prescription drug discount service, began offering telemedicine visits for birth control this month, alongside visits for men's health conditions like erectile dysfunction and hair loss. Unlike GoodRx Care, Blink offers prescription drug delivery as well.

"Investing in telemedicine and expanding our offerings was an obvious and easy decision," Blink Health CEO Geoffrey Chaiken said in a statement to Business Insider. "Our telemedicine offerings will continue to expand and we will have more details to share soon."

Krishna Yeshwant, who leads the life sciences investment team at GV, formerly Google Ventures, told Business Insider that he expects the trend of companies incorporating doctor's visits into their business models to continue. GV, through its consumer team, has invested in Pill Club, a company that prescribes and delivers birth control prescriptions.

Including a doctor's visit is "almost a prerequisite," he said, "because somebody needs to actually prescribe the medication. You can't go to CVS and get a new prescription for oral contraception."

In today's on-demand economy, healthcare hasn't kept pace

People in healthcare have been talking about telemedicine for a long time now. One of the major players, publicly-traded Teladoc, was founded in 2002. Yet these recent moves suggest telemedicine is today taking hold in a broader way among healthcare businesses.

According to a 2019 survey from consulting firm Accenture, 29% of the roughly 8,000 respondents surveyed said that they received some form of virtual care, up from 21% in a similar survey conducted in 2017.

Virtual healthcare reflects "a big difference and change that's happened in consumer expectations," said Victoria Summers, a leader on the Consumer and Patient Health team at consulting firm ZS Associates.

"You have the ability to search basically whatever you want, at your fingertips 24 hours a day. So the idea of waiting a week to find out test results or a week to get to doctor to find out whatever that rash is — there's an increasingly lower and lower tolerance among consumers," Summers said.

Companies that pair prescribing with pharmacy delivery, like Hims and Roman, have attracted hundreds of millions in funding from investors.

And this month, one went public: the clear aligners company SmileDirectClub, which raised $1.3 billion in an IPO, before tumbling in its stock market debut. SmileDirectClub's service connects customers with dental professionals who guide them through their straightening plan.