Company leader
Mike Albainy
Founder and Chief Innovation Officer
MD Clarity
Mike Albainy is the founder and chief innovation officer of MD Clarity, a software company that helps medical practices and health systems give patients accurate out-of-pocket cost estimates and check whether insurers are paying the rates in their contracts. He started it in 2010, after an experience with a medical bill showed him how hidden healthcare prices were, and he has spent about two decades in healthcare billing and data science.
Founding MD Clarity
Before MD Clarity he was a director at a software company, and he left that job to work on the cost of care. He began by building a cloud system for a group of orthopedic clinics. It let patients see what they would pay before a visit and let the clinics' staff check that insurers were paying the right rates. In a 2014 Miami Herald startup profile he gave the first product's aim: "The simple initial goal for the product was to make true patient out-of-pocket cost projections easy for a doctor's office staff to obtain for their patients."
He funded the company with $15,000 of his own money, and customer payments covered its growth after that.
In 2011 he moved from Seattle, Washington, to Miami, Florida, where he felt he could reach a larger network of healthcare providers.
By 2014 MD Clarity had seven employees in Miami's Brickell district and a second office in Seattle, and its customers included the Veterans Health Administration, Summit Orthopedics, HealthEast Care System, and The Polyclinic.
In those early years his team focused hardest on user experience, studying how people used the software and changing its screens until customers rarely needed training.
MD Clarity's Products
MD Clarity now sells patient cost estimate software that helps providers collect payment upfront and meet price transparency rules. It also sells revenue integrity software that finds underpaid and denied claims by comparing payments with each insurer contract, and contract software that pulls the key terms out of payer agreements so staff can search them.
The company runs on two principles: patients have a right to know what care will cost them, and doctors, nurses, and physician assistants deserve fair pay from insurers.
Dan Freeman is chief executive, and Albainy sets the strategic direction for its products.