Swoop has taken control of more than 60 patient communities by acquiring MyHealthTeam, positioning the Real Chemistry spinout to offer new communication options to its pharma clients.
MyHealthTeam runs condition-specific communities such as “My Asthma Team” and “My Obesity Team.” The chronic and rare disease sites contain articles, answers to questions and conversations about their respective conditions. Many of the patient communities, including some Spanish-language groups, have more than 100,000 members, according to MyHealthTeam’s figures.
Swoop has identified the communities as a good fit for its strategy. The company, which split off from the agency Real Chemistry last year, calls itself an AI-driven omnichannel healthcare marketing business. Swoop’s offering includes support for marketing to healthcare professionals and directly to consumers, plus help with planning, running and tracking TV campaigns.
The company said integrating MyHealthTeam into the offering will enable pharma companies to engage with condition-specific communities, “scale opted-in patients reach across all channels” and generate first-party data to better understand patients and healthcare professionals.
Eric Peacock, co-founder and CEO of MyHealthTeam, framed the merger as beneficial for patients, too, saying in a statement that Swoop’s claims data, machine learning and AI capabilities will help personalize the information individuals receive. Peacock said MyHealthTeam will “launch communities in many more conditions this year.”
MyHealthTeam has a history of working with biopharma companies. Belgian drugmaker UCB, which led a $9.4 million series B investment in MyHealthTeam in 2019, partnered with the company to create patient engagement programs. And AbbVie and Merck KGaA have partnered with MyHealthTeam on psoriasis and multiple sclerosis, respectively.