In a healthcare landscape shaken by 2025's premium hikes and subsidy expirations, this rewind of Episode 35 with Wyatt Stokesberry, uncovers game-changing strategies for 1099 clinicians and freelancers, from cash-pay savings to self-funded plans and AI-driven transparency to thrive in 2026's uncertain market.
As 2026 unfolds with looming subsidy cliffs and rising uninsured rates, hosts Phoebe Gutierrez and Dr. Leo Damasco revisit Episode 35, featuring Wyatt Stokesberry. Growing up around business owners and ditching a corporate path, Wyatt shares his pivot from aspiring chef to health insurance innovator, emphasizing the thrill of breaking norms, embracing discomfort, and betting on yourself amid uncertainty.
Drawing from his experience building self-funded plans for small employers, Wyatt demystifies the fragmented insurance ecosystem, unbundling pharmacy, TPAs, stop-loss, networks, and brokers for cost savings. He spotlights the ACA marketplace's stagnation and launches Molly as a transparent, member-owned alternative for solopreneurs: AI tools for cost predictions, in-network checks, and personalized health insights, all while capping at 1,000 members to prioritize quality.
The episode dives into eye-opening realities: cash-pay rates slashing MRI costs by 60-70% (e.g., $300 vs. $2,000 deductible), negotiating bills like pros, and why frequent users need high-deductible catastrophic coverage. Wyatt warns of misaligned incentives, carriers profiting from confusion, and champions AI for empowerment, not denial, bridging wearables data to better risk profiles. Amid fears of AI overreach, the trio stresses ethical uses like navigation and transparency to rebuild trust.
For burnt-out W2 clinicians eyeing 1099 freedom, this rewind equips you with entrepreneurial mindsets, practical hacks, and hope: Molly's waitlist opens soon, proving innovation can outpace chaos and deliver care on your terms.
Three Actionable Takeaways:
About the Show:
Telemedicine Talks explores the evolving world of digital health, helping physicians navigate new opportunities, regulatory challenges, and career transitions in telemedicine.
About the Guest:
Wyatt Stokesberry, CEO and co-founder of Molly, a transparent health plan launching in Q1 2026 for 1099 freelancers, has over five years of health insurance expertise. A risk-taking entrepreneur who rejected corporate life, he leverages AI for efficiency and aims to rebuild trust in insurance.
Website: https://mollyhealth.com
Email: wyatt@mollyhealth.com.
About the Hosts:
[00:00:00] Hey everyone. Phoebe back with telemedicine talks. So we all know we're in 2026. We made it. 2025 was wild. I mean, who would've thought that we were gonna have so many changes when it comes to healthcare premiums, insurance, all of those things. So. I wanted to rewind a little bit and focus on an episode that I think really explains what we can all expect in 2026.
And that episode is episode 35 with Wyatt Stokes of Molly Insurance, Wyatt. Who grew up in the insurance industry, got out and decided to launch his own company that basically is a insurance plan for independent providers. And he taught us so much about just the inner workings of insurance. I mean, come on.
Like [00:01:00] I had no idea. That paying cash for services was probably actually cheaper than paying your deductible. That episode starts now. Give it a listen and we'll see you on the other side.
As always, we have our awesome host, Phoebe Gutierrez, and myself, the lowly cohost, Leo Damas, and today we have an awesome guest. We have STOs Barry. He is a CEO and co-founder of Molly. No, not that type of Molly, but we'll go into that a little further. He has over five years of experience in health insurance and uh, he brings expertise in building, scaling and consumer behavior, self-funded health plans.
Molly also, he is a self-starter, start his business at a very young age and has a lot of insights. You know, a lot of our audience here. We're looking into starting our own business and [00:02:00] a lot of us are just physicians straight off the bat. These are not the topics that we learned in med school and Wyatt, you are, I don't wanna say it, but way younger than me.
Um, and in business it's just got a lot further and a lot more knowledge and it's amazing how much you've learned. So, you know, it's awesome that you're here to kind of just help us navigate that and just kind of share your experience. So thank you so much for being here. Thanks for having me guys. I am super excited.
We're starting something new. Phoebe and I were talking about this and we're like, Hey, what are kind of interesting questions we could ask people kind of shake things out, right? There was a lot of questions she shot down that I had for good reason boring. They were just boring questions, right? Or just really like fifth grade level, because that's really as far as I could go.
But here's a good one that Phoebe came up with, Wyatt. What did you wanna be when you grow up? Did you always wanted to be this entrepreneur? This is like, hey, this is exactly where I thought I was gonna be. So, yeah, great [00:03:00] question. I actually, I wanted to be a chef growing up. I always would cook in the kitchen with my mom and yeah, I always wanted to own a restaurant, cook food for people.
I have a memorable trip that we actually went on when I was a kid and was down to New Orleans and we did this cooking school and I went up on stage and ever since then, obviously I wanted to be a chef, but. Things don't work out. Don't get me wrong. I still love cooking and I love eating food, but honestly, it was really growing up in an environment where I was surrounded by a lot of business owners.
So I was lucky enough to have some friends growing up where their dads were all successful business owners, and I got to see the good, bad, the ugly, and I loved every bit of it. I loved watching the struggle. I loved watching the Climb at the top. I loved watching people be at the top and everywhere in between, so it was always something.
From a young age that I had a lot of interest in. And also I think just doing things different and breaking the system and not having to conform to essentially those societal norms that everyone puts [00:04:00] on people. You have to go to college, you have to get a job, and funny enough, I've actually never worked a corporate job.
I actually accepted a corporate job after an internship, and then a week later went back and I just couldn't move forward with it. I really couldn't see myself just. Working at a job for the next 30, 40 years, just to retire at the age 60, 65, and not really live life, you know? And for some people that's totally fine and they want that corporate job.
They want to feel secure and retire at 65, which is totally fine, but just really wasn't for me. That's amazing. And then so where you, you founded your own business, you helped start this up. Where was that? You know, when did it click for you? What was the kind of eye-opening moment, the transition for you where it's like, Hey, you know, this is something that I can do.
And not only that, because you know, a lot of people just get stuck there, Hey, this is something I can, but not really go ahead and do it. You know, when did you realize it? It's something that not only can I do, but I will do and it is a possibility [00:05:00] and I'm gonna go forward. I don't know if it really ever does click.
When do you really determine, okay, what I've done and like what I'm doing is working? Is it revenue based? Is it happiness based? Is it your time? I think that's a hard question because some people could say, oh, I sold this business for a bunch of money, and that's when it clicked. Or I realized that I didn't have to work the corporate job and that's when it clicked.
And so I, I think for me it's the constant search, um, searching for the next job or searching to. See how I can break the system or see how I can do things differently, or just proving to people that there are other ways out there instead of working that corporate job. Yeah, I think it's all about the journey.
I always tell my girlfriend, like she always asks me, when do you really like understand, okay, this is my career path, this is what I'm doing, and like I feel secure in my future. And I don't think the answer's ever clear for anybody. I think it's hard to determine where you want to go, what you want to do, and I think it really just.
It comes down to doing stuff on a day-to-day basis. Obviously you have your long-term goals, but [00:06:00] really just getting 1% better every day or making sure, like every day you actually give it your all and do your best. You know? And I know that sounds very cliche, but I really think it's true. Like you can't win the day without winning the mornings, and you can't win the year without winning the days.
Yeah, no, I agree. I agree completely because interestingly enough, like I didn't have a very traditional path. Right. I. Had these jobs, I tried to soak up as much as I possibly could to just get the most out of it. Whereas like Leo on the other hand, like dude, like knew he was gonna be a doctor at like age of four, right?
So like he had like a very traditional, like, what are you talking about? Like, I always knew I was gonna do this. Whereas me, I'm like hopping from startup to startup and trying to, you know, like really just like soak the most up out of each experience. Because to your point, like. Part of it is the journey.
You really don't know what you like to do until you actually give it a shot and make some mistakes along the way and, you know, learn as you go. [00:07:00] And it's funny too that, you know, that answer could be different, right? You know, when you were growing up, that answer for you was, I'm gonna cook, I'm gonna be a chef.
Maybe I own my own restaurant, right? And now the answer's totally different, right? Because you know, and myself, right? I went through traditional route. I was always gonna be a doctor. And now. Like a lot of our audience here too, this change into something else, right? Not a doctor. It was kind of life altering.
And that's a lot of us asset and we're very objective concrete people. This doctor's here, we want an answer. And just like the answer of, I don't know, it's different for everybody. And you know, it could be a fluid answer may not necessarily sit well and for good reason. 'cause you know, maybe we just need to shake the foundation that we're thinking about like you were saying.
No, that's a super interesting answer. I think one big thing too is like timelines is everyone's timeliness really different. Some people figure it out in their early twenties, some people figure it out in their late forties. Some people it takes a year to figure out, and some people it takes [00:08:00] 20 years to figure out.
And I think like just knowing that and like taking your time and trying everything. I mean, I've lived in five different cities in the last seven years and just not getting comfortable in the current environment you're at, I think is huge. Yeah, I have to agree. It's that little sense of getting comfortable with always being uncomfortable, I think has been my secret of like, you know, you hear people that are like, oh, I'm coasting.
I feel like I'm constantly like an imposter. Same. Right. I don't know why, like, I don't know how I'm the smartest person in the room, but I, I, I guess I am today. You know, like some of those like moments where I'm like, oh, this is, you know, but I've just, yeah, you kind of just get used to being kind of rolling with the punches and I think that.
From an entrepreneur to an entrepreneur. I think sometimes that's like the little secret sauce too. Yeah, and I think one thing that helps is I've always been a big risk on individual, and I think you really find a way to make things work. Find a way to make ends meet, find a way to provide. [00:09:00] Yeah, it's kind of that feast or famine.
If you're fine and you can survive in that famine, you can do a lot. I like that way of thinking and a lot of us. Especially, you know, coming from the health background or even the physician background, it's other way around, right? It's not, find a way you have an answer, you work your way to it, and that whole, there may not be a definitive answer, is very disconcerting for a lot of us.
You know, Phoebe, when we were working with physicians and teaching 'em how to do telemedicine and branching out, I remember that was one of the frequent questions, especially the risk adverse doctors, right? How do I know for certain, what am I work working towards? And when we gave a pseudo answer, really an answer, that's not really an answer.
Like, oh, you just work, it was, it just, everything just fell apart. Right. It just, it couldn't get their hands around it. Yeah. Right. So how do you work around that? What's your kind of approach to that [00:10:00] and how do you. Basically make yourself comfortable for, you know, working in an uncertain kind of environment or really just being comfortably being uncomfortable.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I think that's a great question. I mean, I think it's, it's preparing yourself for one, obviously being uncomfortable, and then two, really preparing yourself, like when there's famine and getting comfortable in that setting, when that whale comes around or when that big opportunity comes around.
You can give everything to it and then you can a hundred percent capitalize on that situation. I think that's really what's happened for me is I was just waiting. I was really not making enough money, just enough to get by. And then when those big opportunities came by, you capitalize on them and you double down and you give everything that you can, right person, right time, right place, whatever it is, and you worked your ass off.
I mean, that's really what, like I said, happened to me. I had the right opportunity come in front of me and. I did everything I could to capitalize on it, and I learned a tremendous [00:11:00] amount. I think back to your question, people are never gonna be comfortable in an uncomfortable setting, and so I think if giving yourself and building the right tools around you, so when the time to be comfortable or that opportunity comes by, you can pounce on it.
I think sometimes too, one of the things I always tell myself is I like freak myself out when I feel like, oh, I'm failing or something's not working is I've made it this far. Yeah, I'm gonna keep gambling, I'm gonna keep betting on myself because like there's been something that has worked and like it's sometimes just like having a little bit of that faith, you know, I don't wanna say pat yourself on the back, but like at the end of the day, like.
If we've made it this far, I mean Wyatt, like your background and your resume, I think is like extremely impressive. I mean, the knowledge that you have are things that like I have no information on, and I think that at your age and kind of what you've done, it's a pretty amazing feat of like all the information that you've accumulated in your brain and what you're kind of building with Molly.[00:12:00]
Yeah, I appreciate that. I think it's all back to like right place and right time, getting the right opportunity to really double down and learn how something works, how an industry works. And I never thought I'd fall into health insurance. I mean, no one really does unless you're practicing to become a doctor or something like that.
And so, yeah, I had this opportunity come across my desk at my previous employer where someone needed some Excel spreadsheet work done and I said I could do that. From there, it obviously led to all the knowledge that I've retained today, and so it's very invaluable skills that you don't really realize are there and what you can learn from until you're in the setting and you're soaking up that information.
It's funny, I was talking to a buddy recently and you don't really realize how much you've learned and a certain subject or a certain topic until you're explaining it to someone who's never. Really understood that topic. So for example, health insurance, sometimes I find myself talking to my parents about how health insurance works and even how to access care and all this stuff.
And I always find myself so deep in the weeds where I have to keep [00:13:00] pulling myself back out. And in those moments, you really realize how much you actually know and how much you learn. Yeah, I always joke 'cause my whole career has been in healthcare, so like when me and like my girlfriends get together, we're talking Medicaid, we're throwing all these crazy, like we speak the same language, right?
Yeah. My husband looked at me like I am speaking Chinese. I don't know what the hell you're talking about. So like I totally get it to where it's like you're trying to explain things and like you just know it too well that it's like, I mean, even poor Leo, Leo has to be like Phoebe. I just, just stop talking.
Oh, this is why hang out with your husband. When we go together in conferences and stuff, it always ends up being me and him at the bar, just going, Hey, what's going on? I get it. I get it. Well, I think that's a really good segue though, so like. You know, we know we talked a little bit about your company and we're gonna kind of dive in deeper.
But why don't you share a little bit about kind of like your area of expertise, your background, and how you got to the point of, you know, coming up with the idea of Molly and [00:14:00] really what you're hoping to accomplish and the problems you're, you know, hoping to solve. Yeah. Yeah, a hundred percent. So I'll first start with my background and how I got this knowledge.
So at my previous employer, we were building custom self-funded health plan for small employers. And so what does self-funding really mean? Essentially what it does is it gives the employer the opportunity to pull in the best in class vendors of a health plan and really save money. And so there's really five different components of the health plan.
You have your pharmacy, you have your TPA, the third party administer, the people who actually administer the claims. Stop-loss carrier. I was obviously the one who takes the risk on the health plan, the network, and then the broker, and so. Essentially what you can do in these self-funded health plans is you can unbundle all these different pieces and rebundle 'em back together.
And so through this previous employer, I really learned how to do this. It is a very small sector of health insurance. I'd say about 5% of the population is actually doing this self-funded. So outside of actually building these health plans, it was really [00:15:00] valuable for me actually being the first employee because I got to one, not just learn how the health insurance side works, but also how business works, how to set up processes off the bat that can scale to a certain amount, and how to be lean and kind of back to that famine mindset.
But even outside of that, the customer journey was probably one of the most beneficial pieces of my previous employer, and it was really understanding what made sense to a consumer. From a health insurance standpoint, just because health insurance is so confusing, healthcare is so confusing, and I really took some of those skills that I learned in that knowledge and I applied it to what we're doing today.
And so with that self-funding background, I actually had a lot of buddies reaching out to me saying, Hey, I'm a 10 99. What do I do for health insurance? Even at my previous employer, we had a lot of brokers where their employer clients would ask us, Hey, I have a group of 10 90 nines. How do I insure them?
Our answer was always the same. It's, Hey, send 'em to the A CM marketplace. Send 'em to the A CM marketplace. Have them look at subsidies, see how they can save [00:16:00] money. And I really went down a rabbit hole when I started having close friends ask me what the marketplace really was. And I really came to the conclusion that there's been the same players in the A CM marketplace for the last five, 10 years.
And there's nothing wrong with that. But the same players really doesn't drive any competition, and there's no incentive to change or to innovate. I really saw VC marketplace being. Outdated for where the industry's heading right now, both on like a self-funding standpoint, but also on a technology standpoint.
I think the best example of this is Oscar, right now. Oscar is starting to release some of these AI tools to help members understand health insurance, how to access care, and honestly, just the whole member journey. So this large problem in 10 90 nines, really not having access to innovative care like a large employer does, caused us to go down this rabbit hole and.
The pathway of creating Molly. And so essentially what we've done is we have a creative way that allows us to offer health insurance to 10 99 solopreneurs, freelancers, and give them [00:17:00] the tools and benefits that a self-funded health plan has to help them save money. But even outside of saving money, just understand the whole health insurance and healthcare system.
So things like, is this provider in and out of network? Even predicting different care events. Okay, how much am I gonna pay if I get this MRI? And just giving people full transparency. I think that's one of the big things in healthcare and health insurance that is missing or is gray, or is this object in the distance where you think you have it, but you really don't.
It's the idea of knowing how much am I gonna pay? Why are my premiums going up? And I think that's another big benefit of a self-funded health plan, is this health plan is truly owned by the members. Yes. If Molly does make a small fee, we don't increase or decrease our fee though based on the plan running fit or bad.
It is truly owned by the members. So if the members are poor consumers of health insurance, then the cost goes up and if the consumers are good consumers of health insurance, the cost goes down. So really giving, like I said, full transparency and full power to the people [00:18:00] that we wanted to build a health plan that fits that mold.
No, I like that we've all gotten the evidence of coverage or, I mean, people probably don't even know what that. Means, but it's the 300 page booklet that's supposed to tell you what the cost of all your stuff is that exactly you ever look into because it's so confusing and doesn't really make any sense.
And I'm like, just tell me what the MRI is gonna cost, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's almost sad, like in my opinion, I really think that the industry is fine being stuck in this place where it is confusing for members because I think some of these large carriers are fine with members not really understanding what's covered, what's not covered.
Because at the end of the day, the more that members spend, the more that carriers make. So as premiums increase, so do profits for your employers. And I really think that the incentives for employees are misaligned right now. And so. I think the level of transparency is definitely needed in this space, and I think the only way to really change is providing a level of [00:19:00] transparency.
Where are my dollars going? Not just on an insurance basis, but also on a care basis. Why should someone have to pay a thousand dollars a month in premium to then pay a $3,000 deductible to then have to pay 20% co-insurance to then have their care denied? Yeah. Well, and too, like on the flip side, right? I think if you don't quite understand your benefits, you're less likely to use them.
So it's this dual kind of like double-edged sword where, you know, I've had a lot of relatives just honestly be like, I'm not even gonna go to the doctor for the simple fact of like, I don't know if this is covered or not. I'm not taking the gamble because I don't wanna get stuck with something, which ultimately benefits insurance as well, because premiums are being made.
You know, you're technically entitled to these benefits, but if you can't understand them, use them. It's still under utilization. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. That's a great point. I know that you have a lot of insider tips on government stuff. [00:20:00] What are some of your insider tips when it comes to navigating health insurance?
Yeah, yeah, that's a great question. Whenever someone asks me what should I do for health insurance, and they don't want to essentially go to VACA marketplace or enroll in their employer sponsored plan, my tip and trick is always cash pay. Walk into every facility, no matter if you have insurance, if you don't have insurance, and ask for the cash pay price.
The reason being is because that cash pay price is usually gonna be 60, 70% lower. And the reason that is, is because some of these large facilities, and honestly even the independently owned facilities, they're more open to accept cash because. They're having to go out there and chase members for their member portion of whatever care event they had.
And so usually some of these facilities are only accepting 30 cents on the dollar, and so they would rather just accept that full cash pay, even if it's at a 60 70% discount, there's kind of a mess. Is the delta really that significant where, you know, unless there's that [00:21:00] kind of method of approaching it, if you're frequenting or you have this kind of chronic condition.
Does that work too? Or is there some sort of threshold where you're like, okay, maybe you should start using your insurance or start thinking about insurance if you go to the doctors this many times or use this many medications, so forth and so on. Yeah, that's a great point. I mean, obviously if you're a frequent user of health insurance, you're in a very different bucket.
You probably would benefit of having a low deductible and paying your monthly premiums. This is more so for the individuals, especially like in the 10 99 space or the freelancers or people who really don't use as much health insurance. They more so just want to go see a primary care doctor here and there and then have some type of catastrophic care.
On top of the cash pay, I would always recommend, obviously a catastrophic health plan. Very, very high deductible. Something that just in case if an accident happens where you tear your leg open or you have some type of claim that's gonna cost you millions of dollars, you have some type of umbrella policy there.
Just in case. I think at the end of the day, like you have to sit down [00:22:00] and, okay, how much am I gonna go to the doctor? How much do I actually plan on utilizing my benefits and actually using the doctor? Yeah, that's interesting. I, I don't go to the doctor. I call Leo. Leo, is your doctor all done legally and compliantly all?
By the way, for the record, he gives me my disclaimer of this is not medical advice, but I think this is all educational. Yeah, yeah. That's funny. I think, Leo, to your point, obviously around the cash pay basis, primary care doctor, or like a basic copay, like that's not really gonna have much of an impact, but.
We're talking MRIs, let's say larger care events were out the door. With insurance, it could cost three to $5,000 and on a cash pay basis, it's usually less than a thousand dollars. I mean, you can look at companies like Green Imaging and other bundled care providers where you can simply go onto their website and search through their marketplace and find these cash pay rates, and it's astonishing.
I actually had a buddy in Miami and he needed an MRI of his knee and gave me a call and he said, [00:23:00] Hey, I'm gonna have to pay my full $2,000 optical to go get this MRI done. I told him, Hey, go to Green Imaging, see what they have their cash pay rate of, and it was less than $300. Wow. Wow. Really? Yeah. Yeah.
And so by simply walking into the facility and saying, Hey, I don't have insurance. What is your cash pay rate? He saved himself $1,700. Yeah. My copay was more than that for like my most recent MI. It's crazy. That's crazy. Go ahead. It's the insurance industry though. You know, it's the whole idea of like guaranteed money.
That's why Medicaid and Medicare fraud is so rampant. Because if you're able to bill for these services and kind of almost automatically get that, you know, premium amount, you're gonna try to get that premium amount. But to cash pay to your point, $200 is better than nothing. So, exactly. You know, it's the idea of like, what value are they really providing?
I still am very curious why MRIs cost so much. I mean, same reason why [00:24:00] having a baby really doesn't cost that much, but they charge a lot. So, I mean, it's why an Advil in the ER costs $80 and you can go to Walgreens and buy a bottle of 4, 5, 10 bucks. Yeah, yeah. That's a doctor fee. Yeah. Yeah. I'm expensive as you should be taking care of you, give you ibuprofen.
Gosh darn it. No, it's interesting though, the Delta and really just the lack of knowledge that people have about that. You know, it blows me away the difference in that. 'cause literally, I just recently had an MRI and I think my copay was upwards of like 300, 400 bucks, you know? And if cash pay was only like 200, what?
It, it, it's crazy. Makes no sense. And how, how do you find that information? Like, you know, is there a good tool? Can you jump on a platform to find that? What's the best way for people to do their own research and look that up? I think one of the biggest things is now with the access to AI and large language models, you can sit down and talk to chat GPT [00:25:00] and say, Hey, this is what's going on.
Can you help me self-diagnose to a certain extent? Or How much do I pay for this? Or even just knowing out there, like you can call any facility. You can negotiate everything. You can negotiate. Healthcare is truly negotiable. Whether it's simply an MRI, an emergency room visit, you can negotiate on your own behalf.
If you don't have insurance, that's currently what insurance is supposed to be there to do, is to negotiate for you and have these discounts on different bill charges. But their goal is to not help you obviously. So it's back to the misaligned incentives and how does that play? So you just go to the establishment like, I can't pay that.
Your bill is like a thousand bucks. I'll give you 50 bucks for it. Even before the bill, you just say, Hey, I don't have insurance. What's the cash pay rate? Just simply knowing that you can, before any type of care event, you can sit down and say, Hey, I'm gonna pay cash. How much do you guys charge? And then you can negotiate on top of that.
I mean, I've sat down and I've called facilities on behalf of [00:26:00] individuals and said, Hey, we're not gonna pay this. We'll pay X amount. They're willing to find a spot in the middle and accept that payment because they get that payment within 30 days and they don't have to go spend 90 days fighting the insurance company, then fighting the member and and only collecting 30 cents on that dollar.
That's super eye-opening. It's funny, I was out in North Carolina and we were talking to an ENT who owns his own independent facility, and so for a deviated septum. He charges in his facility out the door, $2,000. He doesn't accept insurance. Everything is cash pay for that same exact deviated septum surgery in the hospital system.
It would cost a member $20,000 and he still makes the same exact amount. And it's because it's simply, I mean, walking into that hospital system, you get a $10,000 bill and they charge you $5,000 for the bed and then another $3,000 for the anesthesiologist, and then another $2,000 for the hospital or for the surgeon.
[00:27:00] Great information. I mean, that's one thing that we're trying to do for our members is just give them these tools to understand that there are other ways out there than just accepting, I'm gonna go and network and I'm gonna pay my deductible. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. And this is a very common question, right? For 10 99 doctors coming straight out, right?
You know, they're ditching their W2 jobs and one of the big limiters is, you know, how am I gonna support my family and myself with our health? I, I know my answer has always been, uh, just like, go look at the marketplace. It's too easy. Right? But no, this alternative, you know, is definitely eye-opening and, you know, being able to, you know, talk to somebody like you and, you know, go to the service and talk this through and really just talk approaches and alternative ways to do things.
Thinking outside the box is huge. 'cause yeah, a lot of us just know the quick and easy answer and this is thousands of dollars that you could be saving. So, yeah. I think too often, I mean, again, like this has been our life, right? I think that I told you [00:28:00] like, you know, I've been a Kaiser member my whole life.
My whole life, right? Yeah. To me, that is what I know. I know the Kaiser methodology and I know the Kaiser phone number. I know the process. I know exactly how it works, and so often, you know, we've grown up in this system where. This is what is comfortable. This is what has been told as like, this is what works.
This is what happens, this is what you do. You get on Blue Shield, you get on this, you get on that. And I think, you know, the interesting thing with Molly, and one of the things I really actually appreciate is like kind of integrating some of the AI tools to show people how to actually save money. Because your insurance is never going to do that, and half the time you're just confused.
I leave the doctor confused and then I call Leo and like I'm like, oh. Are they telling me true stuff? Like, give me the real deal here. And so to me, I think that sometimes you have to kind of challenge the status quo. And I think right now in the world and kind of how healthcare is [00:29:00] evolving, especially when it comes to AI and kind of like LLMs, as you mentioned, is second guessing things and validating things, and really using some of those tools to poke holes.
And be like, where can we actually see some change? Because I think there is a lot of mistrust right now in some of the system. And there are going to be more and more companies that are AI forward and transparency forward because like our generation is kind of over just taking people's word for it. Or, I mean, I'll speak for myself like at least, like that's me.
I am always second guessing everything now. Yeah, the status quo is very real, especially in health insurance. I mean, we would sit down with employers and they were extremely happy with a 10% increase. They were happy with what people call trend and how is a group that, this is a little bit of a tangent, but how is a group who is running under expected, who has a clean claims file, how are they getting a 7% [00:30:00] increase?
That just didn't make sense to me. I think also to add on what you were saying, AI in healthcare is very real. I think it's also very scary for people too. People are asking the question, okay, if you're using AI to streamline certain things, is AI now going to be denying my claims? Is AI now going to be working on the provider in the Actually more important, the insurers we have to help them save money.
And I think it's all back to the idea of transparency, showing members, showing individuals, hey. This AI tool is there for you to use. It's not gonna push you to do anything. It's not gonna take away from your health benefits. It's simply just a tool to help you better understand what's happening. And I think it's just bridging the gap between AI and health insurance.
And I mean, we're seeing it with just basic day-to-day. I mean, I don't use Google anymore. I go to chat GPT whenever I have questions about anything. And I think that's what we're really trying to do for people is, is provide a tool out there that's easier to understand, easier to use, and. Knows you better, knows where you're at with your deductible, [00:31:00] knows where you're at with your different claims, even understands you like on a personal level.
So connecting to people's day to day. So bridging the gap between how well are you sleeping, how much do you exercise to the healthcare side is, is something that I think has not really happened yet, and I think it's something that does need to happen and happen quickly. I mean, Leo, like you see patients every day and you sit down and you say, okay, well how did, how are you sleeping?
When they say, oh, I'm sleeping good, I'm sleeping bad. What does that mean? What does good sleep mean? Or what does bad sleep mean? I think providing just a level of insight to doctors saying, Hey, this is exactly how someone sleeps. This is how much time they spend in rem. This is how much someone actually works out.
This is their V two max. Like this is how healthy or unhealthy an individual actually is. And I think, I mean, at least from talking to a number of different MDs. That's something that they want access to better treat their patients. And I think that's one thing that we wanna provide. Amazing. I know that was a little bit of a tangent.
No, I think it's super relevant. I [00:32:00] mean, I think that the idea that we all have to kind of like fill out the silly questionnaires and do all that stuff when like everybody has an Apple watch on or an ora ring. The fact that there is still so much data kind of like missing, but you know, to your point exactly.
A lot of those things could inform health insurance and premiums and kind of like building better, like risk profiles versus kind of the other way, which is like a blanket of like everybody's paying this premium and you know, the high utilizers are kind of priced out the same way. I mean, I, I totally hear you.
I think the sad thing though is, is that people don't trust insurance. At the end of the day, like if I went up to someone and I said, Hey, would you want your insurance company having your sleep data? They would say no. And so I think the shift needs to happen before people are comfortable with providing that level of data.
And it's the shift of transparent insurance. It's the shift of people really trusting their insurance carrier and that's just not there. And I think we're. Very far from being there. It's sad. I mean, [00:33:00] we saw it happen with the U-H-C-C-E-O. People just don't like and don't trust insurance. And so I think, like I said, that shift needs to happen before consumer behavior can happen.
Yeah. No, I agree. I agree. I think one of the key themes on our podcast is, you know, we talk a lot about AI in healthcare, and I think that there's good use of ai and I think there's really crappy use of ai. Hundred percent. I don't think, think AI is going to replace doctors and nurses, and I don't think AI should be our new therapist, but I do think AI should be focused more on certain things, transparency, data collection, risk tiering, being able to surface information, health navigation.
I mean, there's so many cool things that you could do with AI and I think people, you know, unfortunately a lot of companies use it, you know, I mean, to your point. Auto denying prior au, like probably exactly like I'm a big believer that there are certain things where you need to have the human eye, but like 80% of it can be [00:34:00] like automated and really enhanced with ai.
Sorry, that was also a tangent. Leo just knows. Pulling my AI tangent. No, and it's interesting 'cause this is a hot topic right now. Not just on that end, on any end. And it's funny how. We're approaching this and trying to understand what we can do in the limitations. Uh, here's another tangent. I was at my daughter's parent-teacher meeting, and they're learning about ai.
She's in sixth grade. Wow. And their teacher asked them, they took a informal poll, Hey, you know, with this regenerative ai, do you think it's a bad thing or a good thing? The sixth graders, mind you, 85% of the sixth graders thought it was a bad thing. They were scared to use it for different reasons. One.
They didn't trust it. Two, they thought it was gonna take over their ability to think and learn and basically the lazy way around talking about AI use and, you know, it's a powerful tool. Use it all the time, every [00:35:00] day, all day. I think if used correctly, yes, it's something that we're not gonna come back from because it's just a tool that we need to be using, makes everything efficient, blah, blah, blah.
But it's interesting to see how, you know, it, it, it's, it even reflected down again, tangent overload, right? You know, sixth graders that don't necessarily understand and not initially out in the world have already identified things that we are very worried about. Right. That, you know, this is a tool that if not used properly and just, you know, outta control can be used for bad, basically.
Right. You know, this is how the Terminator started. Right. We're gonna end up there. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's comfortability too. Like I think you see the same thing in the older population also is they're not used to the technology. They haven't used AI in their day-to-day life and like. Even if it is terrible for us and it's headed in the wrong direction, God forbid it makes our lives on a day-to-day basis so much more productive and efficient.
Like I don't see a world where we ever go back. Yeah, yeah. I [00:36:00] agree. We can't go back. I also like, don't wanna go back. I walk around, I talk to my chat. I mean, it's like my brainstorm bud, you know? And like, I think sometimes like it's a nice addition. I think, you know, I really appreciate. Molly has used AI though to again like kind of surface some of the things that are just really hard for like normal people to understand, and I think that's kind of like the right method of layering it in into the healthcare industry.
Yeah, I think even like back to the efficiency idea, like it's essentially allowed us to get to the point where we're at. Or we just had to raise money. Recently we had three engineers that were building probably at the speed of 20 engineers back in the day simply by just using ai. And I think we're seeing it left and right, like more and more people.
With the growth of 10 90 nines, more and more people are using AI on a day-to-day basis to make business operations cheaper, more efficient, easier. I mean, I know like some of the stuff that we're doing at Molly in our creative solution, I would've never found if it wasn't for AI or it would've taken me.
Hundreds of [00:37:00] thousands of hours to sift through all these legal documents and this data and come to the conclusion that what we're doing is it works. I think like kind of back to that, like you're seeing so many people in this startup world scale these companies to. Tens of hundreds of millions in a R with teams of less than 10, even five people.
You can have a group of three founding members and scale these companies to tremendous measures before you have to start giving up any equity and raising that money. Yeah, I built my own little AI agent just because I was curious on how to do it relatively, relatively easier than expected. It's, it's crazy.
Yeah, it's really bananas. The hardest part was setting up all the systems too. To funnel into the brain of the little agent. But you know, to that point, like there's so many different options nowadays that you can do to enhance things. Yeah. I know we're kind of coming up on time, so I think why it would be real helpful, like, why don't you just maybe tell [00:38:00] our listeners a little bit more about Molly.
We know that you are launching, so there's a wait list. But yeah, go ahead and give like a little bit more about kind of like Molly and what people can expect and where they can reach out to you. Absolutely. So Molly is launching one of 2026. We are in the wait list, build out process. We are going to go live with about a thousand members and probably cap it at a thousand members.
So if you are interested and you need insurance and you're a 10 99, you're a freelancer, you're a solopreneur, and you feel like you've been underserved in the traditional health insurance space, and you want a level of transparency and you want to control over your claims and your premium costs, we're here for you.
We, we truly just want to be the most transparent health plan and. Help members understand care and even outside of the health insurance space. We wanna help people get healthier over time because that's really our mission and our end goal and that's why we're in it. At the end of the day, we're three health nuts who are our nerds with our health data.
And so we just wanna help people obviously understand care but get [00:39:00] healthier over time. You know, you can find us@mollyhealth.com. Um, you can join our wait list through there. We're also on Twitter at Molly Health. And then you can always follow me on Twitter. I think my. Twitter handle is OG Stokes. OG Stokes.
Love it. Yeah. I mean, we're at the point where there is a huge shift happening in the ac c marketplace. Yeah. 26 million people are likely to go uninsured, and with these enhanced subsidies expiring people are gonna really experience sticker shock. We want to be the last solution and last health plan that members ever have to search for.
Yeah, no, I mean, I have to assume it's a really scary time for a lot of people right now who are anticipating huge hikes or potentially being kicked off different kind of programs, and so, you know, I think it's gonna be amazing to see Molly launch. I know you're capping at a thousand, but you might get some extra in there as you go live.
Yeah, absolutely. Look, looking forward to seeing it too. I think a lot of [00:40:00] our members here, like I said before, definitely one of the questions, one of the heads is to go forward and having this option is really helpful. Just taking that off their plate. No, great. Yeah. Thank you guys. I appreciate the time.
Love the talk, love the conversation. Thank you so much for giving us insight and you'll have to come back after. Yeah, I would love, you're gonna have to come back and tell us how things are going. 'cause we always like to bring guests back on and kind of tell us, you know, a little bit more once you know.
Everything's live. So we'll get you back on in a couple of months. Yeah. We're putting you on the schedule, so Yeah. Yeah. You're stuck to it, buddy. Yeah, I love it. I love it. Get me outta the weeds. Maybe we'll do a surfs too. Come out to Hawaii and Yeah. Podcast in the water or podcast in the boat. Oh, wow.
Yeah. I'll join for that one too. I'll be there for that one. Awesome. Try not to get eaten by sharks. No, I'm just kidding. Well, hey, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate your insight. Again, what's your email one [00:41:00] more time and how do we get ahold of you? Yeah, email isWyatt@mollyhealth.com. You can also find us@mollyhealth.com.
We have a wait list. You can always book time with me there. Happy to chat. Would love feedback from 10 99. So if you feel like you've been underserved in the marketplace, feel free to reach out to me and would love your feedback and opinions on how we can do better. Awesome. Thank you everybody. Thanks for tuning in.
If you have any questions, concerns, Phoebe it. At telemedicine talk.com, leo@teletalk.com or info@telemedicinetalk.com. Until next time. Thank y'all and aloha.
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