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We’re witnessing an AI arms race in medicine. Startups are raising massive rounds, rolling out new tools, and snapping up complementary platforms—all in a bid to claim their slice of the market.

Doximity made yet another move, this time acquiring AI clinical reference startup Pathway Medical for $63 million.

In this article, I’ll break down the deal, explore the competitive landscape, and share my take on what it’ll take to come out on top.

Doximity—the physician networking platform used by more than 80% of U.S. doctors—has acquired AI medical reference startup Pathway for $63 million.

Pathway, based in Montreal, has hundreds of thousands of registered users, with thousands paying $300 a year for its premium version. Nearly half of its team are physicians, and over the past seven years they’ve built one of the largest structured medical datasets in the world—covering nearly every guideline, drug, and landmark trial across all major specialties.

This acquisition builds on Doximity’s recent push into generative AI. The company launched Doximity GPT in late 2023 and more recently rolled out Doximity Scribe, a free AI-powered medical scribe for physicians.

Bringing Pathway into the fold fits neatly into that strategy. It gives Doximity’s massive physician base instant access to a trusted, evidence-based clinical reference—without leaving the platform. It’s a step toward making Doximity a true one-stop shop for both administrative and clinical workflow support, keeping doctors engaged and less likely to turn to competing tools.

The AI-powered clinical reference space is crowded and evolving fast, blending traditional point-of-care references with new generative AI interfaces. A few players stand out to me. I highlight them below.

Below is a market map of the clinical pathways and reference space curated by Elion (they also just raised $9.3 million!).

So, what does it take to win this space? In other words—how do you get every physician to choose your platform over a competitor’s?

Speaking as someone who’s spent six years studying workflows and is now on the front lines using these tools, I think there’s a clear order of operations:

This is all to say, winning in AI clinical reference is about trust, seamless integration, access to physicians, and the right depth of content. Doximity’s move with Pathway shows how these pieces can fit together, but the race is far from over. The next phase will be about proving long-term value at the point of care and earning a permanent spot in the physician workflow. The question is—who’s best positioned to pull that off? Let me know what you think!

We obsess over inpatient COPD care—steroids, nebs, antibiotics, bundles. But the moment a patient leaves the hospital? That’s when the real risk starts.

COPD readmissions are stubbornly high, and they’re not just a clinical problem—they’re a financial one. Since 2015, CMS has been penalizing hospitals for them. We’ve thrown bundles, checklists, and follow-up calls at the problem, but the needle hasn’t moved much. So what actually works?

A relatively recent QI study tested something refreshingly simple: sending a respiratory therapist into the patient’s home. And the results were surprisingly strong…

👉 Full breakdown here.

Medicare Advantage was supposed to deliver better care at a lower cost.

Instead? It’s become a money-making machine for insurers—one that thrives on upcoding, prior auth denials, and favorable selection. Over half of all Medicare beneficiaries are now enrolled in MA plans, and yet the government is projected to overspend by tens of billions of dollars every year.

Even lawmakers—Republican ones—are calling it what it is: a “bastardized” version of the original vision.

So how did we get here? And what would it actually take to fix the system?

👉 See all my prediction updates here.

Hospitals don’t handle most of their supply negotiations. That job goes to Group Purchasing Organizations (GPOs)—middlemen that promise savings by pooling hospitals’ buying power. Sounds efficient, right?

What’s interesting is that GPOs aren’t paid by hospitals. They’re paid by the suppliers. In other words, the more money hospitals spend, the more GPOs make. And thanks to a little-known safe harbor in federal law, that setup is perfectly legal.

It’s a model that’s widely accepted—but rarely questioned. And it raises concerns that feel a lot like what we’ve seen with pharmacy benefit managers: vendor-funded entities shaping what gets used in patient care.

So are GPOs actually saving hospitals money—or are they quietly driving up costs behind the scenes?

👉 Read more details here.

We were trained to take care of patients. But no one ever taught us how the system actually works:

That’s why I built this course: How Healthcare Really Works.

It’s short, visual, and built for people like us — physicians trying to make sense of the business and policy forces shaping our day-to-day work.

👉 Enroll in the course here.