Why Accessum

The best outcomes possible take more than your insurance pays for.

Insurance-based care leaves gaps every family eventually runs into. Accessum shows you where they are in your healthcare and works to close them: through your insurer where it works, and with direct pay where it doesn’t.

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The marketplace

The marketplace isn’t broken. It works exactly as it was designed to.

It’s built around what gets paid for, not around your best outcome. You pay more nearly every year, and more of the work of getting care falls to you.

Denied
1 in 5
in-network claims on HealthCare.gov plans were denied in 2023.
Appealed
<1%
of those denials were ever appealed.
In Medicare Advantage
3 in 4
appealed denials were reversed by the plan (2014–16).

Few people appeal a denial. Many who do are overturned. Appealing is left to you.

Sources: KFF, claims denials and appeals in HealthCare.gov plans, 2023 data; HHS Office of Inspector General, Medicare Advantage appeal outcomes, 2014–16 (2018); KFF Employer Health Benefits Survey (annual premiums).

Our five core beliefs

The marketplace leaves five gaps. We built Accessum on five beliefs to close them.

They are the foundation of every decision we make for a client. Whatever brings you here fits one, some, or all of them.

Read our five core beliefs

Representation
Everyone in your care is responsible for a part, and does it well. The overall strategy falls to you.

Accessum is responsible for the strategy, and works for you alone.

The full case
We believe you need professional representation.Your physicians, the hospital, and the insurer each answer to an institution and own a part of your care. The overall strategy defaults to you, often when you are least able to carry it. Without an expert representing you, even care your plan already covers can be hard to get.
What we builtA firm paid by you, working alongside your physicians on your behalf.
Fully informed
Your records live in a dozen portals, and no one reads them together before a decision.

Your records in one place, and every option worth weighing in front of you before you decide.

The full case
We believe you should be fully informed about your healthcare, and direct it.No one owns your records or sees them together before decisions about your care are made. A second or third opinion can change the diagnosis or the treatment, but the system leaves you to find one, often to pay for it, or to accept the first recommendation as the only choice.
What we builtYour records gathered and read as one, and the options worth weighing identified, coordinated, and in front of you before decisions are made.
Longitudinal
The system reads every result against a population. Your own history is left to whoever happens to look.

Your health managed as one story, with one strategy carried for decades.

The full case
We believe healthcare is longitudinal.The system treats your health as a series of episodes, in a different office each time, and no one is charged with connecting what happened thirty-six months ago to what should happen today. Without a baseline of your own, decisions are made without that context.
What we builtOne continuous record and one strategy, carried across decades, with every result building on the last.
Early detection
Insurance pays to screen on the average person’s schedule. Risk beyond that often waits for a symptom.

Your risks in view early, and a decision on each, made with your physician.

The full case
We believe in early, responsible detection.Plans cover the screenings set for the average person on a standard schedule, then often wait for a symptom before they pay to diagnose and treat. Your own risk may warrant more, sooner, and no one is charged with deciding that.
What we builtYour risks brought into view early, a decision on each, and paid directly when the plan will not.
Navigation and execution
The system routes you by network and the next opening, then leaves the work to you.

The right care found and reached, and every step carried until it is done.

The full case
We believe you need professional navigation and execution.Prices are hard to see, options are hard to compare, and after a decision nothing happens by itself. Most care that never happens was never refused; it was never reached, or it was dropped.
What we builtEvery choice researched well beyond your network, from specialists to clinical trials to your insurance plan; the care reached; and every step carried.

Rely only on what your insurer covers, and you get insurance outcomes. The best outcomes possible require more.

Already have a concierge physician? Most of our clients do, and many come to us through their physicians. Your physician leads the medicine; Accessum carries the work between visits: records, appeals, specialists, and follow-through, and never steers you from your physician.

Hallie Woods, founder of Accessum Health

Why we can say this

Accessum was built by a hospital executive and is managed by clinicians.

“I ran the machinery. I enacted the policies. I built the profit centers. I know what a hospital, a specialist practice, and an insurer are built to do.”

Hallie Woods, founder

Now that knowledge works for you.

Read her story

Insurance and direct pay

Your insurer decides what it will pay for. You decide what you will settle for.

Direct pay means paying the provider yourself, for a second opinion, a baseline, or a specialist outside your network, and only where it closes a gap. Accessum’s fee is separate; the care is billed by whoever provides it.

01 · Representation

A scan your physician ordered, denied by the plan

Left to you

You and your physician’s office work the appeal, on your own time. Weeks pass, and the scan may never happen.

With Accessum

The appeal is worked with the office. If the answer stays no, the direct price is in front of you, and you decide.

02 · Fully informed

A new diagnosis, one recommended treatment

Left to you

One recommendation, and no time or route to test it.

With Accessum

Second and third opinions from physicians who focus on this condition, in or out of network, before you decide.

03 · Longitudinal

A lab value rising over three years

Left to you

Each result reads “normal” against a population, in a different system each year. No one is charged with seeing the trend.

With Accessum

One record read against your own history. The trend reaches your physician now, and what follows is billed to your plan where it applies.

04 · Early detection

No symptoms, a real family history

Left to you

Screening on the plan’s schedule; risk beyond it often waits for a symptom.

With Accessum

The baselines your risk warrants, decided with your physician and paid for directly.

05 · Navigation

Surgery recommended

Left to you

Often, the in-network surgeon with the next opening.

With Accessum

A surgeon with deep experience in this procedure, identified and contacted, with the expected cost in front of you before you commit.

The monthly record

Every step has a name, a date, and a record.

You make one call. What follows is carried for you, billed hourly and recorded to the minute, and each month you see every step, who took it, and the time it took.

Monthly report · illustrative, not a client’s recordOctober

Illustrative monthly report for October
Date	The work	By	Time
Date Oct 2	Records gathered from three offices ahead of the specialist visit	By Registered nurse	Time 0:45
Date Oct 3	Questions for the visit prepared with you	By Registered nurse	Time 0:30
Date Oct 8	You, with your specialist
Date Oct 9	Visit summary obtained; the new medication reconciled with your other prescriptions	By Nurse practitioner	Time 0:25
Date Oct 14	A denied authorization appealed with the physician’s office	By Registered nurse	Time 1:05
Date Oct 16	You, at your follow-up
Date Oct 21	Next quarter’s appointments scheduled, as your strategy sets them	By Registered nurse	Time 0:35
Time this monthEvery minute itemized, every step named.			3:20

A registered nurse at a client’s kitchen table, pointing to a line in a short printed report as he reads.

Who is responsible

Accessum is responsible for the strategy.

Each nurse and nurse practitioner serves no more than ten families, often fewer, so the people doing the work know your history well.

Registered nurses
They take the first call and respond within a day, including weekends and holidays. When your nurse is away, a colleague covers from your record. If you are admitted to a hospital, your nurse can be there.
Nurse practitioners
They bring clinical judgment to your strategy and, for clients who choose them, provide care within their licensed scope in Colorado, primary care included.
Consulting physicians
A board-certified oncologist and a board-certified primary care physician advise the clinical team.

Engagement agreementIllustrative

Who we may speak with

Spouse
Adult child
A friend
No one

Beyond those you name, we share only what your care requires and the law permits.

Your signatureDate

Whose side we are on

Answerable to you, and no one else.

Whoever pays, whether you, your family, or your company, the work is directed by you.

If you cannot direct your own care, we take direction from your healthcare power of attorney or, where there is none, the person the law recognizes, often your spouse. When our own nurse practitioners are one of the options, we say so, and the choice is yours.

Our standard

We promise the work, and an account of it.

We hold ourselves to a fiduciary‑like standard, by choice.

No commissions.
No referral fees.
No financial ties to outside providers we recommend.

Professional Healthcare Management

Is all of your healthcare being professionally managed?

Until now, there was no one to hire. Now there is.

Tell us what you are facing or planning for. A registered nurse will be in touch promptly, learn where things stand, and set out the work and how it is billed in a written proposal before anything begins.

Start a conversation

Available remotely, nationwide. Our nurses are based in Colorado and can travel with you to your specialist. In Colorado, our nurse practitioners also offer in‑home clinical care and primary care, agreed and billed separately.

Not an emergency service. In an emergency, call 911.
Not instead of your physicians. We work alongside them.
Not a guarantee. No one can promise an approval or a result.