Harsha Moole is an internal medicine-trained physician-scientist with more than 100 peer-reviewed publications, including work featured in the New England Journal of Medicine. After years of clinical practice and gastroenterology outcomes research, he made an unconventional transition from the bedside to the boardroom by founding PhysicianEstate, a health care-focused venture capital firm.
Over the past seven years, Dr. Moole has made 22 early-stage health care investments across digital health, medical devices, biotech, and therapeutics. He has also built a network of more than 200 physicians from institutions such as Johns Hopkins and Stanford who help source opportunities and provide clinical diligence before capital is deployed. His core thesis is that physician-scientists with firsthand clinical experience are uniquely positioned to identify health care investments that generalist investors often miss.
His research background is reflected in his publication record on Google Scholar, and he shares professional updates on LinkedIn.
Last year, a startup pitched me a device designed to improve endoscopic procedures in gastroenterology. Slick deck. Strong team. Blue-chip venture capital (VC) backing. One problem: The device added three extra steps to a workflow that gastroenterologists have spent decades optimizing for speed. Any gastrointestinal (GI) physician would have flagged this in the first five minutes. But the investors who wrote the check? None of them had ever held a …
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Health care startups desperately need clinical expertise
