GlobalMed earned the U.S. Bank Emerging Entrepreneur Award this year at the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University’s prestigious Spirit of Enterprise Awards.
In 2002, when Joel Barthelemy started the business that would become GlobalMed, he made imaging equipment for quality assurance in the semiconductor industry. “We did about $1 million a year in sales,” Joel recounted. “Just enough to keep the doors open.”
The company’s very fortuitous move into telemedicine came at the suggestion of a Tulane University pathologist. Joel took his advice and in April, 2005, GlobalMed delivered its first system: cameras and software for the first remote pathology consult, at Tulane.
Today, GlobalMed continues to develop the software and manufacture the equipment that makes telemedicine possible. “To date, we have installed well over 2,000 telemedicine systems in 55 countries,” Joel explained. “We provide patients with access to healthcare wherever there’s an internet connection.” He added, “We’re changing the healthcare system in the U.S. and globally.”
A story illustrates that fact quite poignantly: a woman in Minnesota was fishing with her kids and grandkids when she had a stroke. They rushed her to the community hospital, but it didn’t have the resources to meet her needs. So she was taken via air ambulance to the nearest stroke specialist, but by then she already had permanent paralysis and dementia.
In contrast, when the mayor of rural Copper Queen, Arizona had a stroke and was similarly rushed to the community hospital (which also didn’t have an in-house stroke specialist, but did have a GlobalMed system) he was seen within minutes by a specialist at the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale. The mayor has fully recovered.
Name of business: GlobalMed
Nature of business: Develops and manufactures healthcare IT systems
Address: 15020 N. 74th Street Scottsdale, Arizona 85260
Web: GlobalMed.com
Founded: 2002
Number of employees: 107
