Garner Health uses data to identify the country’s best doctors based on quality and cost, then gives its customers’ employees financial incentives to go to them—which can save 12% on healthcare costs.

Back in 2009, Nick Reber went to see a doctor at a big New York hospital, for help with persistent pain in his back. When the doctor recommended surgery in his mid-back, he underwent the procedure. But he later learned that the real problem was higher up, in the cervical spine. When that first surgery resulted in complications, he had another one—ultimately undergoing four surgeries on his back.

“I was misdiagnosed and mistreated,” he told Forbes. “I probably needed between zero and one [surgeries]. I live with a bunch of back pain and it’s a big part of my life.”

The experience was eye-opening for Reber, a data guy who worked then as co-head of research analytics at hedge fund Bridgewater Associates. So he did what any researcher does: He started reading up on healthcare policy and economics. He eventually came to believe that if he’d only found a better doctor, he could have saved years of pain and several thousands dollars in medical bills beyond what his insurance covered. He realized that if data like complication rates and hospital readmissions could find the best physicians, it should be able to reduce overall cost, too.

That’s the idea behind Garner Health, which Reber founded in 2019. Today, Garner uses deidentified data from some 320 million health insurance claims purchased from insurers, aggregators and others to figure out which doctors have the best outcomes and the lowest costs. These physicians are part of what’s essentially a network-within-a-network for Garner’s corporate........

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