JD Health Sets a Benchmark in Online Family Doctor Services with the Launch of 'JD Family Doctor'

China’s healthcare sector faces numerous challenges, including population aging, urbanization, and the high prevalence of chronic diseases. The traditional hospital- and disease-centered care model has become increasingly inadequate in meeting public health needs. To optimize the utilization of medical resources and further control healthcare costs, China has drawn on experiences from Europe and the United States to introduce a family doctor contract system. This initiative provides residents with “health gatekeepers,” promotes initial consultations at the primary care level, and lays the foundation for the implementation of tiered diagnosis and treatment.

The 2016 “Interpretation of the ‘Notice on Issuing the Guiding Opinions on Promoting Family Doctor Contract Services’” stated that “by 2017, the coverage rate of family doctor contract services would exceed 30%, with the coverage rate for key populations exceeding 60%. By 2020, efforts would be made to expand contract services to the entire population, establishing long-term and stable contractual service relationships with residents, and basically achieving full coverage of the family doctor contract service system.”

However, the rapid expansion of family doctor contract services has encountered several challenges. The large population base, a vast number of elderly individuals and patients with chronic diseases, coupled with a shortage of general practitioners, have placed an excessive burden on family doctors during the contracting process, making the issue of “signed but not served” particularly prominent.

In 2018, the “Guiding Opinions on Standardizing the Management of Family Doctor Contract Services” were implemented, with specific emphasis on the development of “Internet+” primary care platforms. Subsequently, numerous internet platform companies entered the family doctor sector.JD Health, leveraging its advantageous internet medical resources, officially launched its family doctor service product, “JD Family Doctor,” on August 18, 2020.

Leveraging JD Health’s superior medical resources and service capabilities, “JD Family Doctor” is poised to become a model and benchmark for the family doctor industry. For users, this means access to higher-quality health consumption services that address longstanding pain points in the healthcare-seeking process, along with personalized health management services. For society, the launch of JD Family Doctor will supplement the family doctor services provided by existing grassroots community models, addressing deficiencies while enhancing the efficiency of medical services and facilitating a shift toward a “user-centric” approach.

Currently, offline family doctor consultations face challenges such as managing a large patient population and heavy workloads. Family doctors are often overstretched and unable to provide adequate care for each individual. For patients with chronic diseases, who require prioritized management by family doctors, the lack of corresponding monitoring data renders such management ineffective. Although users have signed up with family doctors, they rarely receive targeted services from them.

The “13th Five-Year Plan” for National Family Planning Development points out that China’s total population is projected to reach approximately 1.42 billion by 2020. Based on a subsidy standard of RMB 120 per person per year, the potential market size for basic family doctor services in 2020 is estimated at around RMB 170 billion. From the perspective of the family doctor service supply market, the construction cost of a smart family doctor workstation in a district (county) ranges from RMB 2 million to RMB 8 million. With 2,851 county-level administrative divisions currently in China, the market size for supporting equipment is estimated between RMB 6 billion and RMB 23 billion.

The vast, underserved market has become the driving force for major internet healthcare platforms to enter this sector. JD Health’s launch of “JD Family Doctor” at this time reflects its recognition of the robust demand in the online consultation market, while its inherent strengths in internet healthcare resources and service capabilities enable it to compete in this arena.

JD Health CEO Xin Lijun

As early as 2017, JD Health launched its online consultation platform. The platform fully replicated the offline patient journey, pioneering an online closed-loop service integrating “medical consultation + medication purchase,” and covering the entire process from pre-consultation to during-consultation and post-consultation stages.The online consultation platform currently provides 100,000 professional medical consultations per day. The user follow-up visit rate is nearly 50%, and the five-star rating rate reaches as high as 98.6%.

During the 2019 Double 11 shopping festival, the average daily volume of online consultations exceeded 30,000, with a single-day peak surpassing 120,000. In January 2020, the daily number of consultations exceeded 60,000, nearly equivalent to the total daily outpatient visits of ten Grade A tertiary hospitals. As the pandemic progressed, JD Health launched free consultation services across all medical specialties, with daily consultations exceeding 120,000. The ongoing pandemic has continuously reshaped public perceptions, significantly enhancing the recognition and acceptance of internet-based healthcare.

In fact, JD Health had already been planning to develop a product that could truly penetrate the home health scenario before it officially announced its independent operations in May 2019.JD Health aims to integrate its superior internet healthcare resources and provide them to C-end users, helping them improve their quality of life.The launch of “JD Family Doctor” is not only premised on the massive volume of user consultation demands, but more importantly, it is underpinned by JD Health’s accumulation of advantageous resources in the field of internet healthcare, which empowers the company to deliver such a product.

Centered on two core objectives—connecting users to higher-quality medical resources and creating a more user-friendly health consumption experience—JD Health has continued to deepen its presence in the internet healthcare sector, consistently rolling out a series of products and services.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, JD Health continuously upgraded the service capabilities of its online consultation platform.JD Health has continuously provided consultation services to suspected patients and established psychological counseling channels for frontline medical workers. To alleviate the pressure on offline outpatient clinics, JD Health pioneered free online consultations across all medical specialties. Subsequently, JD Health extended its consultation and psychological counseling services to 60 million overseas Chinese compatriots, launched a bilingual service zone, and integrated premium medical resources to support global pandemic response efforts.

Since its inception, JD Health has been continuously strategizing its presence in internet healthcare, expanding its urban footprint, and driving the informatization and intelligent transformation of the medical industry.JD Health has successively established strategic partnerships with Ningxia, Fujian, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Shaanxi, Guangxi, and other regions to deploy its internet healthcare services. During the pandemic, it collaborated with provincial and municipal governments on epidemic prevention and control efforts, while also helping hospitals such as Peking University Shougang Hospital and Beijing Huaxin Hospital set up online consultation zones to facilitate patient access to medical care. JD Health has also received strong support from numerous hospitals, with a large number of doctors joining its online consultation platform.

And in April 2020,The launch of the “Nankai JD Internet Hospital,” jointly established by JD Health and Tianjin Hospital of Integrated Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine (Nankai Hospital), marks a landmark event. This signifies JD Health’s deep integration into in-hospital medical scenarios, its expansion into specialized domains, and its achievement of a new convergence of healthcare resources.

While continuously advancing the urban landscape of internet healthcare,JD Health has also established a national-level internet diagnosis and treatment center by organizing specialized disease-specific departments, inviting top-tier expert teams in the field, including Academician Han Demin and Professor Hu Dayi.JD Health has gradually launched 14 internet healthcare platforms, including centers for traditional Chinese medicine, cardiology, stomatology, otolaryngology, psychiatry and psychology, nephrology, and diabetes, as well as specialized clinics for maternal and child health, spine care, nutrition, foot and ankle, oncology, pediatrics, and gastroesophageal reflux disease. The development of these internet healthcare platforms continues to expand JD Health’s service capabilities.

Currently, JD Health’s online consultation platform has over 50,000 licensed physicians, 62% of whom are from Grade A tertiary hospitals, and 80% hold the title of attending physician or above.This data is merely a footnote to JD Health’s advantageous medical resources. In response to users’ consultation needs, JD Health has continuously upgraded the service capabilities of its online consultation platform and leveraged its premium medical resource network, ultimately giving rise to its JD Health Family Doctor service product.

“JD Home Doctor” Service Team

On August 18, JD Health announced the launch of “JD Family Doctor.” The service supports multi-user access under a single subscription and provides 24/7 online consultation services with physicians across all medical specialties. Its use cases extend beyond common disease consultations and chronic disease management to include specialized life-stage health management. Additionally, JD Family Doctor offers a team of health managers and integrates with smart hardware devices. In terms of product functionality, JD Family Doctor delivers distinctive advantages over similar offerings on other internet platforms, providing unique features where competitors lack them and superior quality where competitors have comparable services.

More importantly, JD Family Doctor is not an isolated platform.JD Health’s access to top-tier medical resources, including leading specialists and authoritative experts (such as academicians and committee chairs), is another key advantage of JD Family Doctor. Furthermore, JD Health’s existing businesses—spanning pharmaceutical e-commerce, internet healthcare, health check-ups, and smart solutions—will complement and expand the offerings of JD Family Doctor.Users of JD Family Doctor will gain access to premium medical resources, experience convenient and high-quality services, and benefit from efficient service fulfillment.

JD Health Family Doctor provides users with two different versions of service products:“Small Family Protection Plan,” priced at RMB 799 per year; “Whole Family Peace of Mind Plan,” priced at RMB 1,999 per year.“Small Family Protection Plan” supports up to 4 family members, while “Whole Family Peace of Mind Plan” supports up to 8. As products designed for household scenarios, they cater to different family structures: the former is primarily aimed at families consisting of “a couple and their two children,” whereas the latter expands on this by including both sets of grandparents.

“JD Family Doctor” currently offers a 30-day free trial

Its target audience largely overlaps with the “new middle class.”Burdened by demanding work schedules, they are frustrated with the “three longs and one short” phenomenon prevalent in offline hospitals—long registration queues, long wait times for consultations, and long pharmacy lines, contrasted with short consultation durations. They seek convenient solutions for minor ailments and prescription refills. While they are increasingly health-conscious and actively seek reliable wellness information, their limited medical knowledge hinders their ability to respond appropriately to sudden medical emergencies. Additionally, they may have elderly parents living alone at home, requiring services such as chronic disease management. JD Family Doctor can address these challenges to the greatest extent possible.

This group largely overlaps with JD PLUS members.JD Health also reached out to this user group at an early stage. As early as January 2020, JD Health began offering JD PLUS members more exclusive benefits, including rapid online consultation services (12 free consultations per year for annual members and three free consultations per quarter for quarterly members), monthly buy-one-get-one-free deals on health checkups, dental care, ophthalmology, and other products, as well as promotional coupons to encourage the purchase of physical health-related products. Currently, the number of JD Plus members has reached 20 million, all of whom are potential users of “JD Family Doctor.”

“JD Home Doctor” offers two service products with largely similar content, though there are subtle differences.Both offer telephone or video consultations, unlimited rapid text-and-image consultations, unlimited prescription services, unlimited proactive follow-up services, online referrals to renowned physicians, arrangement of in-person specialist consultations, health information collection and record establishment, health plan formulation, weight management, and sleep management.

However, the Xiaojia Huhang Edition supports up to 4 family members, while the Quanjia Anxin Edition supports up to 8 family members. The former provides only 4 telephone or video consultation sessions, whereas the latter offers unlimited expedited telephone or video consultations. The former includes 4 online referrals to renowned physicians and 2 arrangements for in-person specialist consultations. The latter provides 12 online referrals to renowned physicians and 3 arrangements for in-person specialist consultations (for both plans, referrals are limited to designated hospitals and departments, with specialists at the level of Associate Chief Physician or above, but without specifying individual doctors).

“JD Family Doctor” is able to provide the aforementioned services, which is closely related to its extensive physician resources.Currently, it employs over 300 full-time physicians, with general practitioners having more than 20 years of experience accounting for 28%, and physicians with more than 10 years of experience comprising 92%.JD Health has maintained a stringent access mechanism and has not yet onboarded physicians without clinical experience. The number of full-time physicians continues to grow steadily, serving as health stewards during consultations. Meanwhile, a large pool of specialist physicians will serve as the backbone of service assurance.

JD Health’s family doctor outpatient appointment service covers over 100 first- and second-tier cities across China and more than 2,700 tertiary hospitals, with a coverage rate of Grade 3A hospitals reaching as high as 98%.Furthermore, full coverage has been achieved among the top ten domestically renowned hospitals in comprehensive rankings. The most prominent women’s and children’s hospitals across China, including Shanghai Children’s Medical Center affiliated with Shanghai Jiao Tong University and the Capital Institute of Pediatrics, are all covered. In addition, the platform has extended its reach to physicians from China’s top 10 hospitals, including department chairs and academicians. The 14 specialized centers sequentially launched by JD Health further demonstrate its advantageous resources.

The promotion of offline family doctor contract services involves significant policy factors. Referrals initiated through primary consultations with family doctors can relatively secure higher medical insurance reimbursement rates. Meanwhile, the allocation of appointment slots controlled by family doctors also drives the growth of offline family doctor contract services. Medical insurance policies play a crucial role in the provision of family doctor contract services.

On July 21, the General Office of the State Council issued the “Implementation Opinions on Further Optimizing the Business Environment to Better Serve Market Entities,” signaling national support for the inclusion of internet-based healthcare services in the medical insurance system. However, “JD Family Doctor” has not yet been integrated into the medical insurance payment system. Compared with offline family doctors, “JD Family Doctor” attracts users primarily through its integration of high-quality medical resources and provision of premium services.

Compared with offline family doctors, the advantages of JD Family Doctor are mainly reflected in:

Higher service efficiency.Family doctors are required to handle tasks such as receiving patients, collecting health information, explaining test and examination results, jointly analyzing and discussing health conditions with patients, providing health education, issuing various electronic documents, and guiding and advising patients on daily life and medication precautions. However, the large number of patients served makes it difficult for offline family doctors to complete their daily work. “JD Family Doctor,” empowered by technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data, has significantly improved service efficiency.

Establish Acquaintance Relationships.Offline family doctors, burdened by excessive workloads and lacking close personal connections with patients, often struggle to understand individual needs. However, “JD Family Doctor” leverages 24/7 online companionship and referral services, along with real-time updates of consultation data, to stay abreast of users’ latest health conditions at all times.

Enhance Healthcare Accessibility.Offline healthcare is constrained by the uneven development of regional medical resources, making it difficult for patients in certain areas to access high-quality medical services. However, “JD Home Doctor” can change this situation by not only serving patients in regions with underdeveloped medical resources but also ensuring that users with genuine needs obtain access to premium medical care.

“JD Family Doctor” provides users with medical services across four key scenarios: daily consultations, minor illness diagnosis, complex and critical care, and health management. Covered features include health record management, remote care, rapid consultations, specialist referrals, in-person appointment scheduling, expert multi-disciplinary consultations, health planning, and chronic disease management.

After the user purchases the service,First, a comprehensive health record must be established to enable the health manager to develop a personalized health plan. Meanwhile, should the user fall ill, the health manager can leverage the health record to more rapidly and accurately determine the etiology of the disease and formulate an appropriate diagnosis and treatment plan. Additionally, the health manager will conduct follow-up visits based on the health record.

When users have consultation needs, the Health Steward will provide 7×24 online services. Patients can independently inquire about various health issues, including health management, medical conditions, medication dosages, and even locating departmental physicians.

Based on the medical history inquiry, the health steward will recommend appropriate specialists or hospitals for diagnosis and treatment. When a specialist determines that the user is suffering from a complex or refractory condition, they will arrange a consultation with renowned experts or facilitate an offline appointment with such specialists, based on the user’s symptoms.Online expert consultations are available for single sessions lasting up to 48 hours. In-person appointments with renowned specialists, which previously entailed waiting periods of several months, can now be completed within seven days.

Upon completion of the medical consultation, the health manager will automatically update the medical records and reformulate the health plan, pushing medication guides, sending medication refill reminders, and providing rehabilitation recommendations to the user.

What is particularly notable is that for elderly individuals living alone who are unfamiliar with how to operate the system, when they inform their children of their poor health, their children can request a health steward to call and inquire about their parents’ condition and provide targeted recommendations.

In fact,“JD Home Doctor” aims to prevent diseases and stop minor ailments from escalating into serious conditions by providing health consultation advice, health management guidance, and addressing users’ minor health issues anytime, anywhere.In terms of health management, JD Family Doctor provides customized health plans for specific populations or needs, such as prenatal care, weight management, and skincare. These plans encompass diet, nutritional intake, sleep schedules, and exercise, covering the entire life cycle and all health scenarios.

JD Health aims to reach a broader population through its family doctor services.“JD Family Doctor” aims to cover 50 million households, serving nearly 200 million people, over the next five years. In the future, “JD Family Doctor” also hopes to further integrate with commercial health insurance and public medical insurance.For JD Health, the online family doctor services offered by numerous internet platforms remain largely in an exploratory phase. “JD Family Doctor” aims to redefine the concept of the family doctor by setting a new industry benchmark.

“JD Home Doctor,” although a service product designed for home scenarios,Collaboration with B-side commercial clients is not ruled out.Historically, B2B clients have attracted talent by providing commercial health insurance to employees; however, such insurance serves solely as financial protection and does not directly deliver medical services. Corporate clients may consider offering the “JD Family Doctor” product as part of their employee care programs. Leveraging JD Health’s existing enterprise client channels, “JD Family Doctor” is well-positioned to expand in this direction.

JD Health's Family Doctor Service will further build and improve its ecosystem.JD Health already offers a range of medical and health products, including smart physical examination kits and wearable wristbands. In the future, “JD Family Doctor” will deepen collaborations with ecosystem partners to embed its services as standardized modules into these medical and health products, thereby expanding user reach. Meanwhile, “JD Family Doctor” will strengthen integration with smart hardware; for instance, data generated from devices such as glucose meters will be uploaded directly to personal health records, addressing the historical lack of data in chronic disease management.

JD Health stated that it will continue to strengthen its collaboration with primary healthcare institutions. In the future, JD Health will empower and enhance the efficiency of primary care family doctors through partnerships with local governments and health commissions.Currently, “JD Family Doctor” is also collaborating closely with primary care hospitals to integrate online and offline services. This initiative enables community family doctors to transition from inefficient offline service models to an online platform, thereby delivering more efficient care to community residents. By optimizing their capacity, these doctors can serve a broader patient base when they have available bandwidth, which will further drive the development of the JD Family Doctor platform.