CrowdMed [is] a company where patients with difficult-to-diagnose ailments post their symptoms online, offering cash rewards to people in exchange for correct assessments.

The company was founded in 2012 after [Jared] Heyman watched his sister struggle with a rare disease known as fragile X-associated primary ovarian insufficiency. CrowdMed’s target audience is people with so-called orphan diseases, those that affect fewer than 200,000 people.

“We’re not looking for patients who haven’t seen a doctor yet”, says Heyman. “We’re looking for patients who have seen two or three doctors and don’t have a diagnosis they think satisfies their symptoms”.

Via Bloomberg Businessweek for the full story.