eHealthInsurance ( eHealthInsurance)

In the mid-1980's a young man named Vip Patel got deathly ill from food poisoning. As a recent graduate of Stanford University, Patel was still looking for work and did not have health insurance. With little income or savings, Patel was afraid to go to the hospital because he couldn't afford to pay any medical bills. He vividly recalls lying in bed at home, wondering to himself if he was going to die. And, wondering how or what a person in his situation -sick and without health insurance - could do to receive care. There was no internet at the time, and the phone book led him to health insurance companies that were geared toward selling insurance to groups of people, not individuals.That experience stayed with Patel. A decade later, the birth of the public internet led Patel to create eHealthInsurance.com. He wanted the company to serve as the online marketplace for individuals and families who did not have it. They could visit eHealthInsurance.com and find hundreds of health insurance plans from dozens of different insurance companies. eHealthInsurance was founded in 1997 and in 1998, its technology was responsible for the nation's first Internet-based sale of a health insurance policy. eHealth, Inc, the parent company of eHealthInsurance.com went public in 2006 and is publically traded on Nasdaq under the ticker symbol EHTH.