Benchmark method
Evidence before a score.
Compare what can be verified about a business, among US Telehealth providers.
What we assess
The assessment considers contact details, consultation format, pharmacy disclosure, costs and cancellation alongside product presentation, delivery, privacy, payments and independent assurance. The same criteria and weights apply to every company in the comparison. Findings and updates require editorial review.
We assess evidence and transparency. More pharmacy partners, a lower starting price, a processor brand, a live consultation, a pen or a frozen shipment earns no automatic preference. Complaints and pending lawsuits are not treated as final findings.
- Business identity
Named operator, an attributed physical business address and a working-purpose contact telephone. Distinguish registered or correspondence offices from clinical and dispensing locations; online care does not require a walk-in clinic.
Weight: 8%
- Service & eligibility
Who the service is for, prescribing or research-use boundaries, and provider information.
Weight: 5%
- Pricing disclosure
Public prices or a defined quotation process, with recurring or additional charges explained.
Weight: 5%
- Customer terms
Accessible cancellation, refund or ordering terms and a support channel.
Weight: 4%
- Supply-chain disclosure
Named dispensing partners for care services; analytical documentation or manufacturing information for research businesses.
Weight: 10%
- Legal & regulatory record
Entity/product-specific regulatory notices, enforcement, recalls and their resolution, with dates and jurisdiction. A pharmacy license match alone is not a regulatory-history review. No clean record is inferred from silence.
Weight: 10%
- Independent product testing
Product- and lot-specific laboratory reports covering molecule identity and purity, with the laboratory, report date and issuer authenticity check. Full credit requires independently established laboratory identity and a traceable verified report. A testing policy or a report for another batch provides limited evidence only; purity does not establish sterility, endotoxin control or treatment safety.
Weight: 12%
- Independent accreditation
An applicable external accreditation, such as LegitScript for healthcare, matched to the exact business or domain in the issuer’s records. A badge alone does not establish current certification.
Weight: 3%
- Privacy & health-data disclosure
Accessible privacy terms identifying the responsible entities, data uses and applicable health-data notice. A HIPAA claim is not independent verification of compliance; HIPAA is not required of every research business.
Weight: 6%
- Security assurance disclosure
Specific, dated evidence of relevant security practices or an independently issued audit, with its entity, scope and limits. HTTPS, a marketing seal or a claim of being unhackable is insufficient.
Weight: 6%
- Payment transparency
Disclosed payment processing, billing authorization and recurring-charge arrangements. No processor brand is preferred and a processor does not certify the provider’s clinical or product quality.
Weight: 3%
- Product & presentation disclosure
Clear product identity and intended use, distinguishing branded medicines, compounded preparations and research materials; presentation and preparation requirements where relevant. A compounded product is not assumed to be an approved generic.
Weight: 8%
- Delivery & storage disclosure
Product-specific delivery, temperature and storage instructions, including handling of shipping problems. Refrigeration, freezing or a particular presentation receives no automatic quality bonus.
Weight: 5%
Pharmacy record check · 15% in telehealth
The server derives this criterion from exactly matched official state records. A 503A/503B description and a company badge do not establish an active license. 503A and 503B are different compounding frameworks, not A/B quality grades. FDA registration does not approve a compounded drug. FDA comparison ↗
Full accreditation and security-assurance credit require linked evidence from the issuer of the accreditation or independent audit. Company claims alone can provide partial evidence. A general privacy notice does not certify HIPAA compliance, and an analytical certificate of analysis is not a cybersecurity audit.
Weights and calculation
All applicable weights total 100%. Documented findings earn their weight; partial findings earn half. A substantiated concern earns zero. Unknown findings remain unverified and are excluded from the denominator; coverage is shown separately. The overall score is earned weight divided by assessed weight, multiplied by 100 and rounded. Any assessment with scored evidence can show an overall score. Coverage below 80% is marked as limited evidence; a documented regulatory concern earns zero on its criterion and remains prominently flagged. Neither condition hides the overall score. An assessment with no assessed evidence has no numerical score. Individual criteria use 100, 50 or 0; an unknown finding has no score.
Read the score and coverage together: a high score based on a small part of the criteria is less complete than one supported by broader evidence. A missing pharmacy record is not an adverse finding or a verified license. Scores compare documented findings and do not certify a company or recommend treatment.
Published scores describe the last approved evidence snapshot and remain visible with that date. Changed sources or evidence older than 30 days trigger an editorial update; they do not remove the approved score. New scores appear after an editor approves the update. A historical pharmacy match does not establish that its license is still current.
Regulatory findings require a precise match
A finding needs a primary government source, its date, jurisdiction and the exact entity or product covered. A related brand name, generic warning or unsuccessful search does not establish an adverse finding or a clean record. Editors record the limits and relevance of each source.
Laboratory reports: follow the sample
Independent testing carries 12% of the benchmark. Full credit requires the product, molecule, lot, laboratory, report identifier and dates, an issuer authenticity check and independently established laboratory identity, with identity and purity testing. A testing policy or unverified certificate supports partial evidence only. Sterility, potency and endotoxin tests are recorded separately; purity does not establish all of them. A report covers only its identified sample, not all medications or clinical outcomes. Example laboratory verification service ↗
Community experiences are a separate measure
Patient opinions are moderated and weighted to reduce the influence of small samples, rapidly created accounts and duplicate text. They do not change the technical benchmark. The review policy explains the calculation and moderation rules.
How we stay independent
Membership gives readers detailed reports without changing provider scores. Evaluated peptide providers and related brands cannot advertise. Other advertisements require an editorial conflict check and appear outside the ranking, labeled as advertising.
Research and editorial review
Scheduled checks revisit provider sources, including relevant public regulatory records. AI prepares proposals with supporting excerpts. Proposals are stored privately; an editor reviews, edits and approves or rejects them. Saving a proposal does not change the published assessment. Sources that fail or block automated access remain unverified.