The independent evaluation desk for healthcare AI
An evaluation desk means we help hospitals, health systems and practices decide which AI tools to buy and how to deploy them safely, and we publish the evidence we work from. We do not build those tools, resell them, or take a cut when you buy one. Scribes, phone agents, prior authorization and billing automation: we compare the vendors, track the rules that apply, and show our working.
Clunic was founded in 2026 by the operator of established healthcare sector information platforms serving licensing and operations audiences. The work that led here had the same shape as the work we do now: read the primary sources carefully, write down what they actually say, and publish it for the people who have to act on it.
The firm is new, and the site says so wherever the question comes up. There is no client count on this page, no satisfaction score and no logo wall, because there is nothing there we could publish and stand behind yet. What we can put in front of you is the method, the commercial arrangement, and the reasoning on every page we have written.
We are paid by the organisation we advise and by nobody else. No vendor pays us for a recommendation, a placement or an introduction, and we resell nothing. That is the whole of the business model, and it is the reason a Clunic engagement is able to end with the words “not yet”.
How we work
Three commitments that shape every engagement. They are constraints on us rather than promises about you, which is what makes them checkable.
- 01
Vendor neutral, by policy
No product, no reseller agreement, no commission, no referral fee, no paid placement. The only money that reaches us comes from the organisation we are advising, which is the only arrangement under which our answer can be that you should buy nothing.
- 02
We put findings in writing, including the no-go calls
Every engagement ends in a document with the reasoning, the assumptions and the places our knowledge stops all visible. A report that recommends waiting is a finished piece of work, not a failed sale, and it is priced the same.
- 03
We say no to unsafe deployments
Where a workflow puts a clinical decision behind an unmonitored model, or moves protected health information somewhere the contract does not cover, we will say so plainly and decline to help build it. That has to be true before an engagement starts to mean anything during one.
What an engagement letter commits us to
None of this is negotiated per client. It is how the practice runs, and it is in writing before anyone starts.
- The fee is fixed and stated in the proposal, before any work starts.
- The scope is written down, and so is what is out of it.
- A weekly checkpoint with whoever owns the decision while the work is live.
- A business associate agreement is signed before any conversation touches protected health information.
- Every claim in a deliverable is traceable to a source, a system or a stated assumption.
The conditions we work under
Statements about how we operate, not certifications. Where a certificate exists we will publish the certificate.
- BAA-ready
- FHIR/HL7-native
- HIPAA-regulated environments
- NIST AI RMF-aligned
Who is behind Clunic
Every page on this site is attributed to a named author, and each author has a profile you can read before you decide how much weight to give the page.
Clunic Research Team
Research and editorial
The Clunic research team maintains the use case, EHR, regulation and comparison pages on this site. Every page is written against primary sources, and any claim that cannot be traced to one is removed rather than softened. Each page carries the date it was last checked.
- Primary source review against HHS, CMS, ONC and FDA publications
- Methodology aligned to the NIST AI Risk Management Framework
- No vendor commissions, referral fees or paid placements
How the work and the writing are done
Engagements run on the CARE method: chart, architect, run, evaluate, with a fixed fee, a weekly checkpoint and everything in writing. The pages on this site are held to a separate and equally explicit standard, covering which sources we accept, how often each page is re-checked, and where AI is used in drafting.
Make it a formal evaluation
Everything we publish is free to read and free to argue with. When the decision has to be signed, dated and defended to a board, we run the evaluation against your own estate. We take no vendor commissions.
- A 30 minute evaluation call with an analyst, no pitch deck.
- A read on the vendors and the rules in play, and the use cases we would not touch yet.
- A written proposal with scope, sequence and a fixed fee.
- No obligation
- Direct with an analyst, not a sales rep
- BAA available before any PHI discussion