News 6/25/18

Top News

After cutting its staff headcount by half and bringing on a new CEO, Outcome Health announces that founders Rishi Shah and Shradha Agarwal have stepped down from the Board of Directors in an effort to “provide clear leadership transition for the new management team.” Board member and Portage Point Partners managing partner Matthew Ray has taken over as chairman. The medical waiting room advertising company was valued at $5 billion last year, making Shah and Agarwal one-time paper billionaires.

Webinars

None scheduled soon. Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre for information.

Here is the recording of last week’s webinar titled, “Healthcare Organizations: Operationalizing Data Science Models.”

Announcements and Implementations

Clinical dispensing software vendor MDScripts offers end users in Arizona, Indiana, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia access to their state-based PDMP via integration with Appriss Health’s PMP Gateway.

California-based HIEs SacValley MedShare and Connect Healthcare will merge.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

As the details behind CareSync’s demise continue to surface (Dr. Jayne’s latest Curbside Consult provides more inside scoop), my inbox continues to swell with emails from companies anxious to step into the chronic care management company’s shoes. Chronic Care Management Inc., Revenue Maximization Group, and Sargas Pharmaceutical Adherence & Compliance International promise to “seamlessly transition medical groups and patients affected by the CareSync closure” to their respective CCM services. I saw the same phenomenon happen when Practice Fusion changed to a subscription model, and have to wonder how effective these marketing campaigns are (and how many Athenahealth competitors have already written press releases to a similar effect). Has a well-timed press release prompted your practice to switch health IT vendors after your main vendor made a significant change to its business model? Please share your experience in the comments below.

The Aledade team celebrates its fourth anniversary with statistics and figures that point to a successful ACO venture thus far. The juxtaposition of its celebratory PR with the news of CareSync’s passing is an interesting one – one that makes me wonder how much leadership style and investor panache played a part in each company’s evolution.

App-based medical record aggregator and services startup Health Gorilla raises $8.2 million in a Series A round.

New York City-based patient billing and provider CRM vendor Cedar raises $36 million in a Series B funding round led by investment firm Kinnevik. The company has raised $49 million since formally launching late last year. Co-founder and CEO Florian Otto, MD helped launch Groupon Brasil and spent several years at ZocDoc before opening Cedar with AppNexus veteran Arel Lidow.

Healthcare cloud services company NetGain Technology acquires IManaged Solutions for an undisclosed sum. IManaged Solutions offers similar services to optometry practices and EHR vendors. Founder Craig Rodrigue will join NetGain as GM of the IManaged business.

Other

Australian Health Minister Greg Hunt orders a review of appointment scheduling and physician review website HealthEngine after reporters claim it has been sharing health data with third parties without user consent – an allegation the company denies. HealthEngine sent daily lists of its users to law firms looking for clients with personal injury claims as part of a referral partnership – a scheme that may indeed have been legitimate based on details deeply embedded within the company’s privacy policy. HealthEngine was in hot water last week for editing out negative physician reviews.

Sponsor Updates

• Medicity will present at the Internet of Health event June 26-27 in Boston.

Blog Posts

• Unsurprisingly, physicians aren’t thrilled with their EHRs (Medicomp)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

Get HIStalk Practice updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

News 6/20/18

Top News

Cardiologist Lynne Perry-Bottinger, MD files a $1 million John Doe lawsuit in federal court over an anonymous Healthgrades review that she believes was left by a competitor. The suit accuses the reviewer of “false advertising, libel, unfair competition, and tortious interference.” Perry-Bottinger believes the negative review (click the image above to read) – one of a total of five for her on Healthgrades – has led several patients to cancel appointments. Healthgrades has refused to unveil the identity of the reviewer without a subpoena.

Webinars

June 21 (Thursday) noon ET. “Operationalizing Data Science Models in Healthcare.” Sponsor: CitiusTech. Presenters: Yugal Sharma, PhD, VP of data science, CitiusTech; Vinil Menon, VP of enterprise applications proficiency, CitiusTech. As healthcare organizations are becoming more adept at developing models, building the skills required to manage, validate, and deploy these models efficiently remains a challenging task. We define operationalization as the process of managing, validating, and deploying models within an organization. Several industry best practices, along with frameworks and technology solutions, exist to address this challenge. An understanding of this space and current state of the art is crucial to ensure efficient use and consumption of these models for relevant stakeholders in the organization. This webinar will give an introduction and overview of these key areas, along with examples and case studies to demonstrate the value of various best practices in the healthcare industry.

Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre for information.

Announcements and Implementations

Athenahealth will offer Epocrates end users drug therapy advice from Therapeutic Research Center via Prescriber’s Letters updates.

DrChrono adds payment processing capabilities from Square to its EHR and OnPatient portal.

Greenway Health integrates QardioMD’s remote monitoring devices and software with its EHR and practice management system.

NoteSwift develops an API toolkit for vendors interested in adding the company’s Samantha virtual documentation assistant software to their EHRs.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

IGambit, parent company of data analytics management and remote monitoring business Healthdatix, will acquire chronic care management services company Winpoint Health for an undisclosed amount.

Medication management startup MedX Services opens for business in Chattanooga, TN. The company has developed an at-home medication dispensing and care communication system that will keep physicians, pharmacists, and caregivers in the loop when a patient misses a daily dose.

I missed this last month: Boston-based IT services and support company Versatile launches a healthcare managed services division for ambulatory organizations.

Government and Politics

National Coordinator Don Rucker, MD offers an update on how the ONC is making good on the interoperability promises of the 21st Century Cures Act. High-level items of note include encouraging the development of APIs to make health data more shareable, sharing best practices to help stakeholders avoid information blocking, moving forward with TEFCA (Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement), and continuing to find ways to reduce the administrative burdens on physicians.

To advance its MyHealthEData patient data-sharing initiative, CMS will host a Blue Button 2.0 Developers Conference August 13 in Washington, DC.

Telemedicine

This article profiles, Docity, a telemed startup founded by Marine Corps veteran James Cowan that is working to bring virtual consults to consumers through bundled offerings from their Internet service providers. It’s an interesting concept – one that the company pivoted to after attempting to stand up a direct-to-consumer telemedicine service.

Other

Latham, NY-based Med Associates notifies its billing customers of a March data breach that may have exposed the medical records of 270,000 patients. The company attributes the breach to unauthorized access of a workstation.

Sponsor Updates

Blog Posts

• For Phoenix Children’s Hospital, success was just the beginning (Medicomp)
• HIPAA & Texting (AdvancedMD)
• Precision Medicine at the Point of Care (Aprima)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

Get HIStalk Practice updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

News 6/18/18

Top News

Walgreens will open a new office in Chicago next year to accommodate its growing Technology Excellence Center, which includes the company’s retail pharmacy technology, digital, mobile, and e-commerce groups. The 20,000 square-foot facility will eventually employ 1,800, including 1,300 who will relocate to the city where Walgreens was founded in 1901.

Webinars

June 21 (Thursday) noon ET. “Operationalizing Data Science Models in Healthcare.” Sponsor: CitiusTech. Presenters: Yugal Sharma, PhD, VP of data science, CitiusTech; Vinil Menon, VP of enterprise applications proficiency, CitiusTech. As healthcare organizations are becoming more adept at developing models, building the skills required to manage, validate, and deploy these models efficiently remains a challenging task. We define operationalization as the process of managing, validating, and deploying models within an organization. Several industry best practices, along with frameworks and technology solutions, exist to address this challenge. An understanding of this space and current state of the art is crucial to ensure efficient use and consumption of these models for relevant stakeholders in the organization. This webinar will give an introduction and overview of these key areas, along with examples and case studies to demonstrate the value of various best practices in the healthcare industry.

Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre for information.

Announcements and Implementations

Marin County in California selects care coordination technology from ACT.MD to serve as the case management hub for its new Whole Person Care initiative. The program will focus on providing healthcare and social services for Medicaid recipients, particularly the chronically homeless, through data sharing between county departments and community service organizations.

Athenahealth integrates Brightree’s referral management software for home medical equipment with AthenaClinicals.

Aledade partners with population health management company Emtiro Health to launch an ACO for independent primary care practices in North Carolina. North Carolina-based Emtiro will serve as the frontline point of contact, while Aledade will supply technology, analytics, and regulatory insight.

People

Innovaccer CMO David Nace, MD joins the Population Health Alliance’s Board of Directors.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

In Connecticut, the City of New Haven partners with venture capital firm HealthVenture, and accelerators Bridge Innovations and Origami Innovations to open Health Haven Hub. The nonprofit incubator will offer early-stage health IT companies workspace, funding, and mentorship.

Telemedicine

True Nature Holding opens for business with telemedicine service lines for both humans and pets. The Atlanta-based company, which has tapped Jay Morton (Local Pet Rx) as president and interim CEO, plans to develop additional patient engagement, care coordination, and remote monitoring technologies.

Other

Family physician Daniel Dwyer files a $200 lawsuit against Apple after the company refused to revert his iPhone back to its previous operating system. Dwyer’s litigious act was prompted by an operating system update that occurred without his consent and while he was on the phone with the local pharmacy on behalf of a patient. “… I couldn’t use my phone until the update finished,” Dwyer explained. “It was a devious trick that they did, and it’s not fair. They interrupted my business. Thank goodness it was not a life-threatening situation, but it could have been.”

Independent physician practices in Vermont say enough is enough after patients complain of exorbitant lab fees charged by University of Vermont Medical Center. They have stopped sending their labs to UVMC, despite better access to lab results within the health system, and have instead turned to significantly cheaper labs that are out of state or handled by companies like Quest Diagnostics, which provides an on-site phlebotomist and digital results in 24 hours.

DNA testing kit company Dante Labs mistakenly sends five customers used saliva kits, blaming the error on its third-party fulfillment partner. It’s not the first black eye for at-home genetic testing companies: Orig3n DNA failed to recognize that one of its customers was in fact a dog, while several of the more well-known companies sent the same customer extremely different results – all of which makes me think results should be taken with a grain of salt (or ounce of saliva).

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

Get HIStalk Practice updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

News 6/13/18

Top News

New Mexico-based oncologist Barbara McAneny, MD takes the presidential helm during AMA’s annual meeting, while Atlanta-based psychiatrist Patrice Harris, MD becomes president-elect. Both women – the association’s fourth and fifth female presidents, respectively, have strong ties to health IT.

As the co-founder and CEO of New Mexico Oncology Consultants, and founder and manager of the New Mexico Cancer Center, McAneny has spearheaded the use of health IT like NantHealth’s clinical operating system as part of community oncology medical home programs. She has vowed to propel AMA forward in its work with data scientists and tech innovators to bring value to digital breakthroughs in medicine.

Harris has been active on AMA health IT committees and will continue to head its opioid task force. She is in private practice, serves as an Emory University professor, and consults on healthcare delivery services and trends.

Webinars

June 21 (Thursday) noon ET. “Operationalizing Data Science Models in Healthcare.” Sponsor: CitiusTech. Presenters: Yugal Sharma, PhD, VP of data science, CitiusTech; Vinil Menon, VP of enterprise applications proficiency, CitiusTech. As healthcare organizations are becoming more adept at developing models, building the skills required to manage, validate, and deploy these models efficiently remains a challenging task. We define operationalization as the process of managing, validating, and deploying models within an organization. Several industry best practices, along with frameworks and technology solutions, exist to address this challenge. An understanding of this space and current state of the art is crucial to ensure efficient use and consumption of these models for relevant stakeholders in the organization. This webinar will give an introduction and overview of these key areas, along with examples and case studies to demonstrate the value of various best practices in the healthcare industry.

Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre for information.

Announcements and Implementations

White Oak Pediatrics (MD) goes live on patient portal software from EClinicalWorks.

The American Podiatric Medical Association taps MyMipsScore to develop an app for its members, giving them access to its MIPS Calculator, MIPS eligibility status, and related analytics.

People

Gamil Kharfan (Claro Insurance) joins ACO and MSO company Genuine Health Group as its first chief growth officer.

DuPage Medical Group (IL) hires Nick Martin (Optum International) as CTO.

Telemedicine

Physical therapist Richa Kohli launches TheraNow, a Web-based physical therapy platform that includes virtual consults, in 14 states.

Other

That’s fear you smell: Researchers in Italy find that dental students perform better when conducting exams on mannequins outfitted with shirts previously worn by students during class lectures, as opposed to offering checkups to mannequins wearing shirts worn during more stressful exams.

Sponsor Updates

Blog Posts

• Alert Fatigue – Striking a Balance (Culbert Healthcare Solutions)
• Increase reimbursements with voice recognition software (AdvancedMD)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

Get HIStalk Practice updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

News 6/11/18

Top News

Pediatrician Mona Hanna-Attisha, MD recounts in The New York Times her personal and professional struggle to get to the bottom of lead-induced illnesses that were plaguing her patients after the city of Flint, MI switched water sources in 2015. She’ll release a book recounting the experience, the effects of which are still impacting the community, in the coming weeks.

A few snippets:

“Most of my professional life as a pediatrician and medical educator had been pretty predictable. Clinics, meetings, presentations, red tape, training sessions and lots of talking with faculty members and residents and patients. But I’d always seen my work through the lens of social justice. To put it simply, health is justice, especially for the youngest among us.

Now I was coming to see that my work couldn’t stop with treating patients and training other pediatricians. I was becoming something new — an activist, and a detective.

So, along with a growing team of doctors and scientists, I held a news conference to release our findings and demand action. It was an unusual thing for a local pediatrician to do. But that’s what you do when nobody’s listening. You get louder.”

Webinars

June 12 (Tuesday) 2:00 ET. “Blockchain in Healthcare: Why It Matters.” Sponsor: Quest Diagnostics. Presenter: Lidia Fonseca, CIO, Quest Diagnostics. Blockchain technology is gaining traction in many industries, including healthcare. It’s not only a hot topic, but is also showing promise with real-world applications. This webinar will share how blockchain may play a key role in the future of healthcare IT by helping to solve some of the industry’s challenges, distinguishing the hype from reality by discussing how it works, how it can impact healthcare providers, and its future application in healthcare IT.

June 21 (Thursday) noon ET. “Operationalizing Data Science Models in Healthcare.” Sponsor: CitiusTech. Presenters: Yugal Sharma, PhD, VP of data science, CitiusTech; Vinil Menon, VP of enterprise applications proficiency, CitiusTech. As healthcare organizations are becoming more adept at developing models, building the skills required to manage, validate, and deploy these models efficiently remains a challenging task. We define operationalization as the process of managing, validating, and deploying models within an organization. Several industry best practices, along with frameworks and technology solutions, exist to address this challenge. An understanding of this space and current state of the art is crucial to ensure efficient use and consumption of these models for relevant stakeholders in the organization. This webinar will give an introduction and overview of these key areas, along with examples and case studies to demonstrate the value of various best practices in the healthcare industry.

Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre for information.

Announcements and Implementations

Kareo announces GA of Engage, practice and patient relationship management software that includes online patient intake and scheduling, secure messaging, reputation management, and analytics.

Chicago-based direct primary care practice ImagineMD leverages Best in Class Care’s online referral and transparent pricing network.

Government and Politics

In California, the Long Beach Dept. of Health develops an online reporting system for food-borne illnesses. Local health officials hope that new system will result in better oversight of eateries, and help them to understand just how many patrons end up seeking medical care for their symptoms. Its previous telephone-based reporting system averaged just 72 calls a year.

Research and Innovation

Researchers at the Leiden University Medical Center in Holland find that breast cancer patients can recall their health data with remarkable accuracy up to 18 months after surgery – a boon to patients and the physicians who want to foster shared decision-making during follow-up care. Researchers also point out that such recall can help cut down on time spent on explaining procedures, and can benefit researchers by helping them “decide which information to obtain from patients or medical records.”

Telemedicine

Epic Health develops Carie, a mobile app that offers virtual consult and in-office scheduling capabilities.

Other

In Australia, a media outlet calls out online physician scheduling and review website HealthEngine for tampering with patient reviews. Media analysts found that over half of the nearly 48,000 reviews had been edited in some way, with many being changed to more positive wording. HealthEngine Chief Executive and GP Marcus Tan at first defended the company’s practices, pointing out that it publishes only positive reviews to “celebrate” the art of medicine. He quickly recanted after the news broke and has vowed to launch an internal audit of review editing processes.

The beta version of Apple’s latest software update, iOS 12, will give users the option to turn their AirPods into hearing aids via the new Live Listen feature, which amplifies sound through built-in earbud microphones and an accompanying Made-for-iPhone hearing aid device.

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

Get HIStalk Practice updates.
Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.