News 11/12/18

Top News

As Mr. HIStalk reported earlier today, private equity firms Veritas Capital and Elliott Management subsidiary Evergreen Coast Capital will acquire Athenahealth for $5.7 billion. Athenahealth will be combined with Veritas-owned Virence Health, which sells the former GE Healthcare financial, ambulatory, and workforce management product lines.

Virence Chairman and CEO Bob Segert, with the company barely two months, will become Athenahealth’s CEO. (Mr. H offers the back story here.)

The sale seems like the end of a health IT era in some respects, though I suppose that happens anytime an unfiltered, over-the-top company honcho like Jonathan Bush is overtly (or covertly) pushed out. The acquisition shares some similarities with Vista Equity Partners’ purchase of Greenway Medical, though the leadership drain from that company during its rebranding to Greenway Health was slower, evoking far less vitriol than Elliott Management’s pressure on Athena.

Webinars

None scheduled in the coming weeks. Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre for information.

Announcements and Implementations

Physicians Computer Company joins Carequality, giving its customers the ability to exchange health data more easily via the initiative’s interoperability framework. PCC’s Jen Marsala says the membership decision was made to help independent physicians stay that way: “Hospitals will no longer be able to say to our independent pediatricians, ‘You need to join us and give up your independence because we can’t share information.’

In North Carolina, Alliance Behavioral Healthcare goes live on ZeOmega’s Jiva 6.1 population health management software.

LStar Imaging selects imaging workflow software and services from RadNet subsidiary ERad. LStar will open in New Braunfels, TX early next year.

Community Health Center Inc. (CT) and the Weitzman Institute (CT) integrate Safety Net Connect’s Converge e-consult software with their Community EConsult Network. The network will use Converge to help community health centers and primary care providers with addiction treatment specialists across the country.

Research and Innovation

A survey of 2,000 patients reveals that the majority of encounters with  their primary care physicians deal with physical well-being, and often fail to address social determinants of health and other aspects of a patient’s health and well-being. Survey facilitator and family physician Wayne Jonas, MD believes that while shortened appointment times and digital record-keeping requirements may have some part to play in a provider’s ability to dig deeper into a patient’s personal life, it really boils down to a shift in thinking. “Speaking personally,” he says, “as physicians we should be asking, ‘What matters?’ instead of just, ‘What’s the matter?’ so we can better understand why our patients want to be healthy and what might be getting in the way of their health goals.

Other

Urgent care provider CityMD’s new ad campaign, which kicks off with the commercial above, is pretty apropos as we head into cold, flu, and holiday gathering season. I say this as an “older, wiser sister,” of course.

Sponsor Updates

• AdvancedMD employees pack over 900 weekend pantry packs for students in the Granite School District.
• Aprima publishes a new guide, “How to Switch EHRs.”
• EClinicalWorks will exhibit at the 2018 NNOHA Annual Conference November 12-13 in New Orleans.
• Healthwise will exhibit at NextGen UGM 2018 November 11-14 in Nashville.
• Nordic will exhibit at the HIMSS GC3 event November 14-16 in Mobile, AL.
• PerfectServe will exhibit at the HealthLeaders CNO Exchange November 12-14 in Charleston, SC.

Blog Posts

• Three Ways Telemedicine Improves Care for Providers and Patients (EClinicalWorks)
• BPCI Advanced brings quality measures into the mix. Patient education helps you meet them. (Healthwise)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

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News 11/7/18

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Greenway Health promotes Kimberly O’Loughlin to president. She came to the company as COO in May, after spending four years at Philips Healthcare. In announcing her promotion, CEO Richard Atkin alluded to the fact that the company is working to build an experienced leadership team. Atkin came to the company in June, while the rest of the executive team has been together for less than two years.

Webinars

None scheduled in the coming weeks. Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre for information.

Announcements and Implementations

DrChrono adds AI-powered coding automation tools from Diagnoss to its tablet-based EHR.

Red Bank Radiology (NJ) selects RCM and practice management technology and services from Healthcare Administrative Partners.

Rothman Orthopaedic Institute implements Allscripts Practice Management at its facilities in Pennsylvania.

NextGen Healthcare announces GA of Quality/Cost Fusion, a population health analytics tool that helps providers assess the value of their care based on clinical and claims data.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

San Francisco-based primary care company Circle Medical raises $3.5 million in a funding round led by A.Capital with help from Well Health Technologies. Well Health hopes to bring Circle Medical’s proprietary technology, including mobile patient engagement app and telemedicine capabilities, to its network of Canadian clinics.

Physician’s Computer Company, The Verden Group, PedsOne Pediatric Billing Specialists, and the Pediatric Management Institute join forces to launch PediatricStartup. The collaborative will offer pediatricians looking to open their own practices consulting services encompassing all aspects of the business.

Healthcare messaging and virtual visit company Medici acquires competitor DocbookMD from Scrypts for an undisclosed sum. Coinciding with the acquisition is the appointment of Anne Hunt (Castlight Health) to VP and head of product.

Government and Politics

IBM’s Health Corps works with the State of Utah to collect data on healthcare staffing shortages and develop workforce optimization software. Once fine-tuned, stakeholders will be able to use the open-source software to identify program and staffing needs, particularly in the area of primary care. Senator Ann Millner says that, “It will help us step back and rethink in ways that we are not accustomed to … to optimize the talents and the experience of the health care teams we assemble for the future, but even more importantly to do that in such that we’re able to provide more accessible, more affordable, quality primary health care access to the residents of Utah, which is our first priority.”

Telemedicine

In Virginia, the Bay Rivers Telehealth Alliance and the St. Charles Health Council will use nearly $500,000 in USDA grants to boost telemedicine services for opioid addiction and mental health treatment.

Research and Innovation

An Oliver Wyman survey on consumer healthcare preferences finds that:

• 10 percent of the study’s 2,500 respondents have taken advantage of telemedicine within the last year.
• Interest in most virtual care services has increased over the last three years.
• Barriers to telemedicine utilization include a lack of awareness, and a preference for in-person care.
• Consumers are most willing to share their health data if it helps to ensure high-quality care and helps tailor care.
• Nearly half of respondents feel cost of services should be part of a provider’s discussion of recommended treatment.

Sponsor Updates

• EClinicalWorks publishes a podcast titled “How PRM Services Boosted Youth Engagement in NYC.”
• The Chicago Tribute names Intelligent Medical Objects as a “Top Workplace.”
• Nordic will host a reception during the Population Health and Connect Summit November 7 from 6:30-8:30pm in Madison, WI.

Blog Posts

• Keep Patients Safe with Prescription Drug Monitoring Programs (EClinicalWorks)
• The calm through the storm: How I relied on my Managed Services team during Hurricane Florence (Nordic)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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News 10/31/18

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The retail healthcare wars heat up: CVS pilots a delivery service for prescriptions and online purchases at 350 stores in Boston. The CarePass program offers free deliveries with an annual membership fee of $48. It also includes discounts on CVS products, access to a pharmacist helpline, and monthly coupons. The move, which CVS Pharmacy President Kevin Hourican attributes to customer demand, takes Amazon’s Prime membership model one step further by bundling prescriptions with retail goods. Though Amazon acquired prescription delivery service PillPack several months ago, it has yet to offer a similar bundling arrangement.

Should the pilot go well, CVS may include MinuteClinic services in an expanded version of the program.

Amazon, meanwhile, has launched a line of medical devices called Choice that includes blood pressure cuffs and glucose monitors. The new line was developed with help from consulting firm Arcadia Group, which has developed similar product lines for Walmart. Arcadia hopes to incorporate the devices into Alexa’s repertoire in the coming months.

Webinars

November 7 (Wednesday) 3:00 ET. “Opioid Crisis: What One Health Plan is Doing About It.” Presenter: Samuel DiCapua, DO, chief medical director, New Hampshire Health Families; and chief medical officer, Casenet. Sponsor: Casenet. This webinar will describe how managed care organization NH Health Families is using innovative programs to manage patients who are struggling with addiction and to help prevent opioid abuse.

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

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Practice and revenue cycle management company Clinicspectrum relocates to expanded headquarters in Union, NJ.

Bloomberg reports that Elliott Management and Veritas Capital have teamed up to bid on Athenahealth. Veritas acquired GE’s revenue-cycle, ambulatory care, and workforce management software business for $1 billion in April.

New York-based HIE HealtheLink expands with new office space in Depew.

Patient engagement and practice marketing company PatientPop raises new capital, increasing its total funding to $75 million.

People

Less than two months after announcing a $24 million Series A funding round, Cricket Health brings on Sam Mankiewicz (Healthvana) CTO, Robert Sepucha (Fresenius Medical Care) chief administrative officer, and Dianna Budgeon, RN (Sound Physicians) head of clinical operations.

Announcements and Implementations

The Michigan Institute of Urology and The Urology Group (OH) go live on Integra Connect’s specialty-focused EHR at a combined 34 locations.

New York-based urgent and primary care provider WestMed Medical Group implements online appointment booking and virtual visit software from Solv Health.

Telemedicine

The American Psychiatric Association and American Telemedicine Association publish "Best Practices in Videoconferencing-Based Telemental Health," offering guidance on technology, settings, privacy and security, and clinical considerations for patients of different ages and backgrounds.

Philadelphia Eyeglass Labs selects 20/20Now’s telemedicine tools for eye care professionals. The five-location practice had been a beta tester of similar technology from DigitalOptometrics.

Other

A Swedish man credits his Apple Watch 4’s fall-detection feature with helping him contact emergency services (and quite possibly avoiding a kitchen fire) after suffering crippling back pain that caused him to collapse in the kitchen. The watch sensed the fall and offered to call an ambulance. The fall-alert feature is set to call an ambulance if a user is unresponsive one minute after a fall is detected.

Sponsor Updates

• EClinicalWorks posts a podcast titled “Tools and Training to Target Physician Burnout.”
• AdvancedMD will exhibit at APTA PPS November 7-10 in Colorado Springs.
• Aprima will exhibit at the AAP National Conference & Exhibition November 3-5 in Orlando.

Blog Posts

• The Opioid Crisis: How to Increase Patient Safety (EClinicalWorks)
• 7 Key steps for outsourcing RCM for VBC (AdvancedMD)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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News 10/29/18

Top News

Primary care startup Carbon Health merges with Direct Urgent Care. The combined company now offers primary and urgent care at seven clinics in Northern California, aided by the Carbon Health app, virtual consults, and chatbot-powered messaging.

Webinars

October 30 (Tuesday) 2:00 ET. “How One Pediatric CIN Aligned Culture, Technology and the Community to Transform Care.” Presenters: Lisa Henderson, executive director, Dayton Children’s Health Partners; Shehzad Saeed, MD, associate chief medical officer, Dayton Children’s Health Partners; Mason Beard, solutions strategy leader, Philips PHM; Gabe Orthous, value-based care consultant, Himformatics. Sponsor: Philips PHM. Dayton Children’s Health Partners, a pediatric clinically integrated network, will describe how it aligned its internal culture, technology partners, and the community around its goal of streamlining care delivery and improving outcomes. Presenters will describe how it recruited network members, negotiated value-based contracts, and implemented a data-driven care management process.

November 7 (Wednesday) 3:00 ET. “Opioid Crisis: What One Health Plan is Doing About It.” Presenter: Samuel DiCapua, DO, chief medical director, New Hampshire Health Families; and chief medical officer, Casenet. Sponsor: Casenet. This webinar will describe how managed care organization NH Health Families is using innovative programs to manage patients who are struggling with addiction and to help prevent opioid abuse.

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

Announcements and Implementations

Bonita Springs, FL-based EyeMD EMR Healthcare Systems announces GA of its updated EHR for ophthalmologists.

In Arizona, 4C Medical Group will implement Elation’s EHR at its eight clinics.

Casamba adds Kno2’s health data exchange capabilities to its EHR for outpatient therapy practices. Casamba end users will now be able to take advantage of Direct messaging, and tap into the networks of CommonWell, Carequality, and a variety of HIEs and ACOs.

In Chicago, Plumbers Local Union 130 UA selects Cerner to manage a new clinic for members that will open early next year.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Chronic disease management software company Cliexa acquires Preventative Technology Solutions. Cliexa has licensed medical assessment software from PTS for several years as part of its Options behavioral health screening apps for primary care practices. 

The local business paper looks at Indiana University Health Physician’s efforts to acquire Goodman Campbell Brain and Spine – one of the state’s last independent medical groups. IU Health has acquired 65 physician groups since forming in 2009, but is facing a tough road with Goodman Campbell thanks to a fierce independent streak and in-demand physicians who like having the freedom to practice throughout the area’s health systems. Goodman Campbell Executive Director of Operations John Moeller has let it be known that, “Our goal is to continue to be independent.” Goodman Campbell’s contract with IU Health is up in December 2019.

With share prices hovering around $123, CNBC reports that Athenahealth expects to get its highly anticipated deal done with a yet-to-be-named buyer within the next two weeks.

People

The Health Collaborative CEO Craig Brammer will take on the additional role of CEO at The Network for Regional Healthcare Improvement. The Health Collaborative is a member of NRHI, a national nonprofit that works with 30 regional health improvement collaboratives on achieving the Triple Aim.

Government and Politics

CMS issues a proposed rule that would expand covered telemedicine benefits to Medicare Advantage plans starting in 2020.

Telemedicine

Genneve will add telemedicine to its line of health and wellness products and services for menopausal women. The Seattle-based startup will offer the virtual consults in five markets this year, and plans to expand in early 2019.

Urgent care provider Akos and AdviNow Medical partner to develop a medical station that uses augmented reality to guide patients through the self-collection of diagnostic data, which is then sent to an Akos provider via virtual consult. After the consult, AI-based software takes care of e-prescribing and payment details, and follow up.

Other

Suellen Lee, MD gives up her medical license after the Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners found she borrowed $300,000 from a patient and co-worker whom she diagnosed with dementia nearly 20 years later. The patient, who was cleared of dementia by another provider, seems to have alerted the board because of Lee’s failure to repay the loan.

Sponsor Updates

• EClinicalWorks publishes a podcast titled “Long Distance Relationships Made Easy With TeleVisits.”
• AdvancedMD will exhibit at the American Academy of Ophthalmology event through October 30 in Chicago.

Blog Posts

• Three Ways to Succeed with MACRA/MIPS in 2018 and Beyond (EClinicalWorks)
• How to use claims data to get a full report on population health (Nordic)

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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Contact us online.
Become a sponsor.

News 10/24/18

Top News

Digital health company Thirty Madison will launch a telemedicine service for migraine sufferers later this year. The New York City-based company announced a $15 million Series A funding round last week, which it will use for the new product launch and to further develop its telemedicine-based prescription service for men’s hair loss.  

Co-founders Demetri Karagas and Steve Gutentag both hail from Google. They have raised $23 million since launching the company last year.

Webinars

October 30 (Tuesday) 2:00 ET. “How One Pediatric CIN Aligned Culture, Technology and the Community to Transform Care.” Presenters: Lisa Henderson, executive director, Dayton Children’s Health Partners; Shehzad Saeed, MD, associate chief medical officer, Dayton Children’s Health Partners; Mason Beard, solutions strategy leader, Philips PHM; Gabe Orthous, value-based care consultant, Himformatics. Sponsor: Philips PHM. Dayton Children’s Health Partners, a pediatric clinically integrated network, will describe how it aligned its internal culture, technology partners, and the community around its goal of streamlining care delivery and improving outcomes. Presenters will describe how it recruited network members, negotiated value-based contracts, and implemented a data-driven care management process.

November 7 (Wednesday) 3:00 ET. “Opioid Crisis: What One Health Plan is Doing About It.” Presenter: Samuel DiCapua, DO, chief medical director, New Hampshire Health Families; and chief medical officer, Casenet. Sponsor: Casenet. This webinar will describe how managed care organization NH Health Families is using innovative programs to manage patients who are struggling with addiction and to help prevent opioid abuse.

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

Announcements and Implementations

EClinicalworks adds an Opioid Risk Tool to its EHR, giving providers the ability via smart form to assess a patient’s risk for drug abuse and offer alternatives that align with CDC recommendations.

New York-based Care Compass Network will use care management technology from GSI Health to integrate the EHRs of its community health partners, and improve care delivered to Medicaid patients within its nine-country service area.

Athenahealth incorporates real-time prescription pricing and benefit information from CoverMyMeds with its AthenaClinicals EHR.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Medicare quality reporting company Mingle Analytics merges with care management software company SilverVue to form physician practice-focused Mingle Health. Mingle Analytics founder and CEO David Mingle, MD will become executive chairman of the new company. SilverVue founder and CEO Will West will take on the role of CEO.

People

Patrick Block (LeanKit) joins Relatient as CFO.

MGMA names Akash Madiah (DaVita Medical Group) CFO.

Government and Politics

President Trump signs the SUPPORT for Patients and Communities Act into law. The 660-page bill focuses on combatting the opioid epidemic. Among other things, it encourages telemedicine utilization for patients suffering from opioid use disorder, and the adoption of EHRs among behavioral health providers.

OCR extends the Mecklenburg Country Health Department in North Carolina an olive branch of sorts by not fining it for a 2017 HIPAA violation. The infraction occurred when the county responded to a local media outlet’s records request with an Excel spreadsheet containing the PHI of thousands of health department patients. The county self-reported the violation, and has agreed to revise its policies, procedures, and training methods; and to purchase hardware and software that will help it better manage records requests.

Research and Innovation

A JAMA study finds that people have crowdfunded over $4 billion sine 2015 to fund unproven medical treatments. The majority of money was raised through GoFundMe for homeopathic or naturopathic cancer treatments.

Other

In HIMSS giveaway news: Smart mug manufacturer Ember connects its temperature- and quantity-sensing features with Apple’s Health app, giving users the ability to track their daily caffeine consumption and to better understand how it impacts their heart rate and sleep patterns. The mugs retail for between $80 and $150.

Contacts

Jenn, Mr. H, Lorre

More news: HIStalk.

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