News 10/11/23

Top News

Private equity firm General Catalyst launches Health Assurance Transformation Corp., which will work with the firm’s 20-plus health system partners to test new care delivery and workflow optimization technologies developed by companies within its portfolio.

HATco will also eventually seek to purchase a health system through which it can pilot additional concepts.

General Catalyst’s portfolio includes Athelas, which recently acquired Commure; Aidoc; Imprivata; and Transcarent.

Former Intermountain Health CEO Marc Harrison, MD, MMM will serve as CEO of HATco.

Webinars

October 25 (Wednesday) 2 ET. “AMA: The Power of Data Completeness.” Sponsor: Particle Health. Presenters: Jason Prestinario, MSME, CEO, Particle Health; Carolyn Ward, MD, director of clinical strategy, Particle Health. Is your healthcare organization looking to drive profitability and scale quickly? Our experts will explore how comprehensive clinical data can revolutionize the health tech landscape. This engaging discussion will cover trending topics such as leveraging AI and data innovation to enhance patient care and outcomes, real-world examples of organizations leading the charge in data-driven healthcare, overcoming challenges in data completeness and interoperability, and visionary perspectives on the future of care delivery.

Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present or promote your own.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

The cycle of de-listing warnings, extensions, and appeals for failing to file financial reports continues for Veradigm, for which Nasdaq has granted a temporary de-listing stay pending a November 16 hearing.

Walmart will offer no-charge virtual primary care from Included Health to 1 million people who are covered by its employee health insurance plan. Walmart’s pilot project with the company saw an 11% reduction in total cost with only 10% of those treated moving to an in-person care setting. One-third of the visits related to chronic or preventative care.

Commons Clinic, which offers value-based specialty care for orthopedics from two Los Angeles area clinics, raises $19.5 million in a Series A round. The company vows to disrupt the “stagnant hospital-centric model” in favor of conservative treatment, digital-first services, and use of surgery centers for procedures.

Sales

• Citizens Medical Center (TX) will implement Meditech Expanse.
• Clemson Rural Health (SC) selects health information exchange and storage capabilities from Sync.MD.
• Intermountain Health will use Clearsense’s 1Clearsense data archival service to consolidate data from its legacy systems.

People

Ashlee DesJardins (StayWell) joins Cordea Consulting as regional VP of sales.

University of Cincinnati College of Medicine names biomedical informatics professor Rodrigo Deliberato, MD, PhD chief research information officer.

Munson Healthcare (MI) names Michael Saad, MBA (University of Tennessee Medical Center) CIO.

Mike Heckman, MBA (Rockcreek Way) joins Beterra Health as president.

Announcements and Implementations

Healthwise announces GA of Health Compass, a service that delivers educational healthcare content in any format to any digital channel.

In England, King’s College Hospital and Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trusts go live on Epic, which Epic says is the largest single go-live in the world with 51,000 users involved.

Cedars-Sinai launches a virtual healthcare app for patients in California using technology from K Health.

Care.ai equips its Smart Care Facility Platform with Google Cloud’s generative AI and data analytics.

Northern California HIE SacValley MedShare works with Konza National Network to develop behavioral health analytics dashboards.

Orlando Health rolls out AndorHealth’s ThinkAndor Virtual Hospital technology.

Verato will incorporate Clear’s consumer-facing identity verification technology into its healthcare master data management solution.

Main Street Health, which provides an in-house care coordination navigator in each of its 900 mostly small and rural practices in 18 states to support value-based care, raises $315 million in new capital. Investors in the round include the five largest Medicare Advantage plans in the US. One of the company’s investors and builders is Russell Street Ventures, which also backs CareBridge, a provider of remote care to Medicaid patients who prefer at-home care to nursing home admission. That company is named as the fastest-growing in the US by Inc. 5000, with a 157,000% revenue increase last year to $873 million.

Government and Politics

The DEA extends a COVID-initiated rule allowing providers to prescribe select controlled substances via telemedicine through the end of 2024.

The Oklahoma Fraternal Order of Police sues Oklahoma Health Care Authority, claiming that its HIE is unconstitutional because it requires providers who treat Medicaid patients to submit details about the encounter. The plaintiff’s lawyer says the HIE is “the most dangerous attack on Oklahomans’ privacy in the history of the state” and questions its authority to mandate participation or to impose fees that should instead be appropriated by the legislature.

Privacy and Security

The state insurer of the Philippines, which has warned its 36 million members that a ransomware attacked has exposed their information, admits that it didn’t renew its antivirus software agreement in May before the incident because of new government procurement rules. PhilHealth has since asked the antivirus vendor for a 30-day trial of new software.

Other

Advocate Health will send 100 of its Epic experts to England, where they will help seven London hospitals transition to Epic.

Best Buy will partner with virtual care provider Wheel and pharmacy technology vendor HealthDyne to sell prescription continuous glucose monitors from its website. The retailer plans to allow customers to upload CGM prescriptions from their own physicians to their Best Buy health profile.

Sponsor Updates

• Ascom staffers raise $5,000 by riding 10,000 miles in the Great Cycle Challenge to help fight pediatric cancer.
• Nym expands its suite of outpatient solutions for RCM automation to include outpatient surgery and visits.
• Veradigm becomes the first major EHR to join FDB’s Vela e-prescribing network.
• Nuance ranks as the leading vendor for mid-RCM healthcare providers, according to a recent Black Book Research survey.
• Baker Tilly publishes its “Healthcare M&A Update: H1 2023.”
• Censinet releases a new Risk Never Sleep Podcast featuring Skip Sorrels.
• CloudWave wins the Managed Security Solution of the Year Award in the 2023 Cybersecurity Breakthrough Awards program.
• CereCore releases a new podcast, “Vision and Value-Driven EHR Optimization: A Leadership Interview.”
• Current Health publishes a new case study, “The Geek Squad Effect.”
• Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust in England roll out Sectra’s enterprise imaging technology to a sixth trust.

Blog Posts

• Implementing a Revenue Cycle Maturity Framework: Best Practices (AGS Health)
• Data on FHIR: Interoperability standards for whole-person care (Arcadia)
• Are You Struggling with Interoperability Challenges? You’re Not Alone (AdvancedMD)
• Screen, stream, support: The tech-driven future of mental health (Nordic)
• Best Practices for Centralized Virtual Sitting (AvaSure)
• Building New Data Connections Helps Brands Lower Adherence Barriers (ConnectiveRx)

Contacts

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