What You Should Know:

– The American Medical Association (AMA) announced the addition of three Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) codes for AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine.

The American Medical Association (AMA) today announced that
the Current Procedural Terminology (CPT®) code set is
being updated by the CPT Editorial Panel to include immunization and
administration codes that are unique to the COVID-19 vaccine under development
by AstraZeneca and University of Oxford.

The new CPT codes will be effective for use on the condition
that the AstraZeneca vaccine receives approval or emergency use authorizations
from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The AMA is publishing the new CPT
codes now to ensure electronic systems across the U.S. health care
system are updated and prepared for the prospect of FDA approval or
authorization for the AstraZeneca vaccine.

Growing List
of CPT Codes to Support COVID-19 Vaccines

The AstraZeneca vaccine joins two other COVID-19 vaccines that were … Read the rest

Read More »

What You Should Know:

– Service commerce platform EverCommerce acquires Dublin,
OH-based Updox, a healthcare communication platform for in-person and virtual
care.

–  The acquisition
expands EverCommerce’s health services portfolio and enables the companies to
further their shared goal of simplifying the business of healthcare and
facilitating the growth of healthcare practices.

Today, EverCommerce, a leading service commerce platform, completed the acquisition of Updox, a Dublin, OH-based complete healthcare communication platform for in-person and virtual care. The company will join EverCommerce’s portfolio of health services companies, enabling it to provide customers with faster access to more products, a broader suite of solutions, and more resources.

The acquisition comes on the heels of a breakout year for
virtual care. Digital health is on track to hit over $12 billion in investments
by the end of 2020 – the largest funding year for the sector yet – and over 60… Read the rest

Read More »

What You Should Know:

– In partnership with JP Morgan Chase; United Way; top
healthcare organizations including Anthem, Centene, One Medical and Epic; and
other non-profit and community partners, Lyft’s goal is to facilitate 60M safe
rides to vaccination sites.

– Lyft’s vaccine access campaign will help the communities who need it most safely travel to receive the vaccine. These rides will be facilitated through its business segment, Lyft Healthcare, and social impact initiative LyftUp.

 Lyft,
Inc. announced the launch of a nationwide campaign to support universal
access to the COVID-19
vaccine. The goal of this effort is to provide 60 million rides to and from
vaccination sites for low-income, uninsured, and at-risk communities, when the
vaccine becomes available.

Program Partners

Corporate partners JP Morgan Chase and Anthem Inc. and community partner United Way will be working alongside Lyft to lead the effort, with many other businesses, healthcare, and technology … Read the rest

Read More »

A recent Advisory Board briefing examined the annual Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Readmission penalties.  Of the 3,080 hospitals CMS evaluated, 83% received a penalty for payments to be made in 2021, based on expected outcomes for a wide variety of treated conditions. While CMS indicated that some of these penalties might be waived or delayed due to the impacts of the Covid pandemic on hospital procedure volumes and revenue, they are indicative of a much larger issue. 

For too long, patients discharged from the hospital have been handed a stack of papers to fill prescriptions, seek follow-up care, or take other steps in their journey from treatment to recovery. More recently, the patient is given access to an Electronic Health Record (EHR) portal to view their records, and a care coordinator may … Read the rest

Read More »

In 2019, 41 million patient records breached in 572 reported incidents at an average cost of $1.8 million per breach. These statistics are far from surprising with healthcare records selling for a reported average of $45 on the dark web. Unfortunately, the year 2020 aggravated these issues as COVID-19 exposed the true vulnerability of the healthcare infrastructure. Organizations not only had to manage the medical and financial impacts of the pandemic but also the security risks inherent in the work-from-home (WFH) model and the increasingly sophisticated attacks of cybercriminals intent on exploiting these vulnerabilities. In this article, we’ll dive into some of these growing threats.

The Bare Minimum of EDR

Although most organizations have now provided WFH employees with secure computers using endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions or mandated the use of virtual private networks (VPNs), this does not … Read the rest

Read More »

What You Should Know:

– Highmark Health signs six-year strategic partnership agreement
with Google Cloud to transform the health experience for patients and
caregivers through the development of Highmark Health’s new Living Health
Model

– The Living Health model is designed to eliminate
the fragmentation in health care by re-engineering the healthcare delivery
model with a more coordinated, personalized, technology-enabled experience.

Highmark Health and Google Cloud today announced a six-year strategic partnership to build and maintain the innovation engine behind Highmark’s Living Health model. The agreement includes the development of the Living Health Dynamic Platform, which will be designed to help overcome the complexities and fragmentation within the healthcare industry.

Re-engineering The Healthcare Delivery Model

Highmark’s Living Health model is designed to eliminate the fragmentation in health care by re-engineering the healthcare delivery model with a more coordinated, personalized, technology-enabled experience. In addition to offering seamless, simpler, and smarter … Read the rest

Read More »

An in-depth look at twelve recently released COVID-19 vaccine management solutions as COVID-19 vaccines are being distributed nationwide.

1. Microsoft

Microsoft
launches a COVID-19 vaccine management platform with partners Accenture and
Avanade, EY, and Mazik Global to help government and healthcare customers
provide fair and equitable vaccine distribution, administration, and monitoring
of vaccine delivery.

Microsoft Consulting Services (MCS) has deployed over 230 emergency COVID-19 response missions globally since the pandemic began in March, including recent engagements to ensure the equitable, secure, and efficient distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine.

2. Accenture

Accenture recently rolled out a comprehensive vaccine management solution to help government and healthcare organizations rapidly and effectively plan and develop COVID-19 vaccination programs and related distribution and communication initiatives. Expanding on Accenture’s contact tracing capability that leverages Salesforce’s manual contact tracing solution, the platform is rapidly deployable and designed to securely track a resident’s vaccination journey, from registration and … Read the rest

Read More »

What You Should Know:

– Philips acquires BioTelemetry, a U.S. provider of
remote cardiac diagnostics and monitoring for $72.00 per share for an implied
enterprise value of $2.8 billion (approx. EUR 2.3 billion).

– With $439M in revenue in 2019, BioTelemetry annually monitors over 1 million cardiac patients remotely; its portfolio includes wearable heart monitors, AI-based data analytics, and services.

– BioTelemetry business is expected to deliver double-digit growth and improve its Adjusted EBITA margin to over 20% by 2025; the acquisition will be sales growth and adjusted EBITA margin accretive for Philips in 2021.

Philips, today
announced it has entered in an agreement to acquire
BioTelemetry, Inc., a U.S.-based provider
of remote cardiac diagnostics and monitoring for $2.8B ($72 per share), to be
paid in cash upon completion.

 USD 72.00 per share, to be paid in cash upon
completion. The board of directors of BioTelemetry has approved the … Read the rest

Read More »

What You Should Know:

– H1, the largest database of information on every doctor
in the world raises $58M in Series B funding, just six months after raising its
Series A round during the pandemic.

– H1 is the largest database in the world connecting that
provides comprehensive in-depth profiles of more than 9 million healthcare
professionals and 16,000 institutions in 70-plus countries, all of which are
kept up-to-date weekly.

 H1, a global
platform for the healthcare ecosystem, announced today that it has closed a $58
million Series B round of funding co-led by IVP and Menlo Ventures, which led
the Series A round in April 2020. Transformation Capital, Lux Capital, Lead
Edge Capital, Novartis dRx and YC also participated. 

Over 9 Million Healthcare Professional Profiles

Co-founded by Ariel Katz and Ian Sax in 2017, H1 is a developer of a healthcare data analytics platform intended to help companies make … Read the rest

Read More »

Medical device design has been going through sweeping
changes over the last decade.  Ten years ago,
medical device companies weren’t concerned with delivering consumer-level
design: Devices that are both attractive and intuitively easy to use by a wide
variety of users.  Then the Affordable Care
Act was passed, and adherence and healthy behavior change became a
regulatory requirement.  

Our firm, which has been a long-time proponent of the
“consumerization” of medical product design, saw a steady uptick in business
based on our ability to deliver product experiences that a consumer expects
while also meeting regulatory requirements of the FDA.  And yet we still had to do a fair amount of
convincing to engineering teams about the importance of design that not only
works for physicians, but also makes life easier for caregivers and
patients. 

Our goal has always been to make design a priority for … Read the rest

Read More »