Kevin Roche

Mar 27 2017

Physician Wait Times

By Kevin Roche Commentary No Comments

A Merritt Hawkins survey finds that physician wait times for appointments are increasing and Medicaid acceptance rates are declining.

Mar 27 2017

New York-based third-party administrator Pomco Group is being purchased by UnitedHealth Group. UHG does many, many relatively small acquisitions like this every year, most unannounced, as it expands its footprint across the entire health care industry.

http://www.syracuse.com/business-news/index.ssf/2017/03/syracuses_pomco_group_to_be_sold_to_united_healthcare.html

Mar 24 2017

Improving Drug Payment Policies

By Kevin Roche Commentary No Comments

The Pew Charitable Trusts issues a report on how to use drug payment policies to better manage spending.

Mar 23 2017

India-based business process outsourcing company WNS Holdings has acquired HealthHelp for $95 million. HealthHelp provides a care management platform for payers.

https://www.pehub.com/2017/03/mts-health-exits-healthhelp/

Mar 23 2017

Trends in Hospital Care-Associated Conditions

By Kevin Roche Commentary No Comments

The Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality releases updated data on hospital-acquired health conditions.

Mar 22 2017

CarePayment, which helps providers and patients ensure that care will be paid for, has been majority recapitalized by a PE firm and is moving headquarters to Nashville.

https://www.carepayment.com/carepayment-announces-new-owner-moves-headquarters-nashville/

Mar 22 2017

Bivarus, a provider of data and analytics to health care organizations, has received $4 million in fresh financing.

https://www.pehub.com/2017/03/bivarus-scores-4-mln-series-b/

Mar 22 2017

Spending Variation Among Physicians in the Same Hospital

By Kevin Roche Commentary No Comments

Research published in the JAMA Internal Medicine finds more spending variation across doctors within a hospital than between hospitals.

Mar 22 2017

EvidenceCare proves investment worthy, gathering $2 million for its service that provides current medical research results and guidelines in an easy to use form.

http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170314006291/en/Nashville-Start-Up-EvidenceCare-Wraps-2-Million-Funding

Mar 22 2017

Hearst Company division First DataBank, a vendor of information and software relating to drugs, has purchased Polyglot Systems, which assists patients with medication instructions in multiple languages.

http://www.fdbhealth.com/company-news-and-events/2017-03-16-fdb-acquires-polyglot-systems/

Mar 21 2017

The Burden of Alzheimer’s Disease

By Kevin Roche Commentary No Comments

A report from the Alzheimer's Association has scary facts about prevalence and cost.

Mar 20 2017

HMS Holdings, which helps Medicaid and other payers with programs to ensure appropriate payments to providers, has acquired Eliza, which offers patient engagement and member analytics for a whopping $170 million in cash.

http://investor.hms.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=1017033

Mar 20 2017

CVS 2016 Drug Trend

By Kevin Roche Commentary No Comments

CVS issues its 2016 Drug Trend Report, showing the continued influence of brand, especially specialty brand, drug price increases on overall trend.

Mar 19 2017

Traffk is acquiring Capsci Health, exchanging the “k” in its name for the extra “ci” at the end of Capsci, so that it can spell “Traffic” correctly. The former company has “massive data analytics and insurance underwriting technology”, according to the press release. Not sure how mass relates to quality of a product, unless its weight lifting equipment. The acquired firm has a really, really unique product that offers members mobile access to material related to their health plan. I can’t have seen more than a hundred similar offerings.

Mar 17 2017