A report from Truven Health Analytics gives trends on health spending in employer-sponsored plans.
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One of the unintended consequences of all the requirements to use HIT has been the creation and growth of a whole new category of health care employee--the medical scribe.
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Centene, the large Medicaid health plan company, has acquired LiveHealthier, which offers technology-based wellness and health education services.
http://www.bizjournals.com/washington/blog/2015/01/bethesda-based-livehealthier-inc-acquired-by.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+industry_19+(Industry+Insurance)Welltok, the population health management and wellness vendor, raised an additional healthy round of $12 million to add gaming and other incentive capabilities to its platform.
http://medcitynews.com/2015/01/welltok-raises-12-million-expand-cognitive-gaming-technologies/?utm_source=MedCity+News+Subscribers&utm_campaign=d5354f0fc4-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c05cce483a-d5354f0fc4-67648197A Towers Watson brief looks at the results from an onsite health clinic at BP America's headquarters, finding it appeared to have the potential to reduce spending, but did not…
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A Peterson-Kaiser blog post summarizes the data on US health use and unit prices versus other countries. The data indicates that our utilization rates are not out of line but our unit costs are the highest.
http://www.healthsystemtracker.org/2015/01/how-u-s-utilization-and-price-of-healthcare-compare-to-other-countries/Medicare spending, like overall health spending, has been lower for the last few years than was originally projected. A Kaiser Family Foundation brief attempts to understand factors behind the slowdown.
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PipelineRx, the hospital telepharmacy firm, has acquired Quality Pharmacy Management, which provides complementary and similar services.
http://medcitynews.com/2015/01/pipelinerx-expands-telepharmacy-presence-acquisition-colarado/?utm_source=MedCity+News+Subscribers&utm_campaign=cc17f21570-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c05cce483a-cc17f21570-67648197Caremerge has acquired $4 million in fresh capital for its business of coordinating care for seniors.
http://medcitynews.com/2015/01/caremerge-attracts-4m-from-new-investors-to-add-up-to-20-new-staff-to-expand-care-coordination-for-seniors/?utm_source=MedCity+News+Subscribers&utm_campaign=cc17f21570-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c05cce483a-cc17f21570-67648197I am happy I am a luddite and invest my money in things like the lottery that have a better return possibility than other things I read about. Bam Labs, for example, just got another $3.5 million for its bed that monitors sleep.
http://mobihealthnews.com/39278/bam-labs-gets-3-5m-for-clinical-and-consumer-sleep-monitoring/About this Blog
The Healthy Skeptic is a website about the health care system, and is written by Kevin Roche, who has many years of experience working in the health industry. Mr. Roche is available to assist health care companies through consulting arrangements through Roche Consulting, LLC and may be reached at khroche@healthy-skeptic.com.