You described my weekend with mom.
News 8/2/23
Top News
Amazon Clinic expands its telemedicine service to all 50 states and Washington, DC.
The company had postponed the expansion by several weeks due to lawmaker concerns about its method of collecting and sharing customer health data.
Reader Comments
From First Time Rumor Reporter: “Re: HIMSS. You should look into HIMSS salaries, how the now-dead Accelerate project was funded (maybe by not giving refunds to 2020 exhibitors?), and C-level executives paid not to work who knew the CEO prior to his appointment at HIMSS. Freedom of Information Act requires them to respond to you on the 990 forms.” My responses:
- HIMSS has always paid its CEO in the top percentile range among comparably sized membership non-profits. Its most recent IRS filing (from 2020) shows its top earners as President and CEO Hal Wolf ($1.52 million); HIMSS International Managing Director Bruce Steinberg ($586,000); CTO/CIO Stephen Wretling ($633,000); Chief Americas Officer Denise Hines ($402,000); and HIMSS Media sales VP Frank Bilich ($306,000). Wretling and Hines have since left the organization.
- The HIMSS press contact did not respond to my inquiries about why I can’t log into HIMSS Accelerate any more, so I can’t say for sure that it is dead (or at least deader than usual). I’m not sure how that relates to HIMSS Accelerate Health, which it describes as a support community for vendors, which hasn’t posted “latest news” for years.
- The laborious FOIA process should not be necessary to obtain an organization’s Form 990 filings since they are required by the IRS to provide them on request. They haven’t responded to my inquiries, which most recently involved another try this week with Morgan Searles, senior strategic communications manager.
From Bombastic: “Re: HIMSS IRS forms. My understanding is that at least for one subsidiary, the individual who was responsible for filing them failed to do so for several years (!). It was caught after that person left the organization. Make-up filings are underway.” Unverified. That would certainly be embarrassing if it’s true.
From Kevin: “Re: Solutionreach. The small HIT company that does good work in the mobile and patient engagement solution space lays off 75 employees.” Unverified. I’ve emailed the company and will update if they respond. I noticed while looking at their webpage that founder and CEO Jim Higgins has been recently replaced by Ken Ernsting, whose LinkedIn still shows him as COO of HHAeXchange.
Webinars
None scheduled soon. Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present or promote your own.
Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock
Marathon Health, which offers direct primary care to employers, acquires Cerner Workforce Health Solutions, which runs clinics for 21 clients in 35 health centers.
Personalized medication management technology vendor FeelBetter raises $6 million.
Fitch Ratings downgrades the bonds of Regional West Health Services due to lower profits that it attributes to issues that still persist from its Cerner implementation five years ago.
Sales
- CoxHealth (MO) selects ECareManager enterprise telehealth and Capsule Surveillance software from Philips for its new virtual care delivery program.
- Rush University System for Health (IL) will implement Cadence’s remote patient monitoring technology.
- In Massachusetts, the Executive Office of Health and Human Services opts for PointClickCare’s behavioral health treatment and referral solution.
- Memorial Hermann Health System (TX) will offer in-home, around-the-clock cancer care using technology and clinical services from Reimagine Care.
- Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center will implement Deep 6 AI to match patients to available clinical trials.
- Banner Health will expand its use of Charge Infusion from Medaptus to 22 facilities.
People
Recuro Health promotes Phil Fasano, MBA to chairman and CEO.
RadNet names Sham Sokka, PhD (Philips) chief operating and technology officer of digital health and Sanjog Misra (Philips) chief commercial officer of digital health.
Verily hires Andrew Trister, MD, PhD (Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation) as chief scientific officer.
Acmeware names Joel Benware (Samaritan Medical Center) as president.
Bryce Olson, global marketing director for Intel’s health and life sciences group and an advocate for precision medicine, died July 13 after a long struggle with cancer.
Sponsor Updates
- Clearsense publishes a new case study, “Higher Physician Efficiency and Lower Costs to Patients.”
- Nym announces that its medical coding engine has received a 100% customer satisfaction score in a recent KLAS report on emerging solutions.
- Artera will exhibit at NACHC CHI & Expo August 27-29 in San Diego.
- Baker Tilly releases a new Healthy Outcomes Podcast, “Navigating the No Surprises Act: Opportunities and challenges for provider and payer organizations.”
- Bamboo Health releases a case study, “How Pioneer Valley Accountable Care uses Pings to Lower Costs and Improve Care Coordination.”
- CarePort Health parent company WellSky publishes its second annual Evolution of Care report based on proprietary data from CarePort solutions.
- ConnectiveRx launches a new podcast, “The Science of Medication Access: Is it Working?”
Blog Posts
- Questions for Key Stages of Your Epic System Journey (CereCore)
- Managing and Preventing Denials (AGS Health)
- How text messaging can power year-round patient engagement (Arcadia)
- The fog of more: Price transparency will increase health systems’ competition for patients (Nordic)
- Harnessing Data for a Healthier Future: Overcoming Fragmentation to Improve Health Equity and Care Outcomes (Availity)
- 4 Key Insights from AvaSure’s First Digital Summit (AvaSure)
- Key strategies for healthcare providers implementing the No Surprises Act (Baker Tilly)
Contacts
Mr. H, Lorre, Jenn, Dr. Jayne.
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The reason that you may not be able to obtain HIMSS’ form 990 filing could be that the IRS is still processing paper returns from 2021. Otherwise, the 990 forms are available from the IRS.
https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/tax-exempt-organization-search