Very disappointing for the AI /CTO/digital employees at HHS. They could have quintupled their salaries in the private sector and…
News 8/9/23
Top News
Roper Technologies acquires enterprise performance management software vendor Syntellis from its private equity owners for $1.4 billion in cash.
Roper will combine the acquired company with its Strata Decision Technology business.
Syntellis was spun off from Kaufman Hall in 2020.
Reader Comments
From Locus: “Re: ResMed CPAP and MyAir app. Delayed data updates aren’t a patient safety issue, but CPAP compliance is all about timely feedback to user and physician.” ResMed confirms that an error in its over-the-air firmware update inadvertently caused its AirSense 11 PAP devices to send huge amounts of data to the online service’s cloud server, leading to week-long delays in data updates.
From Easy Feesy: “Re: credit card fees. Curious how many physician practices are passing them on to patients who pay their bills with HSA cards.” A few states prohibit sticking the customer for credit card fees that range from 2% to 4%, although a creative workaround is to post the fee-added price and then offer a cash discount. Mrs. H and I had dinner at a cheap Mexican restaurant recently that did this, and while it’s logical since customers have a choice of how to pay, it doesn’t seem worth surcharging a few percentage points on a per-person average tab of maybe $15 when customers truly hate that practice. At least half of that restaurant’s reviews are bad as keyboard warriors lashed out at the clearly stated policy that cost them maybe 50 cents extra, especially since people keep using food delivery services without complaint even as they pile on fees that can end up doubling the in-restaurant price for the honor of having your Dasher steal some of your chips.
Webinars
August 24 (Thursday) 2 ET. “RCM analytics in action: How to use your data to drive decisions + revenue.” Sponsor: Waystar. Presenter: Laura Tungate, solution strategist team lead, Waystar. This webinar will describe how to use RCM analytics to take control of your data even if you use outdated or multiple tools. Attendees will learn how to target improvements, describe the KPIs that are key to revenue cycle leaders, prioritize dashboards that spotlight organizational goals and build alignment, and how and when to apply RCM analytics to go from analysis to action faster.
Previous webinars are on our YouTube channel. Contact Lorre to present or promote your own.
Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock
Bright Health Group secures additional financing while it completes the sale of its California Medicare Advantage business to Molina Healthcare and shores up its remaining provider network. The company has been in free fall for some time, having sold off its Zipnosis telehealth business in May and closed its insurance offerings in a dozen other markets. It raised $1.6 billion in a 2021 IPO.
London-based digital health company Babylon announces that its take-private merger with brain technology vendor MindMaze will no longer take place. In a somewhat garbled press release, the company says it will explore strategic alternatives so that it can secure additional financing and sell numerous UK- and US-based assets in order to avoid bankruptcy.
Sales
- Prime Healthcare (CA) selects Steer Health’s Concierge personalized patient communication software.
- MUSC Health (SC) will use Andor Health’s ThinkAndor Virtual Command Center as a part of its virtual care program.
- University Hospitals (OH) will use patient data integrity services and software from Harris Data Integrity Solutions to clean up UH Lake Health’s master patient index ahead of its Epic implementation.
People
Peter Schoch, MD (AdventHealth) joins Kno2 as chief health officer.
Cleveland Clinic hires Albert Marinez, MBA (Intermountain) as its first chief analytics officer.
Configo Health names David Bertoch, MHA (Children’s Hospital Association) EVP of pediatric analytics and research programs.
Truepill promotes Paul Greenall to CEO.
Steve Shi (Vault Health) joins Pager as CTO.
Providence hires Ray Chung, MPH (Strategy&) as VP of clinical IT solution delivery.
Announcements and Implementations
Get Well announces GA of its emergency department and inpatient care engagement technology.
Deaconess Health Care (IN) launches a virtual patient flow command center using technology from GE Healthcare.
In an effort to gain firmer financial footing, Campbell County Health (WY) postpones its 2023 Epic go live and severs ties with its RCM vendor Ensemble Health Partners. CCH, which had begun the implementation process in 2021 through a partnership with UCHealth, will roll Epic out next summer.
Government and Politics
Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) asks Google for specific information about the inner workings of Med-PaLM 2 medical large language model, expressing concern that Google’s testing of the product in hospitals constitutes “premature deployment of unproven technology.” He cites his previously expressed concern that Google’s race for AI market share involved “secret partnerships” with hospitals that may threaten patient privacy.
Privacy and Security
Zoom updates its terms of service to require customers to consent (with no opt-out) to having their meeting content used by Zoom for AI training, raising concerns about proprietary content and healthcare privacy. In unrelated news, Zoom – which became a household word in supporting work-from-home programs during the pandemic – will require employees to return to the office for at least two days per week.
Sponsor Updates
- NYSE Floor Talk features Arrive Health CEO Kyle Kiser.
- The Millenium Live Podcast features Ascom Americas Managing Director Kelly Feist, “The Toolbox for Digitizing Clinical Workflows.”
- AvaSure publishes a new whitepaper, “Behavioral health needs in hospitals are rising, are you prepared to keep your patients safer?”
- Baker Tilly publishes a new case study, “Sole community hospital reshapes financial outlook through service line analysis.”
- Bamboo Health publishes a new case study, “How Eagle Physicians & Associates Uses Pings to Improve Its Transitional Care Management Services.”
- Black Book Market Research publishes a list of top client-rated healthcare supply chain solutions exhibiting at the AHRMM23 Annual Meeting.
Blog Posts
- From a CEO: What Makes a Meditech Expanse Implementation Successful (CereCore)
- The Cost Savings of Going Digital with Patient EForms (Access)
- We Surveyed Our Customers on Mental Health Issues. Here’s What We Learned. (AdvancedMD)
- Preparing Now for Coding Impacts of CMS IPPS Final Rule (AGS Health)
- The power of healthcare data analytics in end-of-life care programs (Arcadia)
- Authorizations … in Seconds (Availity)
- 4 Key Insights from AvaSure’s First Digital Summit (AvaSure)
- Disease Registries: How the Right Data Drives Principal Investigators, Researchers, and Informatics Teams Forward(Clearsense)
- Business Impact Analysis: The Critical Starting Point to Resiliency Planning (Clearwater)
- Great Communication Begins with Connection (ConnectiveRx)
- To Strengthen Post-Acute Referrals, Healthcare Must Take a Fresh Look at Data Exchange (Consensus Cloud Solutions)
Contacts
Mr. H, Lorre, Jenn, Dr. Jayne.
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I don’t mind low-margin, small-business like restaurants pass along the credit card fee to me. I get points and convenience to use the card, and while that 3% fee is a small amount on a $15 bill, it’s also a significant cut into margin. If the restaurant is running at a 20% margin that 3% revenue cut actually cuts into my margins and profits by 15%.
Not offering a cash discount is effectively a wealth transfer from the poor to the rich.
Everyone pays with a card and the restaurant pays the same fee to each credit card company. Credit card companies pay this fee out in rewards to their users. Users with high incomes and credit get 5% back, average credit 2%, bad credit maybe 1%, horrible credit pays cash and gets 0% back. So effectively everyone is paying the same fee, but when the people with bad credit pay The fee, the credit card company takes the money and hands it to people with good credit. It’s a silent sales tax that is collected by credit card companies who pay enough of it out to the better off to keep the system in place.
Note this situation does not exist in Europe where fees are capped. Credit card companies there can’t charge a high enough fee to effectively market their cards through reward points. The whole system is more equitable.