Morning Headlines 1/23/24

Amazon Pharmacy is Piloting A Consultation Program With One Medical, Further Bolstering Amazon’s Healthcare Ecosystem

Amazon reportedly offers One Medical providers access to virtual consults with Amazon Pharmacy pharmacists as part of a pilot project geared towards improving outcomes for high-risk patients.

CMS Announces Model to Advance Integration in Behavioral Health

CMS will test a new technology-enabled Innovation in Behavioral Health Model that is designed to help community-based practices better coordinate behavioral healthcare with physical and social care services.

Ransomware gang claims responsibility for Christmas attack on Massachusetts hospital

The Money Message ransomware group claims that it has stolen 600GB of data from Anna Jaques Hospital, and that it has information related to parent system Beth Israel Lahey Health.

Morning Headlines 1/22/24

HHS-OIG Issues Notice of Exclusion to Founder and CEO of Theranos, Inc.

HHS OIG bans Theranos founder and federal inmate Elizabeth Holmes from participating in federal healthcare programs for 90 years, the same exclusion it gave to former Theranos President Sunny Balwani.

Hospital IT help desks targeted by sophisticated social engineering schemes

The American Hospital Association warns that offshore hackers are impersonating hospital revenue cycle employees to have their passwords reset by the hospital IT help desk, using stolen information about the employee to answer security questions.

Steward Healthcare’s financial issues could spell catastrophe for the state

Massachusetts regulators worry that Steward Health Care’s financial problems may force it to close hospitals, with the resulting loss of jobs and access to care.

Morning Headlines 1/19/24

Our Acquisition of Summa Health

General Catalyst signs a letter of intent to acquire Akron-based non-profit health system Summa Health, pointing out that the acquisition shouldn’t be considered as “another private equity deal” because it will not focus on cost reductions or a quick flip.

West Coast health tech company bringing dozens of jobs to new River Market headquarters in KC

Health data interoperability platform vendor Hart will move its headquarters from California to Kansas City, MO.

New database of more than 83,000 surgical outcomes aimed at advancing research and training artificial intelligence algorithms now online

UCLA Health creates Medical Informatics Operating Room Vitals and Events Repository (MOVER), a de-identified database of 83,000 surgical outcomes from UCI Medical Center’s Epic and former SIS system that approved researchers can use at no cost to test AI algorithms.

Visibly Launches Real-Time Video Consultations Through Merger With EyecareLive

Online vision testing company Visibly acquires EyecareLive, which offers a similar test along with video visits with optometrists.

Morning Headlines 1/18/24

Netsmart’s owners explore a sale valuing it at $5 bln

The owners of Netsmart reportedly prepare to put the company up for sale, eyeing a valuation of over $5 billion.

PointClickCare Acquires CPSI Subsidiary, American HealthTech

Post-acute care technology company PointClickCare acquires post-acute care EHR vendor American HealthTech from CPSI.

CMS Finalizes Rule to Expand Access to Health Information and Improve the Prior Authorization Process

CMS publishes the Interoperability and Prior Authorization Final Rule, which enacts firm timelines for select payers to issue prior authorizations, and mandates the implementation by certain payers of HL7 FHIR APIs to improve data exchange between providers and payers.

Morning Headlines 1/17/24

Apple to Remove Blood-Oxygen Sensor From Watch to Avoid US Ban

Apple will remove pulse oximetry technology from its Watch to avoid the possibility of having the product banned from importation into the US if Apple loses a pending patent appeal.

Care enabler 98point6 buys telehealth Bright.md

98point6 acquires Bright.md’s 17 telehealth customers and hires six of its employees.

HCAP Partners Leads Investment in Apprio

RCM and patient eligibility and enrollment software vendor Apprio secures an unspecified amount of funding from private equity firm HCAP Partners.

Innovaccer Acquires Cured, Accelerating Growth of the Intelligent Healthcare Experience Platform

Healthcare analytics vendor Innovaccer acquires Cured, which offers healthcare digital marketing software.

Mayo Clinic Diet Announces the Beta Launch of Mayo Clinic Diet Medical Weight Loss Rx Program

Mayo Clinic adds an Amwell-powered telehealth component to its Mayo Clinic Diet weight loss program so that select participants can access prescription weight-loss drugs.

Morning Headlines 1/16/24

Harbor Health Secures $95.5 Million in New Funding to Expand and Enhance Primary & Specialty Care Services in Central Texas

Texas-based hybrid healthcare provider Harbor Health raises $95.5 million, bringing its total raised to more than $218 million.

IT failure caused weekend chaos at Sussex hospitals

University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust in England recovers from a power outage-induced IT and phone systems failure over the weekend that forced its facilities to divert ambulances and revert to downtime procedures.

Quantum Radiology cyber attack: Former and current employees data targeted

A radiology practice in Sydney, Australia, tells patients a November data breach was caused by an unspecified IT issue, all the while dealing with harassing phone calls and texts from the breach’s perpetrators.

Morning Headlines 1/15/24

Towards Conversational Diagnostic AI

A Google-created AI system called AMIE that was optimized for diagnostic dialog outperforms primary care doctors in synchronous text chat with patient actors.

Broadwest’s luxury hotel to host Oracle’s larger-than-anticipated health care summit

Oracle pushes its Health Summit back from February to April and moves it to Nashville, where it will also build a new campus using $175 million in economic incentives.

Law firm that handles data breaches was hit by data breach

A law firm that specializes in business security incidents is itself hit by hackers, exposing the identity, medical, and insurance information of 637,000 people that it had collected from its security incident clients.

Morning Headlines 1/12/24

Artisight to Scale and Advance AI-driven Smart Hospital Platform with Oversubscribed $42 Million Series B Round

Artisight, which offers a smart hospital platform, raises $42 million in a Series B funding round.

New Veradigm Leadership Provides Outlook on Business and Strategy, and Refreshed Financial Estimates for Fiscal 2023

Veradigm lowers its FY2023 revenue and earnings guidance below consensus estimates, noting in an SEC filing that it doesn’t yet know when it will file overdue financial reports for the last three quarters and year-end of FY2023 or convene its annual meeting of shareholders.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise to buy Juniper Networks in $14 bln deal

Hewlett-Packard Enterprise will acquire AI-enabled enterprise networking and security technology company Juniper Networks for $14 billion.

Graphium Health Acquires The ABG Anesthesia Data Group Strengthening Anesthesia Quality and Safety Initiatives

Anesthesia healthcare technology vendor Graphium Health purchases The ABG Anesthesia Data Group, which specializes in qualified clinical data registries management.

Morning Headlines 1/11/24

Mayo Clinic pairs with Cerebras Systems to help develop AI for health care

The Mayo Clinic will use computing chips and systems from Cerebras to develop its own AI models, such as summarizing a patient’s medical records, analyzing diagnostic images, and reviewing genomic data.

FTC Order Prohibits Data Broker X-Mode Social and Outlogic from Selling Sensitive Location Data

The FTC prohibits data broker X-Mode Social and successor Outlogic from selling or sharing sensitive location data, settling allegations that X-Mode sold data that could be used to track specific people’s visits to medical facilities, places of worship, and domestic abuse shelters.

OpenAI debuts ChatGPT subscription aimed at small teams

Boston Children’s is an early adopter of OpenAI’s new ChatGPT Team tool, using the subscription-based model to pilot GPTs for productivity and collaboration.

Morning Headlines 1/10/24

Harris Acquires Fivos Workflow Solutions, Software Dedicated to Advanced Vascular and Cardiovascular Reporting Workflows

Harris acquires the Medstreaming vascular and cardiovascular reporting, practice management, and billing solution of Fivos, which Harris will offer under its Picis brand.

Vita Health Announces $22.5M Series A Funding Round

Suicide prevention-focused telemedicine company Vita Health raises $22.5 million in a Series A funding round.

After Barrage of Hacks, Hospitals Will Face New Federal Cybersecurity Rules Tied to Funding 

HHS will reportedly propose within the next few weeks cybersecurity rules for hospitals that will tie the establishment and management of digital defenses to federal funding.

Morning Headlines 1/8/24

Cracks Appear In Walgreens Clinic Strategy As Patient Panels Go Unfilled

Walgreens Boots Alliance struggles with the performance of primary care chain VillageMD, in which it is the majority shareholder, having already closed 27 of the 60 underperforming practices.

Credo Health Announces Oversubscribed $5.25 Million Series Seed Funding

Medical record retrieval and analysis software startup Credo Health raises $5.25 million.

Announcing Our $24M Series B Funding Round

France-based GPT clinical note generator Nabla raises $24 million in a Series B funding round that values the company at $180 million.

Attorney General James Secures $740,000 from Online Mental Health Provider for its Burdensome Cancellation Process

Online mental health provider Cerebral will pay $540,000 in refunds to New York patients in a settlement with the state’s attorney general, who says the company intentionally made it hard for patients to cancel their subscriptions and instructed its employees to submit fake positive reviews.

UpDoc Debuts the World’s First AI Assistant That Manages Medication Prescriptions and Chronic Conditions

UpDoc announces a new funding round alongside the launch of its AI assistant that manages chronic conditions and prescriptions.

Morning Headlines 1/5/24

MultiPlan Announces CEO Succession Plan

Oracle Health General Manager Travis Dalton (previously chief client and services officer at Cerner) will leave the company to join MultiPlan as president and CEO on March 1.

Arbital Health Completes Acquisition of Santa Barbara Actuaries and Closes Series A Financing

Newly formed Arbital Health, which offers technology and third-party adjudicator services to assess whether value-based care outcomes were received, acquires Santa Barbara Actuaries and completes a $10 million Series A funding round.

Georgia medical board restores telehealth prescribing flexibility

The Georgia Composite Medical Board backtracks its decision to re-impose in-person visit requirements for prescription of controlled substances after provider and patient outcry.

Lilly Launches End-to-End Digital Healthcare Experience through LillyDirect

Drug maker Lilly launches LillyDirect, which will offer home delivery of its drugs for obesity, migraine, and diabetes directly to patients via the Truepill pharmacy service.

Morning Headlines 1/4/24

Mercy leaders promise upgrades as they close deal for southeast Missouri health system

SoutheastHealth officially becomes a part of Mercy, citing a need to modernize its EHR as a factor in its decision to accept the health system’s acquisition offer.

Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP Files Class Action Lawsuit Against Veradigm Inc. and Announces Opportunity for Investors with Substantial Losses to Lead Class Action Lawsuit

A San Diego-based law firm spearheads a class action lawsuit against Veradigm, charging the company and certain executives with overstating revenues by $20 million, artificially inflating revenue over a two-year period, misrepresenting demand for products and services, and failing to adhere to appropriate accounting practices.

Medical Device Cybersecurity: Agencies Need to Update Agreement to Ensure Effective Coordination

The Government Accountability Office calls for the FDA and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to update their medical device cybersecurity agreement so that their efforts are more coordinated and reflect organizational and procedural changes made over the last several years.

Morning Headlines 1/3/24

Veradigm Strengthens Award-Winning Revenue Cycle Services Portfolio with Acquisition of Full-Service RCM Company

Veradigm acquires Koha Health, a full-service revenue cycle management company for orthopedic practices and ambulatory surgery centers.

Cano Health Receives NYSE Notice of Non-Compliance with Market Capitalization Criteria

Primary care company Cano Health receives a second de-listing warning from the NYSE, this time pertaining to its inability to sustain a $50 million total market capitalization over a 30-day trading period.

Liberty Hospital staff worries patients are in ‘jeopardy’ if ‘cyber security incident’ drags on

Liberty Hospital (MO) continues to rely on paper charts as it works to get IT systems up and running after a December 19 cyberattack.

Morning Headlines 12/29/23

Apple will sell latest Apple Watch models again after import ban temporarily stopped by U.S. appeals court

The company also says it has submitted redesigned Apple Watch models for customs approval.

Walgreens’s Ambitions Lean on Its Technology. First, It Has to Build Up Its IT Department.

The Wall Street Journal says that the company is on its third CIO in a year, has low IT employee satisfaction, and has cut back on use of contractors, all of which place its business turnaround in jeopardy.

Another Corewell Health data breach impacts more than 1 million patients

The Michigan hospital has patient information exposed for the second time in a month after breaches involving its vendors HCTec and Welltok.

Employers Increase Access to Mental Health-Related Chatbots or Apps

Two-thirds of large employers offer access to mental health chatbots or apps as an employee benefit despite concerns about effectiveness and privacy.

Morning Headlines 12/28/23

Attorney General James Secures $300,000 from NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital for Failing to Protect Patient Data

The health system settles state charges that it used pixel tracking to send the information of 54,000 website users to advertisers that sometimes included their search terms and demographic information.

Hackers in an Integris Health data breach are emailing victims. What to do if you receive one.

Hackers are emailing the health system’s patients to demand a $50 payment to keep their information private after Integris declined to pay a ransom.

AliveCor praises ITC for Apple Watch ban in the US as it still disputes with Apple

The smartphone ECG vendor company expresses support for Masimo as both companies are embroiled in legal fights with Apple over claimed patent violations.

Kansas City students brainstorm new life for former Cerner headquarters

Students propose that the vacant former world headquarters of Cerner at 2800 Rockcreek Parkway be turned into either a mini-community that includes expansion of an adjacent hospital or a college campus.

Morning Headlines 12/22/23

Invitae Divests Ciitizen Health Data Platform and Implements Further Cost Cuts

Medical genetics company Invitae divests its Ciitizen patient-controlled health data business, which it acquired for $325 million in September 2021.

Notice of Cybersecurity Incident

First responder software vendor ESO Solutions notifies 2.7 million people that their information was exposed in a ransomware attack.

Measuring the Impact of AI in the Diagnosis of Hospitalized Patients: A Randomized Clinical Vignette Survey Study

Researchers find that clinician diagnostic accuracy in image analysis dropped significantly when guided by a systematically biased AI model, even when the model included the methods that led to its flawed interpretation.

Vital signs vs. dollar signs: At HCA hospitals, the person monitoring your heart may monitor 79 other patients, too

An NBC News investigation finds that HCA’s remote telemetry monitoring has been plagued by understaffing, system downtime, and poor communication between technicians and floor nurses.