Morning Headlines 7/31/20

Allscripts Announces Second Quarter 2020 Results

Allscripts reports Q2 results: revenue down 8.6%, adjusted EPS $0.18 versus $0.17,  beating Wall Street expectations for both.

NextGen Healthcare, Inc. Reports Fiscal 2021 First Quarter Results

NextGen reports a slight drop in Q1 revenue to $130.9 million, and EPS of $0.21 versus $0.16.

Strata Decision Technology to Acquire EPSi From Allscripts

Allscripts will sell its EPSi business unit to Roper Technologies-owned Strata Decision Technology for $365 million.

Teladoc (TDOC) Reports Q2 Loss, Tops Revenue Estimates

Teladoc Health reports Q2 results: revenue up 80%, EPS -$0.34 versus –$0.41, beating revenue expectations but falling short on earnings.

Morning Headlines 7/30/20

Humana invests $100 million in telehealth start-up Heal

App-based house call and virtual primary care company Heal announces a $100 million investment from Humana, which will offer the company’s services to its members.

Cerner Earnings Beat, Revenue Misses In Q2

Cerner announces Q2 earnings per share of $0.63 on revenue of $1.33 billion, down slightly from analyst expectations of $1.36 billion.

Using population health analysis to improve patient care brings Sema4 a $1.1 billion valuation

Mt. Sinai Health spin-off Sema4 raises $121 million, earning the precision medicine and analytics company a $1.1 billion valuation.

SOC Telemed to Merge with Healthcare Merger Corp.

Special purpose acquisition company Healthcare Merger combines with SOC Telemed under the acute-care telemedicine company’s brand, which will be listed on the Nasdaq at an initial valuation of $720 million.

Morning Headlines 7/29/20

Withings raises $60 million to bridge the gap between consumer tech and healthcare providers

Withings will use a $60 million Series B funding round to building out its Med Pro division, which offers remote patient monitoring devices to programs run by providers, payers, and employers.

TA, Francisco Partners join hands in $1.4bn-plus deal for Edifecs

Francisco Partners and TA Associates invest in health IT company Edifecs, giving them a combined 51% interest in the company.

Ciox Health Acquires Biomedical Natural Language Processing Pioneer, Medal, Inc.

Health records retrieval company Ciox Health acquires Medal, which specializes in using AI to process unstructured data from medical records.

DOE, HHS, VA Announce COVID-19 Insights Partnership

HHS and the VA will use the Department of Energy’s high-performance computing and AI resources to analyze health data and conduct COVID-19 research.

Morning Headlines 7/28/20

Ro, a 3-year-old online health provider, just raised a new round that values it at $1.5 billion

Health, wellness, prescription delivery, and telemedicine company Ro raises $200 million.

Transformative Raises $1.7M Seed Round After Developing Technology That Predicts Sudden Cardiac Arrest

Transformative raises $1.7 million to further develop and gain FDA clearance for software that can predict cardiac arrest in pediatric patients.

Connecticut Children’s Medical Center and Guidehouse Form New Company to Deliver Revenue Cycle Management Improvements to the Pediatric Healthcare Industry

Connecticut Children’s Medical Center and consulting firm Guidehouse launch an RCM software and services company for pediatric healthcare facilities.

Morning Headlines 7/27/20

WELL Health Forms New Business Unit Focused on Digital Health Apps and Provides Management Update

Well Health Technologies, Canada’s third-largest EHR vendor, forms a new subsidiary focused on discovering and investing in digital health apps.

Prevalence of unprofessional social media content among young vascular surgeons

The Journal of Vascular Surgery apologizes for and retracts an article titled “Prevalence of unprofessional social media content among young vascular surgeons” after doctors complained it was discriminatory and should not have passed peer review.

StuffThatWorks nabs $9M for crowdsourced insights on health conditions

Israel-based StuffThatWorks, which combines crowdsourcing and AI to give actionable data to people with chronic diseases, raises $9 million.

Morning Headlines 7/24/20

Clearlake explores Symplr stake sale, seeking $2bln valuation

Clearlake Capital Group considers selling provider management, credentialing, and payer enrollment technology vendor Symplr, which it acquired in 2018 at a $550 million valuation.

HealthEdge Software Acquires The Burgess Group

Insurer software vendor HealthEdge acquires The Burgess Group, which offers a payment integrity system.

Cerner’s New Cloud-Based Technology Helps Rural and Critical Access Hospitals Reduce Costs, Save Time

Cerner announces CommunityWorks Foundations, a fixed-fee, cloud-based version of Millennium for Critical Access Hospitals that can be brought live in six months.

Morning Headlines 7/23/20

Hair loss treatment vendor Hims seeks deal to go public: sources

Online prescription delivery and telemedicine company Hims considers going public through a merger with an unnamed company.

Tasso raises $17 million for home blood-testing kits

At-home, blood-testing kit startup Tasso will use a $17 million Series A funding round to develop a companion app that will help users share their data with providers.

Walmart Health Expands to Florida, Bringing Affordable and Accessible Care to Local Communities

Walmart Health will expand into Florida next year, with additional openings slated for locations in Illinois.

Morning Headlines 7/22/20

An Open Letter from the American Medical Informatics Association and the American College of Medical Informatics Regarding Public Health Reporting Deficiencies During the COVID-19 Pandemic

AMIA publishes an open letter that expresses dismay that HHS moved hospital COVID-19 reporting from CDC’s National Healthcare Safety Network to HHS Protect, saying that a pandemic isn’t the best time to go live on a new, untested system.

Allscripts cut to Sell at Goldman

Goldman Sachs issues an almost unheard-of “sell” rating to shares of Allscripts, which it says has an unfavorable health IT market position and questionable growth prospects.

Rush University Medical Center Set to Share New “Agile Adapt” Model Powered By CipherHealth for Pandemic Response in Underserved Communities

Rush University Medical Center develops Agile Adapt for its COVID-19 response, using CipherHealth’s patient engagement and communication platform to flex ICU capacity, coordinate with community services, support critical staff, monitor patients across all settings, and anticipate care needs.

Morning Headlines 7/21/20

R1 Announces Sale of its Emergency Medical Services Business to Sarnova Holdings, Inc.

R1 will sell its EMS RCM and electronic patient reporting services to Sarnova Holdings for $140 million.

DXC Technology Announces the Sale of DXC’s Healthcare Provider Software Business to the Dedalus Group for $525 Million in Cash

DXC Technology will sell its healthcare software business to the Italian Dedalus Group for $525 million.

HHS unveils new coronavirus hospitalization database, says it’s more complete than CDC’s

HHS launches a new website featuring hospital capacity data submitted by 4,500 of the country’s 6,200 hospitals.

WellSky Gains New Investment From TPG and Leonard Green & Partners to Advance Technology Innovation in Post-Acute and Community Care

Rather than sell post-acute software vendor WellSky, TPG Capital decides to make an equity investment in the company and bring on Leonard Green & Partners as another owner.

Morning Headlines 7/20/20

With CDC Sidelined, Some States Lose Access To Timely COVID-19 Hospital Data

Hospital associations in Missouri and Kansas warn that HHS’s abrupt change in hospital reporting leaves them unable to update their state COVID-19 dashboards and planning data.

CloudMD to Acquire Snapclarity Inc., an Enterprise Mental Health Platform, Expanding Telehealth Offering to Include Mental Wellness

In Canada, virtual medical care company CloudMD acquires digital mental health startup Snapclarity for $2.5 million.

Hattiesburg Clinic selects new CEO

Hattiesburg Clinic (MS) promotes CMIO Bryan Batson, MD to CEO.

Morning Headlines 7/17/20

‘Sole Source’ Contract for COVID-19 Database Draws Scrutiny from Democrats

Congressional Democrats criticize HHS for issuing a no-bid, $10.2 million contract to TeleTracking Technologies for the development of a hospital bed and supply tracking database, which has become the backbone of the newly mandated HHS Protect COVID-19 reporting system.

Cohere Health raises $10MM in Series A funding to drive adoption of highly collaborative approach with the patient as the focal point

Boston-based care coordination software startup Cohere Health launches with a $10 million Series A funding round.

Cerner won’t reopen its offices for at least several months

Cerner says it will keep employees working from home for at least several more months, pushing back its phased plan to bring up to 50% of employees back to office-based work.

Morning Headlines 7/16/20

Noteworth Secures $5 Million in Funding to Fuel Expansion of Digital Medicine Technology

Care coordination, management, and remote monitoring vendor Noteworth raises $5 million in seed funding.

GYANT Closes $13.6 Million Series A Funding Round Led by Wing Venture Capital

Digital access and care navigation company Gyant raises $13.6 million in a Series A investment round.

Liberty Fox Technologies Joins GPMF Holdings Family Of Companies

GPMF Holdings acquires health IT-focused software developer and consulting firm Liberty Fox Technologies for an undisclosed sum.

Morning Headlines 7/15/20

Amazon Makes Health Care Access Even Easier for Employees with Launch of New Third-Party Health Centers

Amazon will conduct a health center pilot with primary care service provider Crossover Health, which will operate 20 Neighborhood Health Centers in five cities that will serve Amazon employees and their families.

Bottleneck for U.S. Coronavirus Response: The Fax Machine

The New York Times reports that a broken data system — which often includes fax machines as a primary means of communication — is hampering US COVID-19 response.

EConsult Solution Company AristaMD Adds Ascension Ventures and .406 Ventures to Investment Syndicate, Completing Its $24 Million Series B Financing

AristaMD adds $6 million to its Series B investment round with additional funding from Ascension Ventures and .406 Ventures.

Athenahealth Rebrands Centricity Business to athenaIDX, Reflecting Continued Strategic Focus on Helping Health Systems, Hospitals, Billing Services, and Large Practices Optimize Financial Performance

Athenahealth rebrands its Centricity products, acquired from GE Healthcare through a series of acquisitions and mergers, to AthenaIDX in homage to original developer IDX Systems.

Morning Headlines 7/14/20

Allscripts and Microsoft Extend Strategic Alliance to Transform Cloud-Based Health IT Solutions

Allscripts will offer an Azure cloud-based version of its Sunrise EHR as part of a five-year extended agreement with Microsoft.

VA’s Post-Pandemic Plan: Expand Health Care Services at Walmarts

VA Secretary Robert Wilkie says the agency will add more Walmart-based telehealth sites once the pandemic winds down.

Kidney diagnostics developer Renalytix AI sets terms for $78 million US IPO

UK-based Renalytix AI, which has developed a predictive algorithm using data culled from EHRs, hopes to raise $78 million in an IPO this week.

Morning Headlines 7/13/20

Top supplier of electronic medical records to pay $2.55M for cybersecurity firm

In Canada, clinic operator and EHR vendor Well Health Technologies will acquire the cybersecurity division of Cycura.

Former Gwinnett healthcare executive pleads guilty to sabotaging medical shipments

A former VP of finance for a medical device packaging company in Atlanta pleads guilty to trashing the company’s computer systems after being fired.

Ahead, a platform that connects psychiatrists with patients, raises $9 million

Mental healthcare startup Ahead raises $9 million in a funding round led by online B2B pharmacy company Truepill.

Morning Headlines 7/10/20

Health Catalyst Announces Agreement to Acquire healthfinch, a Healthcare IT Company that has Helped Define the Clinical Workflow Optimization Space with its Award-Winning Software

Health Catalyst will acquire Healthfinch, a clinical workflow optimization technology vendor headquartered in Madison, WI, for $40 million in cash and shares.

VA Wants to Automate Digitization of its 5-Mile-High Electronic Health Record Backlog

The VA seeks solutions for automating the digitization of old and new patient health records and ensuring they are linked to the correct patients.

Measure The Impact Of The ONC’s New Interoperability Rules Now

Health policy experts call for ONC to start measuring the impact of the interoperability requirements of the 21st Century Cures Act using six initial metrics.

Kindbody Raises $32 Million in Series B Funding to Grow Employer Benefits Solution and Fuel U.S. Expansion

Technology-enabled women’s care company Kindbody raises $32 million in a Series B round led by Perceptive Advisors.

Morning Headlines 7/9/20

Doctor On Demand Announces $75M in Series D Financing Led by General Atlantic to Expand Comprehensive Virtual Care

Doctor on Demand raises $75 million in a Series D investment round that brings its total funding to $235.7 million.

Walgreens and VillageMD to Open 500 to 700 Full-Service Doctor Offices within Next Five Years in a Major Industry First

Walgreens will invest $1 billion to open primary care clinics run by VillageMD in 500 to 700 of its stores over the next five years, with the bulk of the investment going towards opening the clinics and combining technologies.

Online pharmacy Truepill raises $25 million to expand into telehealth

B2B online pharmacy Truepill uses a $25 million funding round to launch an integrated telemedicine service.

VA Selects Philips to Create World’s Largest Tele-Critical Care System, Further Integrating TeleHealth and Delivering Quality Care for Veterans

The VA signs a 10-year, $100 million contract with Philips to expand development of its Tele-Critical Care Program.