May 19, 2016

By Norm Volsky, Director of Mobile Healthcare IT Practice

As an executive search consultant in the Healthcare IT space, it is my job to be able to identify emerging technology companies that are poised for significant growth. Since I am specifically focused on Mobile Technology and Telehealth, I have plenty of companies from which to choose. I do research daily and during my discussions with industry thought leaders, I make it a point to ask them what companies in the space they find intriguing and unique. I feel it is my job as a member of this industry to share this knowledge/information with my network so that you could be exposed to these organizations too.

Below are companies I have had my eye on all year that I met with in person at ATA to learn more about their story and vision.

Avizia: Robust end-to-end telehealth platform that connects any doctor to any patient at any time. Avizia as a company has made it their mission to advance healthcare by helping all patients have the ability to get top quality healthcare regardless of their location or situation. Named one of the 10 Most Promising Telemedicine Solutions Providers of 2016 by Healthcare Tech Outlook.

American Well: Unveiled their new Exchange service which allows patients to choose the doctor they want to visit with. This announcement was on the heels of introducing the first Mobile Telehealth Software Development Kit (SDK), which lets organizations plug telehealth capabilities directly into their own consumer-facing mobile apps. With the Exchange, these consumer-facing apps can now tap directly into services from American Well’s partners, which include Cleveland Clinic and Nemours Children’s Health System.

Chiron Health: Provides its physician practice customers Telehealth services with the most robust eligibility checks for reimbursement. Chiron’s eligibility check solution is so advanced that they guarantee their customers reimbursement by paying them the claim themselves. They have increased collections by 3-4% for their customers, who also see 98% patient satisfaction. Chiron is partnered with athenahealth, Greenway Health and CareCloud. See their website here:  www.chironhealth.com

Zipnosis: With an average diagnosis time of 2 minutes, Zipnosis is a force to be reckoned with in the provider market. Allowing their customers to save $175 per patient, per visit. In January, the company raised $17M in investment.

Stratus Video Interpreting: With over 1400 hospital customers, Stratus allows its customer to reach a live video interpreter in 30 seconds or less. They have recently moved into Telehealth and hired Lee Horner (President) and Brad Blakey (VP of Sales and Marketing) to build out that team. Stratus has the unique ability to support hearing impaired and English second language patients. Their two new solutions recently launched are Emergency Room/Urgent Care Consult and Post Hospital Discharge. Stratus won Tampa Bay’s Most Innovative Company Award in 2014.

WeCounsel: Telemedicine specifically geared towards Behavioral Health. Their company mission is to increase access to behavioral healthcare for patients. They provide their customers unique back-end administrative functionality and have secured $3.5M in funding. WeCounsel was recently chosen to be the primary provider of Telehealth software for MedOptions.

AMC Health: Device Agnostic Remote Patient Monitoring solution built on an open source platform. AMC Health has over 50 care managers on their team that can communicate with patients using: Virtual Visits, Phone Calls, Texts or Emails. Their mission is to “help people be healthier…anywhere”. Recently, AMC Health partnered with Glooko to fight Diabetes, and Propeller Health to fight Asthma and COPD.  They helped Geisinger Health Plan reduce readmission risk by 44% and delivered a 3.3 to 1 ROI. Their solution is also endorsed by the American Hospital Association.

PokitDok: API platform that helps enable other software platforms to gather information easier. This solution allows its customers to do transactions easier and have access to powerful data. McKesson recently made a strategic investment in the company with a total series B of $34M. Recently, PokitDok became a member of the CommonWell Health Alliance. They launched Digital Eligibility and Pricing Estimate Services for prescription medications.

TruClinic: Was named 2016 IDC Innovators by supporting a variety of telehealth models such as site-to-site, facility-to-field (e.g., EMTs, visiting nurses) and clinician-to-patient (direct to consumer and fee for service). TruClinic has customers on 4 different continents and in all 50 states. Recently signed Sharp Healthcare as a customer. The company’s mission is to make on-line health as common as on-line banking. The solution allows physicians to create their own patient surveys. In the past 15 months the company has experienced 400% revenue growth.

Propeller Health: FDA-cleared asthma and COPD management vendor that helps patients and physicians better manage chronic respiratory conditions. They make digital products that have therapeutic benefit. Propeller Health won the 2016 Innovation in Remote Healthcare Award at the ATA conference.

Doctor on Demand:  “Putting Patients First” is the company motto. Doctor on Demand offer its enterprise customers a consumer-grade experience and does not charge PEPM fees. They have both United Healthcare and several state BCBS plans as customers. Their goal is to help increase healthcare access in the most convenient way possible. DOD has over 400 employer customers, and 4 of the Fortune 10 companies.

Glooko: Diabetes Remote Monitoring solution to help a patient manage their chronic condition. This mobile solution addresses both type 1 and 2 diabetes. Glooko is significantly helping its patients reduce their A1C using its patient engagement and education tools. They recently announced an EPIC integration.

Vivify Health: Remote Patient Monitoring Platform helping move the industry toward value based care. Helping its patient manage their chronic disease, Vivify is one of the leaders in mobile population health management. They recently not only signed UPMC as a customer, but the health system also participated in their recent $17M Series B investment round.

Quintree:  Telemedicine solution specifically geared towards first point of care centers developed by ENTs.  The platform allows a patient to be seen in real time by an ENT, even when there is not one on site.  The care centers can scope a patient and live stream to a waiting ENT or simply video conference an ENT for a consult.  The SaaS model allows for scalability with little capital expenditure. ENT coverage is sparse and this solution allows ENTs to see more patients, more efficiently and allows for care centers to provide quicker and better patient care.  In addition, this solution is trying to curb over-prescribing antibiotics.

Teladoc: The company goal is to improve access to care in a cost effective way. Teladoc provides an ROI of 5:1 to their customers and have saved their customers $400M in net savings. This turnkey telemedicine platform has 95% satisfaction rate and 74% net promoter score which is unheard of. Aetna and state BCBS are customers. Teladoc was the first telehealth company to receive NCQA certification and was honored by Frost & Sullivan with the Product Line Strategy Leadership Award for Virtual Telemedicine Services. The CEO of the company Jason Gorevic announced at ATA that Teladoc will be launching their first chronic condition management program by the end of the year.

REACH Health: Next Generation Telemedicine software platform that cut its teeth in Telestroke and has more recently established themselves as a full end to end enterprise Telemedicine solution. REACH recently launched their 5.0 software update which enables clinical adaptability across the healthcare continuum. Analytics dashboard and reporting functionality allow their customers to monitor their Telemedicine programs at all levels. Being hardware agnostic, REACH allows their customers to have very little capital expenditures and encourages adaptability.

I remember going to this show two years ago in Baltimore and I am amazed at how much the industry has moved towards being software focused. The software vendors are definitely trending up as they had the largest and shiniest booths. I always come back amazed at how passionate and innovative this industry is as a whole. All of the companies above are helping drive change towards value based care and I feel so lucky to be able work in this industry every day.

The next trade show I am planning on attending is mHealth in Washington DC…if you are interested in having your company highlighted in my next blog, please let me know.