MedCity News is providing in-depth coverage of HIMSS2012 as part of a special series sponsored by Hyland Software.
“What is the actual economic ROI of what you do?”
That’s the key question emerging health IT startups will need to answer if they’re going to go in front of Lisa Suennen and Psilos Group, a healthcare venture capital fund that invests in medical devices, health IT and healthcare services. Its portfolio includes the electronic medical records software company Click4Care, as well as mobile health developer PatientSafe Solutions and cardiac medical device company BioVentrix.
Psilos reportedly closed on $50 million in fresh capital in December and is in the midst of raising another $400 million for its fourth fund. They invest in about three companies a year.
Suennen, who attended the HIMSS2012 conference in Las Vegas this week, said that cost savings is the only question that matters because no health IT company can make any progress without such a benefit. Yet, few health IT companies are ready for it.
“They usually come in and say it saves money and does all these fabulous things,” Suennen said. “We say, ‘Give me a concrete example with numbers of how much it costs to buy your system, implement it and then what is the return to the buyer in dollar terms and how long does it take to get that.’ They have a very difficult time answering that.”
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
Suennen said there were plenty of startups at HIMSS, but most of them were working on similar innovations. There’s still a need for entrepreneurs who will focus on leveraging technology to make dramatic improvements around healthcare delivery, such as improve healthcare coordination after a patient is discharged from the hospital or prevent chronic illnesses.
“You really have to find technologies that engage the consumer and the provider and the payer altogether in a system in order to make a difference,” she said.
Hyland Software is the developer of OnBase Enterprise Content Management Solutions.
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