UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH) is poised to acquire digital health company Audax Health Solutions according to a filing with the Federal Trade Commission. The move reflects a growing priority among payers to develop and add tools to boost member engagement.
Audax Health Solutions uses an interface that makes its healthcare assessment and challenge tools feel less like a dry Q&A and more like a gaming app with the idea that it will hold users’ attention. Among its partners are FitBit, Withings, BodyMedia and Polar. Last year it raised $20 million for product development, expansions of its mobile and engineering teams in Washington, D.C., and San Francisco, and strategic partnerships with healthcare insurers and providers.
Among its backers are New Leaf Ventures, Cardinal Health and insurer Cigna, as well as Facebook Vice President of Partnerships Dan Rose and Audax board member Jack Rowe, the former head of Aetna.
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In its latest report tracking payers’ priorities, Chilmark Research points out that projects are targeting member engagement. It is also seeing a growing investment in payer-owned consumer platforms, biometric tracking and new social media tools. “The innovative payers are exploring the wild west of digital consumer engagement and learning as they go,” according to a summary by report author Cora Sharmer.
In its 2013 earnings, UnitedHealth indicated that market demands for consumer engagement led to an 18 percent increase in consumer directed healthcare products in 2013 to 5.7 million members compared with the previous year or nearly 20 percent of the consumers participating in its commercial benefit plans.
Calls to UnitedHealth were not returned and the voice mail box at Audax was full.
Update:
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At the Abarca Forward conference earlier this year, George Van Antwerp, managing director at Deloitte, discussed how social determinants of health and a personalized member experience can improve medication adherence and health outcomes.
Read a comment from Audax here.
