Health IT

At HIMSS17, Integra Connect emerges from stealth with, um, 1,400 employees

Perhaps only at something as large as the annual HIMSS conference can an entity with more than 1,400 employees emerge from "stealth" mode, but that's what Integra Connect is announcing Monday morning.

Perhaps only at something as large as the annual HIMSS conference can an entity with more than 1,400 employees emerge from “stealth” mode, but that’s what Integra Connect is announcing Monday morning. Also, the very same public relations agency that represents Integra Connect mentioned the company in a press release for another client six months ago.

(UPDATE: The agency told MedCity News that the release came from that other company, ZeOmega, which has never been a client, even though the agency is listed as the media contact on that release. Integra Connect is mentioned.)

In any case, Integra Connect, of West Palm Beach, Florida, is launching as HIMSS17 opens a few hours up the road in Orlando. The vendor offers a cloud-based suite of clinical and financial technologies and services to help specialty medical practices adjust to the new world of value-based payment.

Specifically, Integra Connect has its eyes the new Medicare Quality Payment Program, as defined in the new rules implementing the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA). The unusually big startup assists with participation in the Medicare Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) and Advanced Alternative Payment Models, both of which took effect at the beginning of 2017.

“It’s a very, very complex thing CMS is asking providers to do,” Integra Connect CEO Dr. Charles Saunders said of the Quality Payment Program. Saunders is a former CEO of Healthagen, a digital health unit of health insurer Aetna.

What makes it complex is the short timeline for rolling out MIPS and Advanced Alternative Payment models, even though the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is offering flexibility for MIPS participation, at least in 2017.

Integra Connect is starting by focusing on large oncology and urology practices, plus emergency medical services, including practices that run hospital emergency departments. “Ours is an end-to-end solution with care management and analytics,” Saunders said.

In cancer care, Integra Connect is following the CMS-designated Oncology Care Model, according to Saunders. That is one of the Alternative Payment Models delineated in the MACRA rule.

The technology is meant to help practices cope with the fact that payers “are not at the table” in MIPS/Advanced Alternative Payment Models they way they are in other moves toward more accountable care, he explained. The platform also helps with actual care management, not just quality reporting.

“Filling out a form doesn’t keep someone out of the hospital or an emergency department,” Saunders explained. “We provide a platform for them to” coordinate care.

The newly emerged Integra Connect counts seven large customers, encompassing more than 500 specialty physicians, Saunders said. He was not ready to divulge any names.

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