Investments in 51 digital health companies totaled $259.5 million in July, according to a new report by StartUp Health. Its SlideShare report, which resembles Rock Health’s format, notes that the five biggest digital health deals accounted for 59 percent of digital health funding last month. But these companies also offer a window into some of the hot subsectors of digital health, with solutions driven partly by the Affordable Care Act.
Management tools to assimilate physician practices The acquisition of physician practices by hospitals has been on the rise. In an acknowledgement of that trend and the need for tools to adequately respond to it, MedSynergies had the largest round of funding for digital health companies in July and raised $65 million from undisclosed investors. Its packaged management consultant tools, called MSIGHT, help healthcare systems assimilate physician practices. In an interview with D Healthcare Daily, Frank Marshall, the president, said its software suite reflects what healthcare systems wanted from it: a dashboard to quickly and easily view performance of their physician organizations and integrate that information with hospital data to track financial performance. It also makes it easier for primary care physicians to refer patients within their networks and schedule those patients. It’s also designed to track patient data.
Adding technology to health insurance Oscar, a startup backed by Joshua Kushner, the founder of venture capital firm Thrive Capital, raised $40 million from investors to integrate telemedicine with health insurance. Although payers like Aetna are beginning to warm up to telemedicine, broad reimbursement is still some ways off. A description of the company in Dow Jones said: “it will offer unlimited telemedicine consultations and free generic medications to its members.” It’s also going to be offered on New York’s health insurance exchange.
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Using big data to identify appropriate treatment Ayasdi raised $31 million in a Series B round. It uses machine learning technology developed at Stanford University to create a way to provide insights on the best course of action for various industries, including healthcare. For example, one group is working with the company to identify genetic predispositions to certain diseases. It wants to use the technology to glean insights for the development of breakthrough drug therapies. Companies like Flatiron Health and CancerLinQ have applied big data to cancer treatment with the goal of identifying treatments with the best outcomes.
Tracking inventory and automating tasks to reduce hospital costs Kit Check’s radio frequency identification technology is geared to tracking hospital medication kits and trays. It scans each medication, including details such as lot number and expiration date. It also produces charge sheets and keeps track of billing automatically. The goal is to save time replenishing items. RFID tags are used by hospitals to track medical devices to infants. But the technology is also being used for other applications such as improving hygiene to reduce hospital-acquired infections and identifying counterfeit drugs.
Reducing clinical trial costs In an effort to bring down the cost of drug development, several companies have developed software to make clinical trials more efficient. Transparency Life Sciences has developed a way to crowdsource clinical trial design and suggest the best compounds to use for drug development. It also got permission from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration earlier this year to use remote monitoring in a clinical trial. Other companies that spring to mind are myClin and the TransCelerate BioPharma initiative by at least 10 pharmaceutical companies. Comprehend Systems raised $8.4 million for its Software-as-a-Service technology to help drug developers and medical device companies improve collaboration in their clinical trials and connect disparate software systems.
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