From left: MedCity News Editor in Chief Arundhati Parmar, Optonome CEO Dennis Dicker and MHIN President Dennis Depenbusch
Dennis Dicker saw the issues of effectively running and operating a home health agency firsthand as the owner of his own Philadelphia-based company, which provided care to patients with Autism and intellectual disabilities.
With these problems in mind, he developed technology tools meant to ease the burden associated with administration and communication within his operation.
These early experiments eventually morphed into a startup called Optonome, which allows providers to start and manage their own home health agencies through its technology platform.
Optonome was one of a group of winners of the Pitch Perfect contest at the MedCity INVEST conference in Chicago in April, winning the health services track.
“There’s so much documentation and compliance required in home health that you need administrative staff. Before you even start offering services you have to hire administrative staff to help you,” Dicker said.
“That’s why the average experienced healthcare professional like a nurse or occupational therapist are scared to actually go into the business themselves.”
Optonome’s technology combines communication, training and management features to make it possible for clinicians to become entrepreneurs.
In exchange for a licensing fee, Optonome creates what Dicker calls a “home health agency in a box.”
The company creates an LLC with the help of an attorney, works to create the policies and procedures necessary for state regulator review and gets the agency licensed for private pay and Medicaid patients, which make up the bulk of the home healthcare market.
During the licensing and review process, Optonome helps to train agency owners in how to use the company’s platform to manage their business.
Optonome then finds patients who match up with the agency capabilities and recruits, onboards and trains caregiver staff to help provide health services. The nurse or occupational therapist sits on top of the agency and provides more in-depth and follow up care for patients.
The startup is designed to help their customers grow to a size of about 50 caregivers and takes a 10 percent cut of billed services from their home health agency customers.
Because of the the lower administrative and labor costs enabled through the company’s technology, Optonome allows their home health agencies to subsidize housing for patients, providing a ready stream of inbound interest, while tackling a major social determinant of health.
“Our model eliminates the middleman, usually home health agencies have administrative staff doing this kind of manual labor,” Dicker said.
Dicker pointed to home healthcare as a major potential growth market because of Medicaid’s priority to help people live more independent and healthy lives. There is also a financial rationale, with home health being significantly less expensive than care in a hospital or institutional setting.
Optonome mainly focuses on Medicaid patients with behavioral health issues or intellectual disabilities, which require specialized training for caregivers. The company’s technology is also accessible by patients who can use the Optonome app to help themselves live more independently.
“One of the biggest problems in home healthcare is actually helping the patients interact in the community,” Dicker said. “Clients are able to see businesses in their local community, set up transportation to those businesses and coordinate with activities and programs we create based on their behavioral support plans.”
Moving forward, Dicker said the company is testing new features that can increase efficiency in services payments and accounting and auditing processes.
“Our next step is getting to the place where we can manage home health agencies at scale,” Dicker said.
Picture: MedCity News
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