Healthie Digital Health Newsletter: June

As a reminder - you’re getting this newsletter as a Digital Health company?Healthie?has interacted with before, either as a current or potential customer or we just met and became friends?

What’s in This Month’s Newsletter

• Telehealth Corner ??:?Telehealth prescribing capabilities have been temporarily extended.
• Healthie Highlights????:?Since our inception?we’ve been laser-focused on building profitably. Now that’s back in vogue. We wrote about it in?Forbes?and on our?Blog.
• The One Big Idea???:?Market conditions are pushing hospitals to think and act differently.?Could we expect the emergence of a "Virtual Hospital" within this decade?
• Infrastructure Partnerships We???: Interoperability and data use cases are accelerating in Digital Health’s post-Covid phase.
• Upcoming E-Labs Webinar???: Join the Healthie + Rupa Health teams for a discussion (and product demo) on streamlining lab workflows.?Register here.

Telehealth Corner: Extension of Controlled Substances Policy

The DEA announced in May?that it was extending that Covid-era telemedicine flexibilities??granting the prescription of controlled substances, virtually.?The announcement says:

• The temporary rule extends the current flexibilities for six months - until Nov 11, 2023
• For any patient/provider relationships that have been established by that same date, the flexibilities extend for another year (until Nov 11, 2024)

The controversy around these shows a healthcare economy stuck in the middle??of its innovation curve. The US is in a tough spot. We don’t want to limit innovation and access but we also want Americans to be safe and?get the right care they need.

• On one hand, we had a boom in virtual care????over the last few years and millions of Americans maintained or gained access that they otherwise wouldn’t have.
• On the other hand???, those new flexibilities boomed new economies - and?we have over-prescribing scandals like Cerebral’s DOJ investigation?

Ultimately our country is on a long arc in which more healthcare is delivered virtually. It’s a train that has left the station???. But threading the needle between safety and efficiency will be tough over the next decade(s). This comes down to each of us in the virtual care ecosystem maintaining the highest safety and care delivery standards we can.

Healthie Highlights

We were so happy to co-host a happy hour????in Boston with Zus Health and HTD Health . Jonathan Bush gave an impassioned speech on how now’s the time to build in healthcare - we agree! As a reminder,?Healthie integrates with Zus?to bring historical patient encounters, medications, prescription orders and more, directly in your client’s profile.?

There’s a been a few content pieces we want to share with you:

• Our CEO?Erica?penned a Forbes piece titled: “In Favor Of VC-Backed Companies Building Profitably“. This has been a core tenant of Healthie since its inception, and it's a tenant that's now back in vogue in the venture ecosystem.??
• In a similar vein,?Healthie released a blog post on “Building for the Long Haul”, where we articulate three main points:
• Pricing???: A free offering isn’t necessarily a value-add
• Strategic Funding??: Raise Because You Want To, Not Because You Have To
• Product???: Don’t Build Everything, Even When Your Customers Want You To
• If you originally missed this Slice of Healthcare episode, catch Healthie CEO Erica Jain speaking on the?Future of Infrastructure in Virtual Care.?

Healthie has had some?exciting features released lately, including:

• More team member permissions that account admins can leverage?
• Improved allergy syncing between Healthie & DoseSpot , for those that have?E-Rx enabled for their account.?
• More functionality and control when building wellness programs?
• API updates (just a note, all new functionality added to the platform this month is also available via the API)?

Review all of our recent updates in our?Release Notes.

Healthie and Rupa have partnered together?to enable mutual customers to draft lab orders and receive lab results directly within the Healthie platform. Join the Healthie + Rupa Health teams for a discussion (and product demo) on streamlining lab workflows.?Register here.

The One “Big Idea”: Virtual Hospitals

Mckinsey recently penned an article advocating for the Virtual Hospital.?The article has more of an international bent, but the ethos rings true in the US too - the punchline is this:

• The argument is that virtual care is safe, effective, and well liked, so why not use it to scale care outside of the hospital’s four walls? The difference between the US and other countries health systems is that the US is private, therefore hospitals need to make money to survive. And they make most of their money inside the four walls???, not virtually???.?
• However - market conditions may push US hospitals to change. There is some inevitability in the?looming staffing shortages?and?increased hospital consolidation.
• Founders and companies that can get ahead of this trend are poised to succeed. For example,?hospital-at-home company Contessa was recently acquired?for $250M.?

Infrastructure Partnerships We???

Interoperability won’t only come from government mandated interchange - it’ll be accelerated by private companies sharing data?for more efficient patient care use cases.

Big Data companies??? are teaming up with care navigation, coordination and networks to arm the average consumer with the information they need to make educated decisions.

Here are few recent examples we’ve seen from the market that highlight this trend:

• Datavant and Amazon Web Services (AWS) recently announced a partnership?to “...help healthcare and life sciences customers accelerate their ability to manage and optimize clinical and patient insights.”
• Google Cloud Data will help power Pager’s care navigation experience
• MDSave (care network w/ transparent prices) and Ribbon Health (provider data company),?have expanded their partnership?to the point where. employers/employees can?know the prices for healthcare while they search for providers. Really interesting stuff!?
• LexisNexis buys HumanAPI?to more easily underwrite life insurance and provide care teams with the information they need.

That's it for this month!?

Team @ Healthie?

P.S. You can always?book time with our sales team here?or email?[email protected]