Digital health news, funding roundup in the prior week; August 1, 2022

Cleerly raises $223 million; Senate announces healthcare bill; Mayo Clinic and Mercy Health partner

Top Health News

• Gov. Tony Evers and the Wisconsin Department of Health Services awarded more than $2.5 million to 27 providers for community behavioral health services that will provide access to mental health and substance use treatment and recovery supports through telehealth. Grantees will use the one-time funding from the American Rescue Plan Act to expand access to these important services by removing location and technology barriers to care.
• Linus Health, a digital health company focused on transforming brain health, announced that its brain health platform is generally available for healthcare delivery organizations across the US. Designed to facilitate early detection of brain disorders and proactive intervention, the SaaS-based platform combines digital cognitive assessments with actionable recommendations for providers and patients. 
• A 10-year collaboration agreement between Mayo Clinic and Mercy — a first-of-its-kind alliance between two large health care systems — will use the most current data science and years of deidentified patient outcomes to find diseases earlier and start patients on paths to better health more quickly.
• Health care systems Mayo Clinic and Mercy entered into a 10-year collaboration agreement in which they will use the most current data science and years of deidentified patient outcomes to find diseases earlier and start patients on paths to better health more quickly. The Mayo and Mercy alliance will initially focus on patient outcomes.
• Caption Health, a provider of services and AI to improve heart ultrasound access, and Heartbeat Health, a Virtual Cardiology company, announced a partnership that will enable providers to offer their patients earlier access to cardiovascular care than ever before possible. In this partnership, Caption Health's Caption Care clinicians will perform heart ultrasounds in convenient locations, even a patient's home, using the Caption AI platform, while Heartbeat Health virtual cardiologists receive, read, and interpret the ultrasounds remotely through their telemedicine platform. Heartbeat will then provide televisits and discuss findings with primary care teams for patients with abnormal cardiac findings via their virtual programs.
• Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senator Joe Manchin announced a deal on an energy and healthcare bill. The deal keeps the prescription drug prices changes that Manchin had previously agreed to, including empowering Medicare to negotiate the price of certain costly medications administered in doctors' offices or purchased at the pharmacy. It would also redesign Medicare's Part D drug plans so that seniors and people with disabilities wouldn't pay more than $2,000 a year for medication bought at the pharmacy. The deal would require drug companies to pay rebates if they increase their prices in the Medicare and private-insurance markets faster than inflation.
  Altogether, the drug price provisions would reduce the deficit by $288 billion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The agreement also calls for extending the enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies for three years, which would cost $64 billion over a decade, according to the CBO.
• Labcorp announced that its Board of Directors has authorized the company to pursue a spin-off itsClinical Development business. The planned spin-off will result in two independent, publicly traded companies. The Clinical Development Business will be a global Contract Research Organization providing Phase I-IV clinical trial management, market access and technology solutions to pharmaceutical and biotechnology organizations.
• Health Catalyst, a provider of data and analytics technology and services to healthcare organizations, announced a multi-year strategic partnership with Akron Children's Hospital, a pediatric health system in northeast Ohio with two hospitals and 54 urgent, primary, and specialty care locations. Together, Health Catalyst and Akron Children's will implement Health Catalyst's enterprise analytics and population health outcomes improvement expertise to transform clinical, operational, and financial domains for Akron Children's and the hospital's accountable care organization Akron Children's Health Collaborative. Akron Children's population health solution will include Health Catalyst's Data Operating System platform, Pop Analyzer: Stratify Expert Data Collection, Value Optimizer, MeasureAble, Health Catalyst Embedded Care Gaps, and a team of population health and analytics experts.
• Health Catalyst also announced a partnership with LifePoint Health, a diversified healthcare delivery network that operates 63 community hospital campuses, more than 30 rehabilitation and behavioral health hospitals, and 170 additional sites of care from coast to coast. The partnership will leverage Health Catalyst's technology and solutions to help reduce variation in clinical outcomes for patients, improve the overall quality of care, and advance LifePoint's data and analytics capabilities to support its National Quality Program. It also strengthens and builds upon LifePoint's strategy for driving innovation, called "LifePoint Forward." LifePoint Forward represents existing and new capabilities to identify, invest in and deploy solutions to improve quality, access and patient outcomes while lowering costs. 
• Availity, the nation's largest real-time health information network, announced that it will serve as the single-source technology partner for the Symphony Provider Directory, California's provider directory utility. Symphony is a centralized, cloud-based platform that streamlines how health plans and providers share, reconcile, and validate provider data in California. 
• MCI Onehealth, a clinician-led healthcare technology company focused on increasing access to and quality of healthcare, and MDClone, a digital health company and leader in synthetic data, announced a clinical intelligence offering for their global partners. This offering combines real-world health insights with mirrored synthetic data to power deeper research and inspire novel therapeutic development.
• Arthrex, a provider of minimally invasive surgical technology, and Skytron, a health care safety and efficiency company specializing in capital equipment, announced a partnership to offer a broad array of total room solutions designed to address the future needs and challenges of operative care facilities.
• Neuronetics, Inca commercial stage medical technology company focused on designing, developing, and marketing products that improve the quality of life for patients who suffer from neurohealth disorders, announced a commercial partnership with Alleviant Health Centers, a network of full-service mental health clinics that currently operates five locations in Arkansas and plans to expand its service footprint. Under the partnership agreement, Neuronetics will be the exclusive supplier of new transcranial magnetic stimulation equipment to Alleviant and its clinics, with an initial six NeuroStar Advanced Therapy systems delivered in 2022.
• OptimizeRx, a provider of point-of-care technology solutions helping patients start and stay on therapy, announced a partnership with Cooler Screens, a media and merchandising platform. Cooler Screens is currently present in 28 geographical markets nationally with more than 10,000 screens in retail stores and more than 90 million in monthly traffic. Cooler Screens has deployed their in-store digital media ad-platform at more than 700 retail locations nationwide, including Walgreens, CVS, and Kroger.
• Tabula Rasa HealthCare, a healthcare technology company advancing the safe use of medications, announced a five-year contract renewal with Trinity Health PACE for TRHC's CareKinesis PACE Pharmacy services. Trinity Health PACE is the largest non-for-profit PACE provider in the country with 14 owned and managed programs. It currently serves about 3,500 participants through 19 centers in nine states.
• Bose Corporation and Lexie Hearing, a direct-to-consumer hearing aid provider, announced a partnership to bring Bose’s self-fitting hearing aid technology to the Lexie Hearing product line. The new Lexie B1 Hearing Aids will be Powered by Bose, allowing wearers to fit, program, and control their hearing aids with clinically proven, audiologist-quality results — without a doctor visit, hearing test, or prescription.
• Vizient, a member-driven health care performance improvement company announced a strategic partnership agreement with Mpirik, a cloud-based care pathway software company focused on cardiac care, that will enable physicians to make more informed decisions on patient care while helping to reduce undertreatment. The strategic partnership expands access to patient assessment and clinical programs that improve care and helps address health equity with the use of technology including artificial intelligence.
• Maharashtra University of Health Sciences in Nashik, India, partnered with Microsoft to explore the use of emerging technologies such as mixed reality in patient care and medical education. As part of this, the two organisations will co-develop solutions using Microsoft HoloLens 2 to improve healthcare delivery and build training content for doctors, nurses and other clinical staff. The year-long collaboration agreement includes the development of any solution by MUHS or any of its chosen partners. Microsoft will provide the tools and technologies to build applications including cloud infrastructure, blockchain, internet of things, artificial intelligence, and mixed reality.
• GenWorks Health, a startup dedicated to improving healthcare access in India, partnered with medical device company Medtronic to redefine how intrauterine abnormalities are treated
• Calyx, an eClinical and Regulatory solutions and services provider, entered into a partnership with Qynapse, an Artificial Intelligence neuroimaging medical technology company. The partnership enables Calyx to adopt and deliver Qynapse's precise and objective AI-powered neuroimaging analysis solutions, QyScore and QyPredict to its global pharmaceutical and biotech customers as they develop new medical treatments for central nervous system disorders.
• Dialyze Direct, a provider of home hemodialysis services in Skilled Nursing Facilities, partnered with CommuniCare Family of Companies, a post-acute care provider, to conduct onsite hemodialysis services at its facilities around the U.S. Dialyze Direct now offers onsite dialysis services in more than 170 SNFs in Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia.
• Overjet, a dental AI company, partnered with Dental Whale, a practice solution and learning provider. Overjet will provide clinicians in the Dental Whale network with access to state-of-the-art AI radiograph technology that helps them identify the best treatment opportunities for their patients. Dental Whale currently serves over 20,000 private and dental support organizations.
• Envista, a family of more than 30 dental brands, announced an extension and expansion of its commercial partnership with dentalcorp, a network of dental practices. Since dentalcorp's founding in 2011, Nobel Biocare, an Envista company, and dentalcorp have invested resources to expand implant treatment capabilities to each of dentalcorp's 500+ supported practices. Together, Nobel Biocare and dentalcorp have trained hundreds of clinicians and created a network that offers the latest tooth replacement solutions from Nobel Biocare. This partnership extension further strengthens dentalcorp's ability to provide the highest quality of care to its patients.
• DRUID, a provider of conversational AI solutions, finalized a new conversational healthcare project with private medical network Regina Maria, with the help of specialized healthcare technology solution provider Infermedica. The implementation is a novelty on the Romanian healthcare market, leveraging conversational AI technology's benefits to give Romanian patients a safer, more efficient symptoms checker tool, guiding them towards the right medical primary care, based on their described symptoms.
• Multinational pharmaceutical company Sanofi announced a collaboration with Howard University College of Pharmacy for a two-year post-professional Doctorate in Pharmacy fellowship program. Sanofi's goal is to hire fellows into permanent full-time positions at the company, marking the first time a Howard University College of Pharmacy industry partner has committed to post-fellowship employment. Set to begin in the second half of 2022, the program will award ten PharmD graduate students an opportunity to participate in practical learning experiences across multiple research and development fields, including oncology, rare diseases, neurology, immunology, regulatory, pharmacovigilance, clinical and operations, as well as US medical, public policy and patient advocacy.
• Rockley, a photonics-based health monitoring and communications solution, announced a new partnership with a top ten, global contract research organization that provides full-service clinical development services to biopharmaceutical customers. Under the agreement, the CRO and Rockley will collaborate on strategic programs to integrate Rockley’s health monitoring solutions into clinical research studies, including its Bioptx biosensing wristband, cloud services, and other elements of its biomarker sensing platform for continuous, near real-time, non-invasive measurement of multiple biomarkers. 
• Todos Medical, a medical diagnostics and related solutions company, announced that its CLIA/CAP certified clinical laboratory Provista Diagnostics entered into an agreement with Amerimmune Diagnostics, a CLIA/CAP certified laboratory with expertise in immune diagnostics. Amerimmune will provide Provista clinically validated immune panels to assess patients with acute and long-COVID. Provista will complement the testing by measuring the immune system’s ability to produce neutralizing antibodies to the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
• Mayor London Breed and the San Francisco Department of Public Health announced a local emergency declaration to strengthen the City’s preparedness and response to Monkeypox. The declaration of a local emergency is a legal action that will mobilize City resources, accelerate emergency planning, streamline staffing, coordinate agencies across the city, allow for future reimbursement by the state and federal governments and raise awareness throughout San Francisco about how everyone can stop the spread of Monkeypox in our community. It went into effect on August 1.

M&A

• RLDatix, a provider of governance, risk and compliance solutions for healthcare, acquired Galen Healthcare Solutions, a provider of implementation, optimization, data migration and archival solutions for HIT systems
• WebMD Health Corp., an Internet Brands company and provider of health information services for healthcare professionals and consumers, acquired MNG Health, a provider of technology-enabled marketing solutions for life sciences brands
• ClaimLogiq, a technology enabling payment integrity platform, acquired SyTrue, a provider of healthcare natural language processing technology
• Exo, developer of a handheld medical device, and software, for making ultrasounds cheaper, easier, and ubiquitous, acquired Medo, a developer of artificial intelligence technology to make ultrasound imaging faster and simpler to use
• BD, a global medical technology company, acquired MedKeeper, a provider of modern, cloud-based pharmacy management applications
• Clinical Education Alliance, a provider of education, tools, and resources for the entire healthcare team with the goal of improving patient outcomes, acquired Rockpointe Corporation, a healthcare education company and provider of accredited continuing education programs
• Mymee, a provider of specialized care and support for people with significant symptoms associated with autoimmune disease and long COVID, acquired Breakthrough Health, the creator of Emilyn for people with multiple sclerosis
• Deerfield Agency, an independent marketing and commercialization partner for life sciences companies, acquired Verge Scientific Communications, a brand strategy and strategic communications agency dedicated to shaping the stories of emerging and pioneering health and science-driven companies
• Vālenz, a Health Administrative platform that offers cost and end-to-end analytics, acquired Medical Cost Management Corporation, MCM Solutions for Better Health, and its subsidiary, Med-Care Management, a provider of managed care and population health management programs 

Funding Roundup

• AI-based heart health platform Cleerly raised $223 million
• RxLive raised $5 million to put pharmacists on the front lines of care
• Everside Health, a national direct primary care provider, raised $164 million
• Elation Health, a clinical-first technology company powering innovation in primary care, raised $50 million
• Syapse, a maker of software to support precision oncology care and drug discovery, raised $35 million
• PayGround, a healthcare fintech payments platform, raised $5.5 million
• Diagnostic Robotics, a provider of Artificial Intelligence & Care Management solutions for Healthcare plans and providers, raised $45 million
• Lisa Health, a digital health company creating advanced technology solutions for menopause and healthy aging, raised $2.5 million
• Ozette Technologies, a provider of an AI-powered single-cell immune discovery technology, raised $26 million
• BIOS Health, a neural engineering startup, raised CA$1.8 million
• Bryte, a restorative sleep technology company, raised $20 million
• Bento a company trying to transform dental insurance industry and expand access to better oral health care for all Americans, raised $8.1 million
• Replay, a genome writing company reprogramming biology by writing and delivering big DNA, launched with $55 million
• Suvera, a digital health company that delivers a virtual care platform designed to care for people with long term conditions from home, raised £5 million
• Ubenwa, a health technology startup that diagnoses infants using artificial intelligence and machine learning, raised $2.5 million

(Image source: