Digital health news, funding round up in the prior week; October 31, 2022

Google acquired Sound Life Sciences; Waymark partnered with Aetna; HealthJoy raised $60 million

Top Health News

• Renee, a healthcare assistant that combines human support with advanced AI to alleviate the burdens of healthcare, announced it accelerated the launch of its flat fee prescription drug program to give relief to all Americans. In the midst of soaring drug prices, high inflation and increasing layoffs, Renee's prescription plan includes the 500 most commonly prescribed medications for one flat rate of $25/month — with no insurance required, no copays, no shipping costs, and no hidden fees. Through this new plan, Renee closes access gaps that prevent patients from receiving and taking their prescribed medications.
• Brightline, a virtual mental health solution built specifically to care for children, teenagers, and their families, partnered with Violet, a company on a mission to build health equity by measuring, increasing, and recognizing cultural competence within care delivery professionals. The idea was to use Violet’s benchmarking and training to increase Brightline's ability to deliver the highest quality care to these families. Through its partnership with Violet, Brightline was able to launch its new BIPOC, LGBQ, and TGNC care verticals within just nine months, and now the two companies have released a case study showing the effectiveness of their work together, including having improved overall inclusivity on Brightline by 67%. As per the case study, Violet gave Brightline providers a benchmark of cultural Awareness, Proficiency, or Excellence. The Brightline team earned more than 900 hours of Violet education, resulting in 58% earning a BIPOC benchmark, a 24% increase; 24% earning an LGBQ benchmark, a 97% increase; and 4% earning a TGNC benchmark, a 483% increase. As a result of their partnership, Brightline and Violet were able to increase inclusive care offerings by 3x for a 99.3% match rate to culturally competent providers. The partnership was also a success with patients, as 66% percent of members and families were satisfied with the inclusive care they received.
• Alife Health, which uses AI to advance in-vitro fertilization (IVF), announced the public launch of its Alife Assist platform, which consists of three products. Its first medical product is called Stim Assist, which supports reproductive endocrinologists during the ovarian stimulation process. That is when a patient receives injections of hormones to induce the ovaries to generate mature eggs; clinicians are able to retrieve the eggs from the patient so they can be fertilized and implanted back into the body for pregnancy. The company's other two products, which it launched since its last funding round, are called Embryo Assist and Insights. Embryo Assist streamlines and enhances an embryologist's workflow so that they can keep consistent records, save time, and automate reports. This enables embryologists to digitally capture, grade, organize, and report embryo grading data with real-time EMR connection. Insights, meanwhile, is an analytics dashboard that gives directors, managers, and administrators the ability to monitor and visualize their clinic's performance in real-time. The idea is to simplify the process of extracting trends and sharing reports to optimize overall clinic operations.
• ObvioHealth, a global Virtual Research Organization pioneering end-to-end decentralized clinical trials, partnered with Oracle in Asia Pacific to help get breakthrough therapies to market faster through more efficient integration of diverse data sets. The alliance will enable the rapid collection, integration and analysis of multi-source data collected from sites, patients, devices and labs.
• Waymark, a community based care provider, collaborated with Aetna Better Health of Virginia, a CVS Health company, to provide services to improve access and quality of care through community-based teams for Aetna’s Virginia Medicaid members. Patients enrolled in Medicaid often experience challenges with access to care, prescriptions, and social support such as housing and food. Waymark hires, trains, and deploys a network of community health workers, pharmacists, behavioral health therapists, and coordinators in clinics to work with patients and primary care providers to improve care delivery. This collaboration will enhance the impact and reach of community-based care. Waymark’s proprietary data science technologies will help identify patients and match them to the right interventions, while reducing the administrative burden on providers.
• Contexture, Arizona’s health information exchange, announced that Unite Us, a technology company that builds coordinated care networks of health and social service providers, will provide the technology powering CommunityCares, the statewide referral system designed to address social determinants of health needs in Arizona. Unite Us is the enterprise technology company providing the digital infrastructure to power connected health and social care ecosystems.
• Eviset, a B2B marketplace, announced that it has been selected for Amazon Web Services Health Equity Initiative, a $40 million, three-year commitment, supporting organizations that are developing solutions to advance health equity. Eviset is a tech start-up developing a data-driven, B2B marketplace for social care providers to optimize matching of community-based organizations (CBOs) with funding and healthcare sector contracting opportunities. Through the initiative, AWS offers AWS credits and customized technical expertise to selected organizations around the world that want to use AWS services to improve health outcomes and health equity in any of the following areas: 1) increasing access to health services for underserved communities; 2) addressing social determinants of health; 3) leveraging data to promote more equitable and inclusive systems of care; and 4) advancing equity in diagnostics and screening.
• Soligenix, a late-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing and commercializing products to treat rare diseases where there is an unmet medical need, announced the formation of a Medical Advisory Board to provide medical/clinical strategic guidance to the Company as it advances the Phase 2a clinical development of SGX302 (synthetic hypericin) for the treatment of mild-to-moderate psoriasis. The Company previously announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had cleared the investigational new drug application and Phase 2a clinical protocol. The study is anticipated to begin in December 2022.
• ixlayer, a digital health company on a mission to make health testing more accessible by pairing at home self collection testing with digital experiences, announced it is now the platform for CVS Health branded at home sample collection kits. Easily accessible to consumers, the easy-to-use kits provide convenient, affordable and quality testing for Vitamin D, Lyme disease, sexually-transmitted infections, and thyroid function – and offer next best care communications, which includes education and information about what test results mean.
• GPO Plus, a company that uses the power of Group Purchasing to save businesses money, signed of a Binding Letter of Intent Asset Purchase Agreement to acquire assets of Betterment Retail Solutions, including its “Feel Good Shop.”
• Ginkgo Bioworks, ahorizontal platform for cell programming, and the Ministry of Investment of Saudi Arabia, representing the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, announced that they have entered into a non-binding Memorandum of Understanding with the intent of developing biotechnology and biosecurity capabilities to deploy new public health initiatives in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. MISA is tasked with developing the cross-government investment ecosystem in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, including biotechnology and biosecurity capabilities. Ginkgo is building upon the large-scale COVID-19 monitoring platform developed by its biosecurity and public health arm, Concentric by Ginkgo, to create sustainable global biosecurity infrastructure to help prevent, detect, and respond to a wide variety of biological threats. Together, they will work to add another node to a global network of pathogen monitoring infrastructure.
• HealthAlliance Hospital, a member of the Westchester Medical Center Health Network, and Royal Philips held a ceremonial signing commemorating a partnership that is delivering advanced medical technologies to the new HealthAlliance Hospital and the communities the hospital serves in and around Kingston. The Philips health technologies at HealthAlliance Hospital will help medical imaging technicians capture patient scans fast, with enhanced clarity for more accurate diagnoses of patient conditions, monitor patient vital signs with increased efficiency, and enable patient care collaboration between HealthAlliance Hospital clinicians and medical subspecialists around the WMCHealth Network.
• Phil, a patient access platform company that revolutionizes life science product commercialization with technology to improve patient prescription access, announced an exclusive partnership with Syneos Health, a biopharmaceutical solutions organization. Through the strategic partnership, Phil will serve as Syneos Health’s hub partner, creating an end-to-end commercialization solution for life sciences organizations to ensure patients can seamlessly start and adhere to therapy and receive and refill medicines quickly, easily and affordably. Under the terms of the agreement, Phil will exclusively provide Syneos Health with HUB-related services. Syneos Health will serve as Phil’s preferred provider for outsourced services, including field teams, engagement center, market access, field reimbursement, nurse navigator and other services.
• G42 Healthcare, an Abu Dhabi-based AI health-tech company, announced a partnership with Saphetor SA, a Swiss precision medicine company and creator of the VarSome suite of bioinformatics solutions. The collaboration is a pivotal step in G42 Healthcare’s strategy to support the health of future generations, in addition to reinforcing the UAE’s reputation as the hub for global innovation and research in the field of clinical genomics.
• Complia Health, a home health and hospice technology provider, announced their selection by Hosparus Health, a not-for-profit provider of hospice and advanced illness care. The contract includes Mobile Edge, EMMA (the Electronic Medical Management Assistant), integration with Hosparus' DeltaCare Pharmacy partnership, and full back-office and offline support. Complia Health technology solutions are designed to improve clinician and consumer experiences, and clinical and financial outcomes. The following two solutions, which will be delivered as part of the Hosparus Health contract, are new to the Suncoast EMR portfolio: Mobile Edge - An integrated electronic visit verification (EVV) application designed to increase documentation accuracy and efficiency, streamline the scheduling process, and improve the caregiver experience; EMMA - The dynamic face of Complia Health's Smart Aging Platform™, which connects consumers, their devices, their care team, and agency administrators. Utilizing secured text messages, secured email communications and in-app chat options, EMMA streamlines communication to increase timeliness and convenience, improving front-line engagement and satisfaction for caregivers.
• Bergen New Bridge Medical Center, New Jersey's largest hospital and a clinical affiliate of Rutgers, announced a partnership with CareRev, a technology platform that connects hospitals and health systems with local nurses and other healthcare professionals. With CareRev, Bergen New Bridge can identify and hire local qualified nurses, certified nursing assistants, and technicians per diem to accommodate fluctuating patient volumes and fill in gaps to support the hospital's full-time staff. CareRev works with hospitals and health systems throughout the country who need a ready supply of labor to support their existing workforce. These facilities are willing to meet the needs of today's healthcare workforce, many of whom are looking for more flexible schedules. Credentialed healthcare professionals in New Jersey will soon be able to use the CareRev app to find and book shifts to work when and where they want, without committing to a minimum or maximum number of shifts.
• The University of Arizona and the University of Arizona Global Campus launched the first programmatic partnership between between the Doctor of Pharmacy program at the UArizona R. Ken Coit College of Pharmacy and the Master of Business Administration program at UAGC. This partnership represents an important milestone in the UAGC integration into UArizona, as it opens the door for more programmatic partnerships in the future. This partnership provides an easier and more affordable path for UArizona Doctor of Pharmacy alumni to pursue their MBA. They can save time by applying completed PharmD credits and transferring them to the UAGC MBA to receive up to nine credits. In addition, this MBA program will save them up to $7,560. Additional savings on tuition and fees may apply.
• MCG Health, an evidence-based guidance company, announced the implementation of a prior authorization automation solution between a payer, provider, and technology vendor using the HL7 Da Vinci Project FHIR (Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources) standard. MCG and MultiCare Connected Care collaborated successfully to use MCG’s interoperable application to surface and automate clinical requirements for prior authorization requests natively from electronic health records (EHR) at the point of care to payers using HL7 FHIR standards. With real-time data exchange and communications, the solution is expected to significantly reduce authorization decision times to support timely patient treatment, alleviate administrative burden for both hospitals and health plan staff, and decrease the overall costs of care delivery. MCG and MultiCare are members of the HL7® Da Vinci Project, a national, private sector initiative to accelerate the use of HL7® FHIR to enable value-based care through interoperable data. MultiCare is utilizing the MCG Authorization application to surface transparent policy requirements and automate the retrieval of clinical data needed to establish coverage within the payer and provider workflow. MCG used the Da Vinci Implementation Guide (IG) for Documentation Templates and Rules (DTR) to accomplish the transparency and automation requirements.
• Walgreens announced free prescription delivery of Paxlovid, a COVID-19 oral antiviral therapy, directly to the doorsteps of those in need, with the help of delivery partners DoorDash and Uber Health. The initiative, which will launch on Walgreens.com and the Walgreens app in the coming weeks, will prioritize access to free delivery of Paxlovid for patients with a prescription who are in socially vulnerable or medically underserved communities, and will help ensure that transportation access is not a barrier to receiving treatment for COVID-19. Walgreens dispenses COVID-19 oral antivirals to eligible populations at nearly all locations across the United States.
• Proteros biostructures GmbH announced a multi-target drug discovery partnership with Adrestia Therapeutics, developer of synthetic rescue therapies for genetic diseases. Proteros will provide access to its entire customizable platform of technologies for early drug discovery guided by the company’s experienced discovery teams. The partnership brings together Proteros’ discovery capabilities which are tailored to unlock even the most technically challenging drug targets with Adrestia’s expertise in target biology with a novel synthetic rescue drug development platform. The partners will jointly discover lead compounds with the goal of further developing them into first-in-class drugs for intractable genetic diseases. The partnership is already providing Adrestia with world-first protein crystal structures and is using both the Swiss Light Source (Villigen, Switzerland) and the Diamond Light Source, the UK's synchrotron facility, to enable rapid drug design.
• As part of a new collaboration with Vera Whole Health and Central Ohio Primary Care, JPMorgan Chase & Co. launched three new on-site advanced primary care centers across the company’s Columbus offices, providing a full suite of comprehensive in-person and virtual health and wellness services for more than 20,000 JPMorgan Chase employees. In addition, Vera and COPC will provide the same advanced primary care services at two near-site care centers to serve employees and the more than 15,000 spouses/domestic partners and children enrolled in JPMorgan Chase’s benefit plan. Vera and COPC, two leaders in delivering advanced primary care services for employers and employees, will manage and staff the on-site and near-site care centers. Vera is one of four companies that has received financial and strategic support from Morgan Health and JPMorgan Chase as part of a broader effort to rapidly scale and expand innovative accountable care programs across the employer-sponsored market. Vera, part of the larger apree health brand, has an advanced primary care model that takes a whole person approach to health, incorporating coaching, behavioral health specialists, and wellness alongside a primary care physician to form an integrated care team. COPC is one of the largest independent physician-owned primary groups in Ohio and the U.S. and currently serves many Columbus-based JPMorgan Chase employees and their families. Employees already receiving care through an established relationship with a COPC provider will continue to have access to the full suite of COPC services and support.
• Medtronic plc announced its intention to pursue a separation of the company's combined Patient Monitoring and Respiratory Interventions businesses ("NewCo"), which are part of the company's Medical Surgical Portfolio. The decision to pursue a separation represents an important next step in ongoing portfolio assessment by Medtronic that demonstrates its commitment to creating value for all of its stakeholders. The separation will enable greater investment focus in the areas of highest strategic priority across the company, and will facilitate the execution of its leadership strategy in attractive medtech markets that leverage the company's strengths.
• PerfectServe, a provider of cloud-based clinical collaboration and provider scheduling solutions, announced a partnership with Lyniate, a global leader in healthcare data interoperability, to power its clinical integrations program using Lyniate Rhapsody as a service. The move allows PerfectServe to build on an existing program that already supports hundreds of integrations with key clinical, IT, and telecom systems. Lyniate has over two decades of experience building Best in KLAS interoperability solutions. By selecting Lyniate Rhapsody as a service, the PerfectServe customer solutions team is now equipped with a more advanced and user-friendly integration engine. As a cloud-based solution, RaaS reduces overhead and maintenance for PerfectServe, and the engine's inherent flexibility means it can accept and output a wide variety of message types. All of these benefits converge to allow RaaS to become the single solution for aggregating and converting data across all of PerfectServe's products.
• Bezyl, an app makes it easier for patients to ask for help from friends, family, and caregivers, plus any other supportive sphere curated to each clinical trial, announced that it is collaborating with Scout Clinical and Atlas Clinical Academy to enhance its personalized mental health digital app and support system to patients participating in clinical trials. As part of this new partnership, Scout Clinical will offer travel and patient reimbursement, and Atlas will build and house curated training for clinical trial participants as an option to include within the Bezyl mental health app.
• Vivan Therapeutics, a biotechnology company, and Gotodoctor.ca, a Canadian healthcare solution company, entered into an agreement to provide personalized cancer therapeutics in Canada. Vivan utilises an advanced treatment selection technology pioneered at The Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York. The partnership will enable Vivan to connect with Gotodoctor.ca’s broad physician, pharmacy and patient network. Gotodoctor.ca’s patent pending Service Engine technology will also provide full customization of its algorithms and analytics to support physicians and patients Vivan will provide world class personalized cancer concierge services to Gotodoctor.ca’s community. In addition, Gotodoctor.ca will assist to bring awareness and education of this life-saving advanced cancer therapeutics to clinicians, institutions and insurance service providers in Canada.
• The Royal College of Radiologists partnered with xWave, an Irish health technology company, to make its technology platform available across the UK. xWave’s platform has already been proven to speed up patients’ access to life-saving treatments. This new collaboration will help reduce unnecessary scans and wasted appointments, having a positive impact on waiting lists and the workload of clinicians. The Clinical Decision Support platform allows clinicians to input information about a patient case and then be presented with a ‘next step’ action suggestion in line with the latest evidence-based guidance. This could be a referral for an x-ray, MRI scan, clinic appointment or a self-management plan. The digital tool will help clinicians to make the best possible referral decision for each patient, while also supporting hospital-based radiology teams to vet and approve imaging requests more easily.
• PrinterPrezz, a company that combines polymer and metal 3D printing, nanotechnologies, and surgical expertise to design and manufacture next-generation medical devices, signed a memorandum of understanding to explore collaboration opportunities for the development of 3D printed medical implants in Singapore. Working with the National Additive Manufacturing Innovation Cluster, PrinterPrezz entered into an agreement with the three national healthcare cluster groups, Singapore Health Services, National Healthcare Group, and National University Health System. The agreement is intended to expand the development and adoption of implantable products leveraging its expertise in Additive Manufacturing and nanotechnologies for the healthcare sector. Under the terms of the agreement, the parties will explore areas of collaboration in the design and development of 3D printed implantable products; R&D in musculoskeletal areas and Orthopaedics, and venture creation models in new emerging areas; and exploration of additive and advanced manufacturing processes and technologies in emerging industry sectors.
• The Medical University of South Carolina health system and The MetroHealth System formed a partnership to create Ovatient, a new, comprehensive virtual and in-home care non-profit company with the aim of transforming health care delivery while building and maintaining connectivity to health systems and the high-quality care they provide. The new approach also signals an opportunity for health systems to pool resources and address common health care workforce issues by working together, such as increasing access to a limited number of behavioral health and specialty care providers instead of competing against each other for them. Currently, Ovatient is working with providers at MUSC Health and MetroHealth to build clinically informed technology to support clinical workflows and provide a seamless continuum of care to existing and new customer bases. Both health systems are committed to improving care access not only in South Carolina and Ohio but across the United States, meeting patients where they are and connecting them with trusted, evidence-based health systems.
• Echosens North America, a high-technology company offering the FibroScan portfolio of solutions, and ChronWell, a digital health and therapeutics company targeting metabolic conditions like non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, announced an exclusive strategic partnership to offer LIVErHEALTHY in conjunction with FibroScan. Under this exclusive agreement, Echosens and ChronWell will expand digital collaboration between their platforms and co-promote FibroScan and LIVErHEALTHY, respectively, as the preferred non-invasive testing and digital therapeutic platform for NAFLD and NASH.
• GC LabTech, an accredited, FDA-registered specialty laboratory with plasma tests, selected 1health.io, a software company revolutionizing the way laboratories expand testing into the at-home markets, to deliver its innovative new lab tests direct-to-consumers. The new partnership between 1health and GC LabTech enables GC LabTech to sell its innovative new health and wellness tests into the $1 billion direct-to-consumer lab testing market. 1health offers a direct-to-consumer solution that connects to its platform enabling labs to sell tests to consumers via an intuitive eCommerce storefront and then manage patient information securely, including kit registration, sample tracking, notifications, and reporting, among a host of other features.
• Cloud DX, a Virtual Care and Remote Patient Monitoring company, and Medioh, a provider of in care device and inventory management, announced a new partnership to optimize digital health inventory for clinics and hospitals. The partnership will allow Cloud DX to offer its customers the ability to expand their reach and breadth of services by offering an RPM platform that is currently one of the most widely used in North America. In addition, it will enable Cloud DX clients to benefit from Medioh's extensive reach across North America given its presence and breadth of areas covered. The partnership is a natural fit for both companies given their complementary strengths.
• Verily, an Alphabet company focused on precision health, and the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to finding cures for Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis and to improving the quality of life of children and adults affected by these diseases, announced an expanded strategic partnership. The collaboration will focus on building a longitudinal registry to accelerate research in Crohn’s disease and in ulcerative colitis, collectively known as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). The registry will establish an infrastructure designed to rapidly answer clinical research questions in IBD, to accelerate treatment development and ultimately improve quality of life for people living with these diseases. It will build on the Foundation’s existing patient communities, including patient research communities, and builds on a pilot effort from the partners, which launched in 2021.
• Neurovative Diagnostics, a provider of in-home EEG testing and Continuous Monitoring services in acute care settings, announced a partnership with NeuroX, a physician-led, global telemedicine company and leading online clinic for neuro-psychology and neuroscience. The partnership will provide patients with the highest quality neurodiagnostic testing, real-time consultation, and interpretation.
• Sidra Medicine, a facility committed to providing women and children in Qatar with tertiary healthcare services, signed a memorandum of understanding with Microsoft to facilitate its research division’s digital transformation goals and accelerate its precision medicine and genomics research programs. The MoU signals a series of strategic collaborations and implementations that will enable Sidra Medicine’s research division to expedite its technology and cloud adoption on Microsoft’s platforms, towards a complete digital transformation.The transformation, which will be led by Sidra Medicine’s Digital Health team (Research), will use Microsoft Cloud to safely store and access data more quickly and conveniently. It will allow its scientists to perform complex data operations using Microsoft’s Data and AI platforms. Sidra Medicine will also utilize High-Performance Computing on Microsoft Azure for industry-specific services to build an ecosystem that can facilitate genomics computing.
• YouTube announced that, for the first time, certain categories of healthcare professionals and health information providers can apply to make their channels eligible for its health product features that were launched in the US last year. This includes health source information panels that help viewers identify videos from authoritative sources and health content shelves that highlight videos from these sources when you search for health topics, so people can more easily navigate and evaluate health information online. Up until now, these features have only been available to organizations such as educational institutions, public health departments, hospitals and government entities.
• Florida Blue announced that it became the first health insurer in the state to offer Amazon Pharmacy as their exclusive home delivery service provider for its commercial insured members. Starting January 1, 2023, more than 2 million Florida Blue members covered under individual and employer group insured products, including Truli for Health, a Florida Blue-affiliated health plan, will have access to Amazon Pharmacy's low prices on prescription medications and convenient, no-extra-cost home delivery. Earlier this year, Florida Blue also began making the service available to self-insured employers. To order prescription medications with Amazon Pharmacy, Florida Blue's members may sign in through their existing Amazon account—either online or via the mobile app—or create a new Amazon account at no cost. Amazon Pharmacy will provide Florida Blue members access to a wide selection of affordable prescription medications that treat common conditions such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, depression, and more. In addition, customers may contact Amazon Pharmacy 24/7 with questions about their prescriptions.
• Aster MIMS Hospital partnered with Medtronic India to build a stroke programme in Kerala. It will form a hub-and-spoke network of identified hospitals around Calicut which will be provided with teleconsultation support and resources for mobilising stroke patients at a critical stage and in urgent need of therapy. With Aster MIMS at the core of this network, partner hospitals can pass on scans and vital parameters of suspected stroke patients to a team of experts at Aster MIMS for further evaluation. Their condition will then be continuously assessed through telemedicine.
• Lunit, an AI software company devoted to developing AI solutions for precision diagnostics and therapeutics, announced that it signed a collaboration agreement with the Abu Dhabi Health Services Company, part of Pure Health, the UAE's largest healthcare network. Following the agreement, Lunit and SEHA will proceed with a proof of concept of the Lunit INSIGHT suite, the company's AI solution for radiology, at medical institutions across the Middle East. The POC will include SEHA's trial of the Lunit INSIGHT CXR, an AI solution for chest X-ray analysis, and the Lunit INSIGHT MMG, an AI solution for mammography analysis, for evaluation.
• Memora Health, a care program for virtual care delivery and complex care management,  announced the first phase of a research program with Mayo Clinic to extend care to postpartum patients. This program will allow maternal care teams to further engage and care for postpartum patients between visits and empower them to have a more connected care experience while simultaneously reducing the burden on clinical and administrative care teams. Memora's AI-backed, digitized care programs are designed to proactively interact with patients from the comfort of their homes and address patient responses in real time, which drives a more dynamic care journey tailored to each patient's needs, and supports postpartum patients needing proactive and ongoing support at home. The programs also reduce email messaging volumes and notifications to care teams, simplifying complex care navigation for patient providers. Additionally, Memora's care programs efficiently respond to patients' frequently asked questions, triages patient-reported symptoms using natural language processing, proactively provides educational resources, and administers postpartum depression screenings.
• AtlantiCare, an integrated healthcare system, announced it implemented the Orbita virtual assistant and conversational AI platform. The technology makes it easier for individuals to connect with their providers and for the healthcare system to support access to self-scheduling options. Serving five counties from more than 100 locations in southern New Jersey, AtlantiCare is dedicated to streamlining access to healthcare across its diverse service area. Its programs and services include a two-campus hospital with ambulatory care sites; primary, specialty and urgent care; surgery centers and more. It is also an accountable care organization.
• GTCR, a private equity firm, announced that it has entered into a Leaders Strategy partnership with Steve Powell and Mary Mattes to form Harpula Health Holdings. Harpula will seek to acquire companies and assets in the technology-enabled pharmaceutical solutions industry as part of a strategy to build a market-leading company focused on improving the efficiency of drug research and development. GTCR's Leaders Strategy approach involves partnering with exceptional management leaders in its core domains to identify, acquire and build market-leading companies through transformational acquisitions and organic growth. GTCR has successfully applied The Leaders Strategy™ for several decades and maintains a culture of partnership with management teams as they build strategically attractive businesses over time. Mr. Powell and Ms. Mattes are serving as Chief Executive Officer and Chief Operating Officer of Harpula, respectively, and will make a substantial investment alongside GTCR.
• FINN Partners, a marketing and communications firm, announced that it will join forces with OffScrip Health, a digital health media platform focused on patient engagement, health equity, and access to care, for the multimedia campaign "Heartbreak in America's Heartland – Crisis in Rural America." The campaign aims to raise awareness of the many challenges Americans face in rural areas and build advocacy to address the persistent, underlying causes.
• MedAvail Holdings, a retail pharmacy company, and Progressive Care, a personalized healthcare services and technology company, announced a technology agreement to deploy five MedAvail MedCenters in Florida. MedAvail MedCenter’s unique medication dispensing technology will allow PharmcoRx, a subsidiary of Progressive Care, to provide pharmacy services in any state where Board of Pharmacy laws allow remote medication dispensing through digitally integrated kiosks. Patients visiting these care sites in the future will be able to consult virtually with a pharmacist and fill their prescriptions at the point of care through a touch screen, eliminating the need to make a separate trip to a pharmacy.
• Sound Long-Term Care Management, an accountable care organization specifically for long-term care Medicare beneficiaries, partnered with PointClickCare Technologies, a healthcare technology platform enabling meaningful collaboration and access to real‐time insights, to bring Virtual Health to its network of participating facilities. SLTCM aims to improve quality for long-term care residents, some of the most complex, high-acuity patients within Medicare, who have historically been overlooked or excluded from value-based programs.
• iMDsoft, a clinical information system and the developer of the MetaVision Suite for critical care, selected Viridian Polska Sp. z o.o as its Channel Partner, authorized to market and sell licenses for the MetaVision Suite, and provide implementation and support services to MetaVision customers in Poland. This channel partnership marks an important milestone in iMDsoft's mission to make its state-of-the-art MetaVision Suite available in new territories. With Viridian Polska, iMDsoft now has 10 channel partners operating globally.
• Reliq Health Technologies, a company that develops innovative virtual care solutions for the multi-billion dollar healthcare market, announced that it has signed a new contract with a network of 40 Skilled Nursing Facilities in Florida. The Company expects to begin onboarding with these clients next month and have all 40 SNFs live by the end of March, 2023. This contract is expected to add 4,000 patients per month to Reliq’s iUGO Care platform as of April, 2023 and the Company expects to have over 50,000 new SNF patients onboarded by the end of 2023.
• Solera Health, a platform for connecting people  to proven and personalized health solutions, announced the launch of a Women's Health network of digital point solutions. Solera's new network covers the spectrum of women's health needs, including those underserved by the market today, filling critical gaps in care to bring more access to women who need it. Solera's Women's Health network will begin with five partner solutions: Frame Fertility, Origin, Pacify, RestoreBalance and Visana. This network has been carefully vetted and curated to bring the best possible solutions together in one place to address women's physical, behavioral, and social needs at each life stage. These solutions serve as a strong complement to leading maternal offerings to help a health plan or employer better serve the needs of all women in its population through a single contract and IT integration.
• Gladstone Institutes and the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub signed an affiliation agreement to increase their research collaboration. The two San Francisco organizations, both located in the Mission Bay neighborhood known for being a hub for health and biotech, will partner to uncover the fundamental mechanisms of disease in order to find new prevention strategies, treatments, and cures. Gladstone researchers are eligible to apply to become CZ Biohub Investigators, and as part of the new agreement, those selected can use Biohub's funding to support their research both at Gladstone's and Biohub's scientific facilities.
• Adprime, a healthcare publisher and technology-driven online advertising platform, announced that Spectrum Science, a health and science marketing, communications, and media agency, selected Adprime to provide its demand side platform technologies and services to extend the breadth of its programmatic capabilities for clients. This includes precision targeting to improve campaigns for pharmaceutical product marketing and clinical trial recruitment, which is a growing opportunity for the agency. Adprime's DSP is specifically engineered to address the complexities and unique requirements of marketers focused on well-defined healthcare audiences, including biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, health insurance, and hospital systems.
• Reproductive science and medicine company Inception Fertility announced its clinical research team has partnered with technology companies on four fertility studies that will elevate the patient experience, evolve fertility services, and enhance pregnancy outcomes. Led by Alice Domar, PhD, Chief Compassion Officer at Inception, the clinical research team is designed to give Inception tools to better understand and treat a greater range of fertility issues, while empowering aspiring parents through improved education and more precise treatment options. Current studies include the OTO Device Research Study, Gameto Research Study, Lotus Research Study, and Oura Research Study.
• Mirah, a provider of measurement-based care, announced a partnership with Norse Feedback to bring its behavioral health measurements to the US. With Mirah, patients use an intuitive online platform to take assessments between visits and clinicians use the resulting data to guide treatment. Mirah boasts a robust library of over 400 measures so providers can tailor assessment for their patients. These measures, while clinically validated, are typically built by researchers and practitioners with a specific area of concern in mind. The Norse measures, however, offer a groundbreaking alternative. Purpose-built for measurement-based care, they are computer-adaptive, adjusting dynamically based on response. This means they can measure more constructs in less time and provide a fuller picture of a patient's health – all while reducing measurement fatigue.
• Thermo Fisher Scientific, a supplier of scientific instrumentation, reagents and consumables, and software services, upgraded its Applied Biosystems Chromosome Analysis Suite software through a collaboration with Genoox, a community-driven genomic data company. ChAS users will be able to access Genoox’s cloud-based AI platform, Franklin, with the launch of CytoScan Automated Interpretation and Reporting solution, making cytogenetic research data analysis easier. By automating interpretation and reporting, ChAS with Franklin provides an intuitive and flexible workflow for instant access to consistent, reproducible cytogenetic analysis results. While manual interpretation can take hours, ChAS users can now get accurate results in just seconds.
• Uwill, a teletherapy solution for colleges and students, announced a partnership with East Carolina University that will expand the current mental health services on campus by providing teletherapy to students at no cost. Uwill's innovative platform enables students to select counselors based on need, preferences, and immediacy, expanding access during a time of urgent necessity for student mental health support on college campuses.
• The Michigan Health Information Network announced that J&B Medical, a family-owned home medical supplies, diabetes, and pharmacy provider has become an official Trusted Data Sharing Organization, enabling J&B to exchange clinical and medical supply data throughout Michigan. J&B Medical will soon be equipped to extend to its Michigan clients the ability to receive notifications when patients visit the emergency department and experience major transitions of care. They will be notified when there are important updates related to immunization and diagnostic tests and, increasingly, when clinical data is collected and reported in the home or on personal devices such as via telehealth or remote monitoring systems.
• MedTech innovation startup ProvenMed signed an agreement with South Korean advanced manufacturing platform HubForward to produce its flagship medical kits. The agreement is a result of increased demand for ProvenMed’s flagship product for people with urinary incontinence – the ActivGo®– from distributors all over the world. The ActivGo® kit, which includes wearable catheters, a unique integrated cleaning system, a portable bidet, and a sleek wearable urine bag, is currently selling in 7 countries, with 6 newly signed territories.
• Home care provider for aging adults, Home Instead and DispatchHealth, an in-home, high acuity medical care provider, announced their nationwide collaboration to provide in-home acute care for Home Instead Clients. This partnership will enable Home Instead, an Honor Company, to provide their Clients with a new way to receive convenient medical care in the comfort of their own homes. DispatchHealth’s proven platform provides care to patients at home and coordinates support for ongoing needs with their care teams.
• Champion Health, a workplace health platform and part of Physitrack PLC, announced it entered into a partnership with Currys PLC, an omnichannel retailer of technology products and services, to support and improve the wellbeing of Currys' over 15,000 employees across the UK&I. Every Currys colleague will receive a unique health report, including a snapshot of their overall health and a tailored wellbeing action plan. Content is recommended based on colleagues' health results, but they can also explore an entire world of wellbeing, described as 'The Netflix of Wellbeing', including workouts to mindfulness sessions, expert-led masterclasses, nutrition plans, sleep stories and more.
• Ceiba Healthcare announced strategic collaboration with Pelstar LLC, manufacturer of, Health o meter Professional Scales, that allows customers to access EMR integration technologies for their patient weight data. Ceiba Healthcare’s IoMT eConnect Box and Cloud platform allow customers to swiftly and securely integrate both their existing and new Health o meter® Professional scales to 20+ EHRs or third-party systems. Ceiba’s proprietary technologies allow system implementation to be completed in less than three days with minimal IT support. Coupled with Ceiba’s 24/7 worldwide support, health systems can now easily integrate their patient weighing products and more than 1,000 other medical devices with their EHR systems.
• The Kenyan Ministry of Health, in partnership with the World Health Organisation, is set to train over one thousand health workers as part of ongoing measures to mitigate against a possible importation of the deadly Ebola Virus disease into the country. The training, that kicked off this week, has seen 75 health workers drawn from the national level and Nairobi County receive essential information and techniques required to deal with the disease as well as training on preparedness and response with the exercise set to be cascaded to the county and sub county levels in the 20 counties most at risk of EVD importation. About 1,400 Health Workers are targeted in the ongoing exercise.
• Kidney care provider Monogram Health and health and well-being company Humana announced a new value-based care agreement for most Humana Medicare Advantage HMO and PPO plan members in four states who live with chronic kidney disease. Value-based care focuses on the collaboration and coordination of all aspects of a patient’s care, and this agreement is designed to help improve quality of life for the members who have chronic kidney disease in Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana. The members can now access Monogram’s specialized resources, which include in-home primary and specialty care visits, medication management, dialysis and transplant coordination, palliative care, and social services.
• OSF HealthCare and Bradley University created a new Innovation for Health partnership aimed at generating scholarly research that can translate into practical solutions to improve individual and community health. Designed to create a robust, collaborative research community, the new agreement is between employees at two of Peoria's largest and most impactful nonprofit institutions: Bradley University and OSF HealthCare. Significantly, Bradley will be the first private university to enter into a formalized research partnership with OSF HealthCare. The two anchor institutions have a shared history within the Peoria community; Lydia Moss Bradley was instrumental to the founding of both organizations.
• headversity, a provider of preventative mental health solutions for employers, announced a new partnership with the Denver Broncos. The multi-year agreement will offer headversity’s mental health and resilience platform to the Broncos’ professional staff, launching in January. as part of the Broncos’ integrated health and wellness solutions.
• Bread of Life announced the launch of the Healthy Houston Collective program, in partnership with the Quest Diagnostics Foundation, to improve access to affordable healthcare in underserved communities and reduce health disparities in Houston for more than 9,000 people. Funds will support the BOL Healthy Houston Collective, which is a multi-year initiative focused on addressing healthcare disparities in underserved communities in Houston and Harris County through four program areas: the Community Care Program, the Bread of Life Academy and Eco-Life Staffing, Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHC) collaborations, and the Community Based Organization (CBO) Regranting Program.
• Qualifacts, a provider of electronic health record (EHR) platforms for behavioral health, rehabilitative, and human services organizations, announced an enhanced partnership with current customer Woods System of Care to meet their expanding care needs. To support Woods’ integrated care model, Qualifacts will bring the power of its InSync platform primary care workflows together with its CareLogic platform leading behavioral health clinical engine to allow clinicians across disciplines to have the information they need at their fingertips to provide comprehensive care effectively and efficiently. This project has already begun and will be fully delivered and available to all Qualifacts customers and the market in 2023. 
• Covenant Health, East Tennessee’s largest health care system, and Lirio, which combines behavioral science and AI to power hyper-personalized health consumer experiences, announced they are collaborating to launch Lirio’s Precision Nudging solution to improve mammography adherence across Covenant Health’s 23-county service area. Lirio’s Precision Nudging solution for mammography consists of personalized digital interventions designed to overcome people’s unique barriers to getting breast cancer screenings and move them to schedule and show up for mammography appointments when they otherwise would not.
• Medalogix, a data analytics company in the post-acute care space, launched Pulse, a resource management home health solution. Medalogix Pulse is finding patients who are at highest risk and over 10 times more likely to hospitalize in the next two weeks than others on census. Today more than 30% of all home health patients in the US are being supported by Medalogix products. Other Pulse features include risk-based recertification and discharge guidance, and insight into non-critical upcoming low utilization payment adjustments.

M&A 

• Aspen Surgical Products, a developer of disposable surgical products, acquired Symmetry Surgical, a supplier of high-quality surgical instrumentation, from RoundTable Healthcare Partners
• Google acquired Sound Life Sciences, a company that developed an app to monitor breathing
• A newly established portfolio company of Syncona Limited, a healthcare company focused on founding, building and funding global leaders in life science, acquired Genetic Technologies Corporation, a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on the development and commercialization of adeno-associated virus based gene therapies for the treatment of rare and debilitating diseases
• Ping An Health, part of Ping An's managed care services system, acquired Ping An Smart Healthcare, a business segment of Ping An Smart City
• AIVF, a reproductive technology company transforming fertility care, acquired ART Compass, an application for the management of the IVF laboratory.
• Sumitovant, a Japanese pharmaceutical company, acquired all outstanding shares of Myovant, which helps women with uterine fibroids and endometriosis and men with prostate cancer by developing new medicines
• Color Health, a platform providing the technology, infrastructure, and logistics required to distribute large-scale health initiatives to diverse populations, acquired Mood Lifters, a group-based mental health company
• MediQuant, a provider of enterprise data archive technology for the healthcare industry, acquired Knowledge Based Systems, a company solving the data access challenges in healthcare

Funding Roundup

• Elion, a digital healthcare marketplace, launched with $3.3 million
• HeyRitual, a provider of virtual couples therapy, launched with $2 million
• WhizAI, an augmented analytics platform purpose built for the life sciences and healthcare industries, raised an undisclosed amount of funding
• Electronic Caregiver, a designer of telehealth products and services, raised $30 million
• Vara, an AI breast cancer screening platform, raised $4.4 million 
• Shadowbox, a healthcare automation solution, raised $6 million
• Micreos, which develops targeted antibacterial solutions based on endolysin and phage technology as a sustainable alternative for antibiotics, raised €25 million
• Resolve Biosciences, a provider of Molecular Cartography technology, raised $71 million
• Alto Neuroscience, a precision psychiatry company, raised $35 million
• Actuate Therapeutics, a biopharmaceutical company focused on cancer, raised $11.2 million
• Amplifica, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, raised $11.8 million
• COTA, an oncology real-world data and analytics company, raised an undisclosed amount of funding
• ClaimLogiq, a healthcare technology platform that enables complex claim reviews for health plans prior to payment, raised an undisclosed amount of funding 
• HealthJoy, a healthcare benefits navigation platform, raised $60 million
• RightMove, a provider of patient-focused virtual musculoskeletal physical therapy, raised $21 million
• Daye, a gynecological health startup, raised £10 million
• Gabbi, a breast cancer risk assessment and care navigation company, raised $4.4 million
• OKKO Health, developer of eye health self-monitoring apps, raised £2 million
• Sleepiz, a device for the contactless measurement of respiration and heart rate, raised £800,000
• Hazel Health, a provider of school-based telehealth, raised $51.5 million
• Navina, a healthcare technology company that is using data to transform every provider-patient interaction, raised $22 million
• FitHappy, a behavioral and medical-based wellness app to solve diet problems, raised an undisclosed amount of funding
• Neocis, a robot-assisted dental implant surgery company, raised $40 million
• Midi Health, a virtual care clinic making expert care accessible and affordable for all women experiencing the hormonal changes of midlife, raised $14 million
• Hippo Technologies, a startup developing tech to connect patients in rural areas with specialists, raised an undisclosed amount of funding
• Floreo, a VR therapy vendor, raised $10 million

(Image source: elastic.co)