UnitedHealth Group has quietly added yet another provider group to its growing Optum Health subsidiary. Earlier this year, UHG acquired Crystal Run Healthcare, a New York-based physician group with about 400 doctors. There was no fanfare around the acquisition until media reports resurfaced it this week. Local newspaper Mid-Hudson News obtained an internal email in late February, where Crystal Run leaders informed employees that they were a part of Optum as of Feb. 22. In the message, CEO Hal Teitelbaum, M.D., said the deal would advance the provider group’s value-based care capabilities.
Author: Abhay Panchal
Editor’s note: This story has been updated with additional information from a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Pear Therapeutics, maker of prescription digital therapeutics, announced today that it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and is seeking a sale of its business or assets. The company will continue its scaled-down operations during Chapter 11 as it seeks a sale, and Pear will use its available cash to fund its operations and costs post-petition. The Boston-based company’s CEO Corey McCann referenced the filing on LinkedIn, stating, “Today is a difficult day for Pear Therapeutics. We announced that Pear voluntarily…
Precision diagnostics company Oncocyte on Friday announced the publication of results from the randomized phase II AtezoTRIBE clinical trial for metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC), which used the company’s DetermaIO gene-expression test. The results, published in Clinical Cancer Research, show that DetermaIO, which assesses the tumor microenvironment to predict response to immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) treatment, identified more patients who were potentially responsive to ICI treatment than current biomarkers.
The physician-led Independent Physician Association of New York, one of the largest in the nation, has been acquired by the private equity-backed Vytalize Health, through an investment in Practice Management of America. An announcement from Vytalize states that the deal builds on an existing partnership between the organizations dating to 2020 and accelerates the firm’s expansion into Medicare Advantage, commercial plans, Medicaid, and multi-specialty care. “IPA NY is a longtime partner that shares our commitment to supporting independent physicians and helping them succeed in delivering high-quality, value-based care,” said Faris Ghawi, Vytalize Health co-founder and CEO, in a statement.
Key takeaways: Patients with rectal cancer who were observed by a watch-and-wait approach reported “good” quality of life and less major bowel dysfunction than those requiring surgery, according to study results in JAMA Surgery.
When it comes to billing, all medical degrees are not created equal. A recent survey from Dallas-based healthcare staffing firm AMN Healthcare found that physicians bill between $11.7 million and $1.3 million annually, with some non-physicians billing more than their doctor colleagues. The report estimates that physicians originate 80 percent of all healthcare dollars spent in the system. As healthcare costs rise, numerous forces are at work to curb prices, but shifts toward value-based care, bundled prices, and transparency haven’t stopped unsustainable increases in healthcare prices over the past decades. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services found that spending…
Bain & Company’s 12th annual Global Healthcare Private Equity and M&A report reflects the continued resilience of the healthcare industry, with 2022 seeing near-record levels of healthcare dealmaking, in terms of both volume and value. Despite a slowdown caused by macro-economic and geopolitical forces in the second half of the year, 2022 was still the second-best year on record for healthcare dealmaking, due in large part to the white-hot pace of investment at the start of the year. Total disclosed deal value reached nearly $90 billion, down from $151 billion in 2021 but still more than $10 billion more than…
Allicent Curry, MSN, FNP-C used to love her job as a nurse practitioner in the emergency department – until the Covid-19 pandemic hit. Little by little the joy faded, with only her teammates keeping up her resolve. “Then as the sickness began to dissipate, the rate of hateful angry patients picked up,” she said.Curry is among the wave of clinicians who are continuing to change jobs at a rapid pace. After her six years in the ER, she became a family nurse practitioner last December for better compensation and stable hours. “I’ve never been happier and am actually finding my…
AGA Shark Tank winner | Gut on a chip | 4 GI device innovations This reimbursement issue poses a ‘real challenge’ for gastroenterologists (Becker’s GI & Endoscopy)Vivek Kaul, MD, Segal-Watson professor of medicine in the gastroenterology and hepatology division at the University of Rochester (N.Y.) Medical Center, discusses the biggest challenge GIs face regarding reimbursement rates for GI procedures. And the winner of this year’s Shark Tank is… (AGA)Find out which of the five finalists was declared the winner at last week’s AGA Tech Summit. ctDNA Testing in Colorectal Cancer Deemed Promising but Not Ready for Prime Time (Cancer Therapy…