access user-generated data in aggregated and individual form to improve outcomes. They also see value in connecting directly with consumers for engagement and marketing. Ginger.io, Eliza, and Achievemint are all working on solutions in this sector.
Access to healthcare information and services: There is a supply and demand problem between patient needs and access to healthcare (including health information). Appointments are hard to book, doctors are often late, visits are too short, and post-visit follow-up is cumbersome. Companies that are emerging as market leaders are ZocDoc, which helps patients schedule appointments, and HealthTap, which helps patients get their questions answered by doctors online. One Medical Group is also a leader in this space, and MyHealthTeams is a personal favorite.
Tackling readmissions: Hospital Impact reports that one out of every five Medicare patients is readmitted to the hospital within 30 days of being discharged. Medicare has a new policy—called a Readmissions Reduction Program—that docks up to 1 percent of pay for hospitals with high readmission rates. This very real cost of readmissions, estimated at $17.5B/year, is an area that can be addressed in part by technology. Wearable sensors, wireless tracking of vital signs, two-way information flow, and automated discharge plans can all help.
Tools for doctors: Manhattan Research reports that 62 percent of doctors use iPads and over 85 percent use smartphones professionally. Although selling into hospitals can be a cumbersome, lengthy, enterprise sales process, many companies are developing applications and technology that doctors adopt directly. Doximity has created a large social network for connecting doctors and Airstrip is a leader in delivering patients’ clinical data to a doctor’s mobile device. Medigram offers a secure text messaging system for doctors and nurses.
Lowering corporate insurance premiums: As payers’ costs go up, they increase premiums to corporations, and corporations in turn pass along many of these fees to their employees. Payers would likely lower premiums if convinced that a workforce is healthier than the baseline or overall health is improving. Several companies, such as Keas, RedBrick, Bloom Health, and EveryMove are trying to measure employee health and improve it by incentivizing employees to lose weight or stop smoking.
The venture capital community is certainly still looking for companies pursuing FDA-approved therapeutics and devices, but the emerging sector of digital health is continuing to garner attention. Firms that have traditionally invested in both healthcare and IT have a distinct advantage in this converged sector, but we are now beginning to see traditional IT firms investing in companies that are out to disrupt the current healthcare paradigm. A lot of firms lost significant capital in the late 90’s and early 2000’s investing in healthcare IT, which at the time was mostly enterprise software for hospitals. This time around we expect real cost savings and data-driven improved outcomes with several long-standing companies built in the process.
