What You Should Know: - Accenture Federal Services has won a five-year, $628 million recompete of a contract award from the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to continue its work supporting Healthcare.gov. CMS made this award through the Strategic Partners Acquisition Readiness Contract (SPARC) vehicle. - In 2014, Accenture Federal Services was awarded a prime contract to take over management of the Federally-Facilitated Exchange (FFE). FFE is the backbone of
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Affordable Care Act
Why Speech Therapy is an Effective Treatment to Counter the Health Challenge of Social Determinants of Health (SDoH)
Over recent years, the virtual speech therapy delivery model has intersected with a host of healthcare disruptions -- value-based care delivery, the COVID-19 pandemic and the influence of social determinants of health (SDoH) have reshaped healthcare delivery. There has been a seismic move away from a provider-centric delivery model to a patient-centric model. This innovation has been made much easier with the ever-present catalyst of technology and its increased patient acceptance. Speech
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EMRs Are Outdated, but Big Tech Is Not The Answer
Over a decade ago, the “meaningful use” clause in the United States Affordable Care Act incentivized Electronic Medical Record (EMR) adoption. The purpose of this directive was to improve the transfer of laboratory data to point-of-care clinicians to help us make better, more informed decisions for our patients. In the years that followed, EMR systems have proliferated globally; countries like New Zealand, Norway, and the Netherlands are reporting EMR usage rates above 90% for primary care
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Analysis: 2022 Semi-Annual Health IT Market Review
Executive Summary Act III of COVID: Navigating the Crosscurrents of Post-Inflation 2022 ushered in Act III of the market’s latest transitionary period: The Post-Inflation Era. Since 2008, the US economy functioned with remarkably low inflation and interest rates. As the cost of capital went lower and lower during the decade, valuations steadily rose. Between 2010 and 2020, the NASDAQ experienced a 17.1% annual growth rate, with no small share of the growth a result of expanding valuation
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Analysis: Is Oracle Cerner Planning to Build A National EHR?
Earlier this month Oracle closed its $28.3B acquisition of Cerner and shortly after Oracle founder and CTO, Larry Ellison, outlined Oracle’s vision for Healthcare IT post-acquisition. The key elements of this vision included: - Developing a solution for a national EHR database. - Leveraging this solution, and similar smaller-scale connected EHR initiatives, to provide life science, pharma and other users with a rich environment for research, clinical trials and drug
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SimpliFed Raises $6M for Virtual Breastfeeding & Baby Feeding Support
What You Should Know: - SimpliFed, the telehealth platform dedicated to democratizing access to baby feeding services, announced it has closed $6M in its seed round, led by Morningside Ventures and The Venture Collective, with participation from NY Ventures, Elizabeth Street Ventures, Waterline Ventures, and 3CC. - SimpliFed provides virtual breastfeeding and baby feeding support fully covered by your health plan from pregnancy to weaning. Virtual Inclusive Baby Feeding Support for
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Why The End of the Public Health Emergency is Everyone’s Problem
The COVID-19 pandemic led to sweeping healthcare policy changes that enable vulnerable Americans to receive affordable health coverage and access essential safety net benefits. The steep incline in unemployment and fears that millions of people would lose their health coverage drove the declaration of the national public health emergency (PHE) on January 31, 2020. Under the PHE, states must keep Medicaid enrollees continuously covered, irrespective of their circumstances. With the PHE set
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Why Medicaid Programs Need to Update Their Information Systems
You don’t have to be a news junkie or political aficionado to know that state unemployment information systems massively failed during the COVID-19 pandemic at a time when they were most desperately needed. Overwhelmed by a rush of newly laid-off workers, websites crashed and timed out while phone lines were tied up for hours, leading to frustration and delays in benefits payments – harming local economies and imperiling American families. In Ohio, unemployment overpayments reached
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Q1 2021 Health IT/Digital Health PC/VE, M&A, IPOs/ SPACs Activity
The first quarter of 2021 has been one of investor optimism as the vaccine rollout continues ahead of expectations and economic activity begins to accelerate in response. Within the Health IT industry, the already strong investment and M&A trends seen in 2020 have only accelerated. Over the course of the quarter, we observed $7 billion in private equity and venture capital investment across 158 companies. By comparison, Q1 of 2020 saw $3.2 billion and 127 investments. Health IT
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Payers Struggle with Provider Data Management Too
Provider data management is usually discussed from the provider perspective: the busy staff, the needless paperwork amid a pandemic, the faxing, emailing and uploading of data. In these scenarios, the health plans are often painted as the villains for their bureaucratic processes and unique requirements. But the reality is that health plans aren’t totally to blame. Payers and providers share a common goal: to provide the best quality care for their patients. The amount of data, including
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