UNITEDHEALTH GROUP ACQUIRES REMOTE PATIENT MONITORING TECHNOLOGY COMPANY VIVIFY HEALTH

UnitedHealth Group Embraces Telehealth

Telehealth continues to build momentum in the United States; and UnitedHealth Group’s acquisition of Vivify Health exemplifies this trend and will help drive it further. Vivify, based in Plano, Texas ( a suburb of Dallas ) centers on remote patient monitoring technology. It enables individuals to be monitored while they are home and as symptoms, vital signs and other variables change, healthcare providers can be notified. This can prevent emergency room visits as well as facilitate a nurse visit to the home of the patient to care for them before conditions progress to a more serious state. 

Vivify's Patient Care Attributes

Vivify utilizes mobile, cloud-based information technology and its own suite of healthcare software applications which encompass these and other capabilities:

• Biometric data monitoring
• Personalized care plans
• Text-to-speech configured to the needs of each patient
• Video education and conferencing

Some of the patient care issues Vivify technology supports includes:

• Asthma
• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease ( COPD )
• Congestive Heart Failure
• Diabetes
• Hypertension
• Oncology
• Pain Management
• Weight Management

Vivify Deployed With Healthcare Provider Organizations 

UnitedHealth Group’s Optum business unit orchestrated the deal. Vivify, which was founded in 2009, is used by these and other healthcare provider and service organizations:

• Alignment Health
• American Medical Response
• Ascension Health
• Children’s Hospital of Colorado
• Interim Healthcare
• Memorial Hermann
• Ontario Telemedicine Network
• SCL Health
• Shannon Medical Center
• Trinity Health
• University Health Network ( Canada )
• University of Vermont
• University of Pittsburgh Medical Center ( UPMC )
• Vanderbilt University Health

UnitedHealth Group's History Of Acquisitions

The acquisition of Vivify is part of UnitedHealth Group’s ongoing initiatives to change its business model. They are going beyond being a healthcare plan / healthcare insurance firm or managed care organization and building themselves out as a healthcare provider organization. Recent mergers, acquisitions and investments it has made include:

• Surgical Care Associates ( $2.3 billion )
• DaVita Medical Group ( $4.3 billion )
• Reliant Medical Group ( $28 million )
• Equian, a healthcare billing firm ( $2.3 billion )
• A hearing aid health insurance company and a sizable investment into a physician staffing firm

As other plans, such Anthem and Aetna, have chosen to expand their covered lives, conventional managed care plans and PBM units, UHC has chosen a different route. By acquiring medical practices and provider organizations, UHC has more direct influence on patient care, treatment protocols and costs associated with them. 

UnitedHealth Group's Business Model Expands

Through adding SCA and the other medical provider organizations to their business model, it provides different streams of revenue for UHC.  It also improves their position to negotiate rates with other health systems and care providers. While United Healthcare has a long way to go to reach the scale Kaiser Permanente has in terms of being a patient care services provider, its investments in the provider sector seem to indicate they have a long term plan to strategically grow the provider side of their business.

Terms of the Vivify Health transaction were not disclosed. As an integrated healthcare enterprise, Vivify and United Healthcare can develop their own proprietary telemedicine solutions according to their specific requirements which other health plans and provider organizations will have to coordinate with outside partners. The acquisition of Vivify adds a new resource dimension to UnitedHealth Group which it can deploy in its own healthcare provider organizations to save money while marketing it to existing Vivify Health customers as well as new clients to increase revenue.

LinkedIn: John G. Baresky

Twitter: Healthcare Marketing Guy