Back in February we had the announcement ofimage United Labs and here’s the first output that will crunch numbers on devices to determine which work best, which have the best pricing and so on and so forth.  From the paragraph below it looks like the data analytics will be for sale to physicians and others who want performance and numbers on devices.   

:Contract pricing will be comprised of simplistic pricing models, be available for customer physician preference item needs, and have transparent terms and conditions”.

The sale pitch in here about the J and J hips being caught sooner is just that as it was out there but nobody was listening so to claim that could have been caught earlier is a little stretch but I am used to the United reports and studies that use that word “trillions” with projected savings and know those are not accurate and wonder how they are modeled because I don’t think anyone is in a position to make those kind of numerical claims, but they do get readers attention and create a sense of urgency, it’s the old throw big numbers out marketing that’s been around for years. 

United Healthcare Launches UHC Research Institute–More Data, More Analytics to Measure Performance, Improve Performance, Optimize the Supply Chain and Increase Revenue For Academic Medical Centers

We have already had some of that via non profit Kaiser Permanente with orthopedic devices and again they encompassed everything as they have claim costs as well as all the medical records to look at and analyze for all knees and hips.  They have the largest registry in the US for orthopedic hips and knees and you can read the story below on how their analytics helped on patient as they had the complete run down on the devices.  I would guess their registries go beyond orthopedic too as they have been doing this a while longer than most. 

Kaiser Permanente Registry Information Pays Off With Hip and Knee Replacements For Patient Having Double Hip Surgery (Video)

Kaiser does a lot of neat things out there like this big donation of the convergent medical technology too to help with SNO-MED and other healthcare standards.

Kaiser Permanente Announces Their Donation of Convergent Medical Technology This Week For Open Access

Back on track here I would also assume this information will be for sale to device companies so they can see where they stack up with claim data and so forth when it comes to pricing.  it appears you have to be a member of the group here to gain the insight of the big data crunches.  With big healthcare systems donating their medical records and adding claim information this is where the big dig is going to be of course as well as performance.  I just wonder how the device companies will take to this?  Maybe they can get the same or similar information from Kaiser a non profit and not have to pay for it?  That’s a guess on my part here.

This sounds like it’s direct competition for the FDA Sentinel program too as remember back a few years ago when insurers were going to donate claim information to add to the device and drug files that were being gathered to evaluate for safety along with medical records added?  Dr. Hamburg has talked about the program quite favorably as it is helping with safety devices and drugs, but did the insurance companies decide not to send claim information to the FDA and decide to make a buck instead selling data?   About the FDA Sentinel below:

“Monitoring the safety of its regulated products is a major part of FDA’s mission to protect public health. But, currently, the Agency’s efforts are limited to its largely passive safety monitoring systems, which depend on healthcare professionals, patients, consumers and pharmaceutical companies to report any adverse effects of FDA-regulated products. The Sentinel System would enable FDA to actively query diverse automated healthcare data holders—like electronic health record systems, administrative and insurance claims databases, and registries—to evaluate possible medical product safety issues quickly and securely.

They also have Humedica that they paid hundred of millions of dollars for that can kick in here too with selling de-identified patient medical record data.  Humedica will be able to package up the non identified data and sell it to pharmaceutical, device  companies and others. Humedica uses a portal service for the hospital analytics and the information sold from EMR records can show which products are doing better, worse, etc.  The intelligence will be there but not big savings like everyone thinks as you get a new left curve every day that takes what you saved yesterday and spends it today.  Humedica MinedStream, is a a real-time predictive clinical surveillance system that identifies high-risk and high-cost patients, so I wont say any more there as you know what goes on there with saving money with the algorithms and models and the risk of being used out of context with a strong financial drive for profits gets added to the mix. 

United Healthcare Buys Humedica and Gets More Data to Analyze and Sell To Medical Device and Drug Companies–More Big Profits From Health Data

Now that they have Steve Larsen on staff who used to work for HHS and was credited with writing most of the healthcare law they know where to poke and build models even better for profit perhaps. 

Do you ever why your health insurance premiums are so high at times? 

All of this IT Infrastructure costs a lot of money so with all of the analytics, is this really going to create the savings that are hyped?  It will certainly create revenue from selling the data…and again it looks like they are poking the FDA in face a bit with not donating claim information on devices but rather keeping in a subsidiary that can make money selling data.  Well with big data and all of the hype with Quants still trying to figure out the models for all of it, half of analytics investments anyway will be a waste of investment so stay tuned on this one, as one thing for sure it will generate data for sale which is a given for more profits.  BD

Half of Analytics Investments By Companies and Banks Will Be a Waste–What Do We Analyze with Big Data and Does It Have Value–Some Algo Fairies Would Do Better at Disneyland…


For the first time, health care organizations can access comparative medical device studies that are completely independent of manufacturer influence. In conjunction with Optum Labs, member-led Clinical Review Teams will analyze medical device performance and make clinical recommendations based on the results.

SharedClarity will compile comparative effectiveness information for the following medical categories: cardiology, ophthalmology orthopedics, radiology, imaging, cardiac surgery, and general surgery.

With the integration of device data, registry data, claims history and other clinical information, insight into the best-performing medical devices will be available to help doctors and hospital administrators make smarter choices to improve patient outcomes. Comparative Effectiveness information will be made available exclusively to SharedClarity’s membership.

United Healthcare Wants to Expand Predictive Modeling for Medicare and Medicaid–Billions in Savings Predicted in Report Only As Good as the Day It Is Published

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20130409/NEWS/304099957?AllowView=VW8xUmo5Q21TcWJOb1gzb0tNN3RLZ0h0MWg5SVgra3NZRzROR3l0WWRMWGJVUDBJRWxiNUtpQzMyWmV2NTNVWUpibW0=&utm_source=link-20130409-NEWS-304099957&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=hits

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