Business Briefs: Sodexo Acquires UK Home Care Provider

Sodexo Expands Home Care Market in UK

Quality of life services provider Sodexo has announced the acquisition of UK home care provider Prestige Nursing + Care.

The acquisition will help expand Sodexo’s private-pay home care market in the UK, as well as build on the company’s brand Comfort Keepers, according to a press release Monday.

“Prestige Nursing + Care combines a long history of home care provision with a progressive and forward-thinking approach,” Sarosh Mistry, CEO of Sodexo Global Home Care, said in a prepared statement. “We are very impressed with the professionalism and expertise of the Prestige Nursing + Care senior leadership and the way they have embraced the private-pay model. We look forward to working together to grow this business.”

Prestige Nursing + Care has 44 branches and offers personalized home care to seniors across the UK on a private-pay model.

“This agreement is a major milestone in our efforts to expand the support we provide to help our clients live independently in comfort and security at home,” Jonathan Bruce, managing director of Prestige Nursing + Care, said in a prepared statement. “There are a strong set of shared values between Prestige Nursing + Care and Sodexo, and we are excited by the prospect of strengthening our in-home care services to support our continued growth and innovation.”

Briggs Partners with MatrixCare 

Briggs Healthcare has partnered with MatrixCare to launch eBriggs, a digital solutions for electronic medical record systems for the home care industry.

“This partnership brings together a superior post-acute EMR system with a long-time trusted source of documentation. Using eBriggs integrated with MatrixCare, users will experience a smoother transition to documenting in an EMR,” Dustin Epstein, Briggs Healthcare’s chief digital officer, said in a press release.

The solution offers full integration between HTML and advanced PDF technology to ensure users can get the forms they trust and known as well as ensuring they are compliant with regulations.

“By partnering with Briggs to embed industry approved and tested forms, we can offer a much broader suite of assessments and notes to our clients in all lines of home care and home health. Rather than descend into a black hole of forms design and constant change requests, standardizing on the Briggs form set allows us to focus our efforts on workflow, usability, business intelligence and clinical decision support, leading to better outcomes and a happier, more productive care team,” Joe Kraus, senior vice president and president of Home Care Solutions at MatrixCare, said in the press release.

SAFE HOMECARE Opens Location in Denver

Starting off the organization’s national rollout of franchise locations around the country, SAFE HOMECARE announced the opening of a location in Denver.

The organization provides non-medical in-home care and companionship services.

“SAFE HOMECARE is just beginning its national rollout of franchise locations across the United States, forecasting to award nine new franchise locations in 2017,” Adam Krueger, chief operating officer of SAFE HOMECARE, said in a prepared statement.

ABILITY Network Acquires ShiftHound

Healthcare technology company ABILITY Network has acquired ShiftHound, which creates cloud-based SaaS healthcare workforce management solutions, according to a recent press release.

“ShiftHound’s workforce management solutions together with ABILITY’s existing revenue cycle management and clinical management applications create a powerful combination,” Mark A. Pulido, chairman and CEO of ABILITY, said in the press release. “In bringing together ABILITY’s clinical intelligence capabilities with ShiftHound’s workforce management solutions, providers will be better able to ensure they are staffed to acuity – improving quality of care while effectively managing costs.”

ABILITY and ShiftHound both provide technology solutions to providers across the care continuum including acute, post-acute and ambulatory.

“The strength and reach of ABILITY’s customer-facing organization means that we can now reach even more providers to help solve challenges associated with workforce optimization and enhancing patient care,” Ian Chaplin, co-founder and president of ShiftHound, said in the press release. “With deeply rooted expertise in health care and technology, both organizations share a commitment to helping simplify complexity. We are excited to join the ABILITY team.”

Always Best Care Expands Services in Colorado

In-home care provider Always Best Care announced that an existing franchise in Boulder, Colorado will be expanding its services.

The company provides non-medical in-home care in more than 200 independently owned and operated franchise territories throughout the United States and Canada.

Wilson Medical Center Pens Partnership

As part of a joint venture, North Carolina-based Wilson Medical Center will be owned by a joint venture of LifePoint Health, The Wilson Times reported.

Wilson Medical Center’s Hospice transitioned ownership and management to a joint venture of LifePoint Health, Wilson Medical Center Hospice’s parent company that’s also a joint venture owner of Wilson Medical Center — a Duke LifePoint hospital and LHC Group (Nasdaq: LHCG), according to The Wilson Times article.

“Hospice services, in fact all post-acute care services, are an increasingly important part of how we care for people in our communities,” Frank Batten, Wilson’s joint venture board chairman, said in the article. “Together with LHC Group and LifePoint, we will have new resources and support to strengthen and grow these services locally. We are excited to build upon the care we already provide to people in their homes and to have new opportunities to better serve the changing needs of our patients and their families today and into the future.”

Health Recovery Solutions Partners with Adirondack Health 

New York-based Adirondack Health and Health Recovery Solutions (HRS) partnered up to bring remote monitoring and videoconferencing to northern New York, according to a press release.

Adirondack Health has set up plans to have HRS integrated through Hixny, a Qualified Entity that serves 1.7 million patients in the Capital District, northern New York and the Mohawk Valley. Hixny operates a health information exchange (HIE) which allows for secure electronic access to patients’ records, with consent.

Adirondack Health’s hospital to home initiative project was awarded Capital Restructuring Financing Program (CRFP) funds of $250,000 to support the the goals of the Delivery System Reform Incentive Program (DSRIP). DSRIP’s goals it to reduce avoidable hospital admissions by 25% over five years and expand Medicaid.

Franklin, Essex and Hamilton County Public Health Agencies are distributing HRS tablets and monitoring patients. Office for Aging, North County Home Care, and HCR are the home health agencies that will be assisting the patients if they need help in using their tablets and peripherals.

Written by Alana Stramowski