DispatchHealth Raises $200M to Expand In-Home Medical Care Model

With a new round of financing secured, in-home medical care company DispatchHealth is gearing up for another major expansion push.

The Denver, Colorado-based company announced Wednesday that it has raised an additional $200 million in Series D, bringing its overall fundraising total to more than $417 million since launching in 2013. DispatchHealth’s latest funding comes less than a year after closing a $135.8 million Series C round, a fact that underscores both the provider’s momentum and the general interest in home-based care.

Working with most major insurers, DispatchHealth offers on-demand acute care and advanced-level medical care in the home across 18 states. The company’s hospital-at-home capabilities have repeatedly put it in the spotlight over the past several months, especially as traditional acute care facilities have struggled with the COVID-19 virus and in-patient capacity limitations.

DispatchHealth — led by co-founder and CEO Dr. Mark Prather — will use its new funding to expand its platform to a total of 100 markets.

“As an ER doctor, I spent more than two decades caring for patients,” Prather told Home Health Care News in an email. “It became obvious that many might have had better outcomes if we kept them home to be treated and recover, where they were comfortable and providers had better context to develop a care plan.”

Tiger Global led the $200 million Series D round, with previous investors Alta Partners, Echo Health Ventures, Humana, Oak HC/FT and Questa Capital also participating.

Following the added capital, DispatchHealth’s valuation is now $1.7 billion, according to the company.

“DispatchHealth has established itself as the most comprehensive provider of internet-enabled in-home health care in the U.S. and is well-positioned to continue improving access to quality, convenient care,” Tiger Global Partner Scott Shleifer said in a statement. “DispatchHealth’s model is accelerating the shift to at-home care, and we’re excited to back the leader in a large, underpenetrated market.”

Humana Inc. (NYSE: HUM) has been one of DispatchHealth’s biggest backers, even beyond the insurer’s initial investments. In early February, the pair announced plans to team up to offer hospital-level care in Denver and Tacoma, Washington, with plans to expand into more markets later this year.

Broadly, the Humana-DispatchHealth partnership is focused on treating medical conditions — COPD, heart failure, cellulitis and others — that require urgent intervention but not necessarily hospitalization.

“From a dollar-and-cents perspective, we will see lower readmissions. We will see less need for post-acute care,” Susan Diamond, home care business president at Humana, previously told HHCN. “This [initiative] takes more of a 30-day episode of care approach, where [DispatchHealth] will continue to watch the member even after their admission and address those things that would otherwise potentially require alternative settings.”

Baystate Health and MultiCare are among DispatchHealth’s several health system partners.

DispatchHealth’s mobile care teams and at-home intervention were able to save $1,729 per patient visit in Baystate’s value-based care program in calendar year 2019. Similarly, MultiCare had previously reported that its urgent care partnership with DispatchHealth led to a reduction of $1,509 in cost, on average, per patient.

Prather and his team expect their organization to generate more than $2 billion in combined medical-cost savings by 2023.

“In 2013, we set out to create that [patient-centric] solution and have since become a pioneer in the delivery of in-home care,” the CEO said.

DispatchHealth has been able to land new opportunities by proving its mettle during the pandemic, but the company will likely be propelled by home-based care tailwinds for years to come. That’s particularly true as more payers seek in-home care capabilities to more effectively bend the health care cost curve.

“We are so proud of the progress we’ve made to improve health care and are even more excited about what’s yet to come,” Prather added.