Heal’s Home-Based Care Model Aims to Reduce Senior ER Use

As visits to hospitals and outpatient clinics have become sources of anxiety for patients worried about exposure to the novel coronavirus, plans and providers alike have begun to make major investments in home care. One such plan is Humana Inc., which announced a $100 million investment in home primary care startup Heal Inc. last month. Heal CEO Nick Desai tells AIS Health his company will aid Humana’s long-term strategy to reduce the cost of care and improve quality.

Heal’s model places patients with a consistent primary care physician who makes house calls. The doctors are dispatched and routed using an app and driven to visits with a medical assistant, and they input notes and update care plans into an electronic health record between visits. According to Desai, the company’s physicians typically see 10 or fewer patients per day and spend 30 minutes to an hour with each.

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Peter Johnson

Peter Johnson

Peter has worked as a journalist since 2011 and has covered health care since 2020. At AIS Health, Peter covers trends in finance, business and policy that affect the health insurance and pharma sectors. For Health Plan Weekly, he covers all aspects of the U.S. health insurance sector, including employer-sponsored insurance, Medicaid managed care, Medicare Advantage and the Affordable Care Act individual marketplaces. In Radar on Drug Benefits, Peter covers the operations of (and conflicts between) pharmacy benefit managers and pharmaceutical manufacturers, with a particular focus on pricing dynamics and market access. Before joining AIS Health, Peter covered transportation, public safety and local government for various outlets in Seattle, his hometown and current place of residence. He graduated with a B.A. from Colby College.

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