Free Market Health, a technology company focused on specialized medications, has acquired Beeline Rx, another company in the specialized drug space, announced Tuesday.
Free Market Health with headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, offers payers, including Highmark, access to a specialized pharmacies market of all sizes. Payers can choose which specialized pharmacies in this market want to have on their network. Then, when the members are prescribed a special medicine, Free Market Health can connect that member with the best adjusted pharmacy within the network of their health plan.
This compares to the way in which traditional payers manage specialized medications, which is through exclusive relationships with a single specialized pharmacy.
Now, with the acquisition of Beeline RX, Free Market Health hopes to even more rationalize the specialized pharmacy space, spectularly around prior authorization. Because specialized medications are so successful, the payer approach is generally required for patients to access medicines. However, prior authorization leads to delays for patients.
Beeline Rx, meanwhile, sacrifices a platform for this prior authorization process to be more efficient. It is integrated with electronic health records and provides access to 320 million medical graphics of the patient. It also helps coordinate between prescribers and specialized pharmacies and provides access to medical policies and coverage guidelines. Free Market Health will integrate this technology into its own platform.
“That [Beeline Rx] Builting is found in all the facilitation of prior authentication and modernization of the approach, leveraging the interoperability of data and really practical use cases. … incorporating its technology into our market -based market platform is about offering the improved experience of members. In this case, he is the son of overhanging some of the admission capabilities that the health of the free market already has, “said Joe Cardosi, founder and CEO of Free Market Health, in an interview.
The terms of the agreement were not revealed.
The co -founder and CEO of Beeline Rx, Steve Fleck, will join Free Market Health as strategy director, while co -founder and president Josh Cordle will be Director of Products, and Coo David Palmer will be senior vice president of operations.
“Beeline RX undertakes to put the patient first, a commitment that we proudly share with the [Free Market Health] Team, “Fleck said in a statement.” We could not be more excited to join forces, building innovative technology together to ensure that the specialized pharmacy ecosystem is responsible to patients who depend on it. “
The acquisition occurs when the cost of specialized medications is shooting: they currently represent more than half of the total drug spending. While Cardosi does not expect the specialized drug space to complicate less, he believes that technological solutions such as Free Market Health and Beeline Rx can help support the space.
“I think that a modern technology company that is aligning interested parties, bringing more stakeholders together, ultimately, serving the patient will be a critical piece of taking advantage of some, managing part of that complexity and fragmentation.
Another company in the specialized drug space is Waltz Health, which sacrifices a platform that connects members of the health plan with the specialized pharmacy that best suits their needs.
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