Emerging Companies 2017

The healthcare information technology sector is awash with new vendors and technologies promising to deliver the next disruptive technology. Providers are looking toward new technology to solve challenges in specific areas, such as patient experience, population health, physician experience, and automation. With many up-and-coming companies offering a plethora of different functionalities, it can be difficult for healthcare organizations to judge who has the greatest potential. While KLAS usually measures HIT solutions that are already live in provider organizations, this report focuses on vendors whose performance is not currently measured by KLAS and those whose technology is not yet live or widely adopted. To find out which emerging vendors and technologies have caught provider organizations’ attention and are gaining mindshare, KLAS spoke to over 200 organizations and then narrowed down the final results to 74 vendors mentioned by 69 high-level decision makers at some of the nation’s largest healthcare organizations; 49 of these decision makers are leading executives.

1. Healthcare Organizations Turning to Patient Engagement/Experience Vendors to Improve Satisfaction

Nearly 30% of all interviewed decision makers are looking to emerging patient engagement/experience vendors to enhance patient satisfaction. 19 different emerging vendors were mentioned; only Phreesia and Simplee were cited more than once. More than one-third of decision makers looking to enhance the patient experience are turning to various telehealth vendors to provide services—such as eVisits, remote patient monitoring, and telestroke services—in an effort to make healthcare more accessible, convenient, and/or affordable for the populations they manage.

2. Many Population Health Vendors Being Sought After to Fill Needs

More than 1 in 5 providers are looking at solutions from population health management vendors; 16 different vendors were mentioned, each offering a different solution to analyze, aggregate, display, and make use of data in unique ways. Provider organizations often feel that these vendors provide actionable data about their patient populations and that their innovative technologies have the potential to help improve clinical and financial outcomes.

3. Providers Looking to Enhance Physician Experience Through New Technologies

Nearly two-thirds of decision makers looking to improve the physician experience mention at least one of three vendors: healthfinch, Augmedix, and AgileMD. Each received multiple mentions from organizations for their ability to assist physicians in their activities and help them deliver better care. As a whole, vendors whose technology aims to improve the physician experience are looking to offer EMR overlays, enhance physician-patient interactions, increase efficiency, or provide other technologies that will allow physicians to practice medicine more effectively.

4. AI and Machine Learning Vendors Being Leveraged to Automate Remedial Tasks

Several AI vendors were highlighted by decision makers for a variety of technologies that aim to automate activities, reduce costs, and/or allow providers to deliver more efficient care. Of these, only CrossChx and Zebra Medical were mentioned more than once. Beyond providing basic AI functionality, provider organizations hope that imaging AI vendors will be able to keep promises of automating diagnostic processes for radiology images; several respondents admit that while they are hopeful, many imaging AI vendors still have work to do in order to prove their concepts.

Designer
Natalie Jamison