LYNDHURST, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Vitals announced today that it has acquired Compass Healthcare Advisers. Together, the two companies are positioned to bend the cost curve by helping consumers achieve real, measureable savings on their health care. The companies will combine and extend their current Cost & Quality Transparency solutions. The combination will allow health plans and employers to reduce costs, engage patients and deliver a “retail” way to buying health care services.
Vitals is a leader in providing online transparency tools and data, helping consumers make informed decisions about their medical care. Compass Healthcare Advisers extends this capability, by aligning the economic interests of patients & their employers. A unique component of the Compass SmartShopper solution is providing financial incentives to patients who choose high-quality, low-cost health care providers for their care.
“Even the smartest, most curated transparency information in the areas of cost, quality and access have, so far, delivered modest engagement from consumers towards owning their own care,” said Mitch Rothschild, CEO of Vitals. “What's needed are incentives and analytics to trigger and increase engagement. Marrying Vitals’ suite of transparency tools designed to assist the consumer in shopping for health care, with Compass’ engagement capabilities that activate the consumer is clearly the model that will lead consumers to make better health care choices.”
Compass’ Smart Shopper solution engages patients through proactive outreach that includes alerts and cash incentives to seek out high-quality, lower-cost, providers. The power of incentive-based engagement rewards results in impressive savings. The company estimates that the average patient saves $635 each time they use the Compass SmartShopper service. The service works: 65% of patients who used Compass’ incentive-based solutions re-engaged in following years.
“Incentives engage where benefit designs can’t,” says Rob Graybill, CEO of Compass Healthcare Advisers. “Compass was started to provide consumers with a smarter way to shop for their health care and to reward the patients that generate the savings. Vitals helps us with that mission by exposing enhanced quality metrics and reviews so consumers are confident they’re getting the best care at the lowest price.”
Baldwin & Clarke acted as exclusive financial advisor to Compass and McLane Law served as its legal counsel. Lowenstein Sandler served as legal counsel to Vitals.
ABOUT VITALS
Vitals is reinventing the way people choose doctors and medical facilities. We provide increased transparency to cost, quality and access information to support effective decision making. Vitals brings together actionable data, online tools and an engaging consumer experience that empowers consumers to make more informed, higher-quality and lower-cost health care decisions. Through health plans, hospitals and our leading consumer websites, Vitals helps more than 150 million people each year access information for better, more affordable care.
ABOUT COMPASS
Compass educates patients about the huge price differentials for common inpatient and outpatient health care services in their area, then provides the tools to quickly and easily shop hundreds of services based on price, quality and location. Compass Smart Shopper was the first health care transparency service to integrate financial rewards into a consumer engagement program—and it works. Clients see a significant jump in patient engagement rates when cash rewards are provided. And employers and health plans see measurable savings. Compass transforms patients into active health care consumers, armed with the power to significantly reduce claims costs and take control of their health care financial decisions.
