Technology company Appriss Health provides prescription drug monitoring analytics to help healthcare organizations improve their management of opioids and avoid misuse.
Beyond just identifying potential opioid misuse, the Louisville, Kentucky-based company has acquired OpenBeds to help link patients with substance use disorders to behavioral health resources and treatment programs.
As the name suggests, OpenBeds' software provides real-time data that shows open beds at inpatient psychiatric facilities and inpatient substance use disorder programs as well as other resources for crisis support and availability at outpatient programs.
The acquisition of OpenBeds helps Appriss Health build on its efforts to address the complex and changing opioid crisis through technology solutions to help providers more quickly connect patients to behavioral health resources and treatment, the company said in a press release.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
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OpenBeds is a cloud-based platform that identifies and tracks behavioral health resources using a single, common network. The Washington, D.C.-based technology company facilitates rapid digital referrals with up-to-date availability of both inpatient and outpatient behavioral health services with the aim of improving patient access to treatment for crisis, mental health and substance use disorders.
“We are in the midst of a public health crisis. It is widely recognized that one of the major barriers to addressing the opioid crisis is access to treatment,” Nishi Rawat, M.D., co-founder of OpenBeds, said in a statement.
As a critical care provider, Rawat often saw patients sent home after opioid overdoses rather than being connected to treatment, and patients boarded for days in the emergency department until they were connected to inpatient psychiatric care, he said. That experience motivated him to launch OpenBeds in 2016.
"With technology, we can do so much more to improve outcomes by quickly connecting patients to appropriate and quality treatment," she said.
Indiana and Delaware have already deployed the OpenBeds platform on a statewide basis. In Delaware—where more than 17,000 referrals have been made since the system was implemented in September 2018—over half of referrals are acknowledged within 30 minutes, and the system is helping the state identify gaps in care delivery and ensure people have the opportunity to get appropriate treatment, according to the company.
Agreements are also in place for statewide implementation of the OpenBeds platform in six additional states.
OpenBeds' software enables coordination among medical and mental health providers, social services and substance use disorder programs. It is HIPAA compliant and meets 42 CFR Part 2 requirements.
“With OpenBeds, providers no longer need to spend hours of their day manually trying to find treatment facilities for patients – the data is available to them within minutes, in a secure network, allowing more time to care for patients," Appriss Health President Rob Cohen said in a statement.
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The technology also enables patients to be referred digitally and admitted to treatment much more quickly, the companies said.
More than 130 of the nation’s largest electronic health record platforms and every major pharmacy chain and pharmacy management system have integrated the Appriss Health platform directly into their healthcare information technology systems, currently connecting more than 500,000 prescribers and pharmacists at nearly 80,000 facilities in 40 states and supporting more than 60 million patient encounters per month, the company said.
In Delaware, OpenBeds' software helps to support the state's treatment and referral network. "Because of the Delaware Treatment and Referral Network, health care providers, in consultation with individuals and their families, won’t have to spend hours on the phone trying to find out if a treatment slot or bed is available,” Dr. Kara Odom Walker, secretary of the Delaware Department of Health and Social Services, said. “Faxed paperwork won’t get misplaced. And a bed won’t be given away to someone else while an individual seeking treatment tries to get to a treatment location.”