With 3 consecutive days of $100M in funding, here is the most confusing (or rather the most confused we have been) Episode 147 of Health in 2 Point 00. Jess asks Matthew about Verily partnering with Swiss Re to get into the stop-loss insurance game, Prescryptive Health raising a $26M Series A for their maybe GoodRx-like or PBM platform, Sonde Health acquiring NeuroLex for its vocal biomarkers platform, Aetion reopening their Series B and raising another $19M to the $36M they have already raised, and Otsuka after investing millions of dollars in Proteus, deciding to buy the rest of it with $15M, but we don’t know why any of these deals happened

Matthew Holt was joined by some of our regulars: health futurist Ian Morrison, WTF Health Host Jessica DaMassa, health care consultant Daniel O’Neill. The conversation revolved around how insurers should reshape some of their practices amid the pandemic, what the large Teladoc-Livongo merger brings to the marketplace, and how there are still lots of potential ways start-ups can fit their models into care practices in the industry.

The THCB Book Club is a discussion with leading health care authors, which will be released every month. And this is the first one!

We kicked off with a new book from Hemant Teneja (VC at General Catalyst who has been writing many big checks lately) and Stephen Klasko (CEO at Jefferson Health System and one of the most unusual hospital system bosses in America). Their book is called “UnHealthcare: A Manifesto for Health Assurance” which is a how-to for creating a platform for a revolutionary future for health care.

“UnHealthcare” is about a new concept called Health Assurance-- which Tenaja says is "an emerging category of consumer-centric, data-driven healthcare services that are designed to bend the cost curve of care and help us stay well.”

Sitting in on the interview because we can't get rid of him was Glen Tullman from Livongo. (Just kidding, Glen!) He weighed in on how this connects with his new idea of Consumer Directed Virtual Care and the Teladoc-Livongo merger.

In September the THCB Book Club will feature Jane Metcalfe with her 2020 book NEO.LIFE

The original video recording of this interview is up on The Health Care Blog’s YouTube Channel.

Can we call this digital health anymore? What do we call it? On Episode 146 of Health in 2 Point 00, Jessica DaMassa asks Matthew about Amwell filing for their S1, Lyra Health getting $110M to develop their mental health platform, PatientPop raising $50M to improve SEO for doctors and patients (they also brought Johnathan Bush on their board!), Brightline closing $20M for their behavioral health platform for kids, and Science 37 getting $40M for their site-less clinical trials

Today on Health in 2 Point 00, Jess asks Matthew about the big news that Google Cloud has entered into a partnership with Amwell and invested $100 million into the company—looks like their IPO is really a thing! OneDrop gets $98.7 million in a partnership with Bayer, following at $40 million partnership last November, in a funding and development agreement. Outset Medical files their S1 and is going to go public, looking for $100 million for their portable dialysis system, and finally Podimetrics raises another $8 million for their foot ulcer detection platform for diabetics.

Joining Matthew Holt today are some of our regulars: writer Kim Bellard, patient safety expert Michael Millenson, MD & hospital system exec Rajesh Aggarwal, data privacy expert Deven McGraw, and Casey Quinlan. The conversation revolved around the responsibilities of the CDC & HHS, why the data hasn't been shared properly around COVID19 transmission, and why payers & providers are cautiously innovating health care.

On Episode 144 of Health in 2 Point 00, Matthew has gingerly emerged from his office and gone into a Magical Forest! Jess asks Matthew about Healthline media acquiring PsychCentral, the first-ever online psychiatry support group and I explain the history of how it has been passed around from Corporates to PE firms, Bridge Connector getting 25.5M for its interoperability platform, Cecelia Health raising $13M for its chronic condition management service, and Reify closing $30M to help pharma companies run clinical trials from home. Also, we had our first book club discussion with authors Hemant Teneja (VC at General Catalyst) & Stephen Klasko (CEO at Jefferson Health System) on their book “UnHealthcare: A Manifesto for Health Assurance”. Glen Tullman also made a special guest appearance during the discussion. The episode will be released soon!

On Episode 143 of Health in 2 Point 00, we have all the alphabets in the raising series represented ;)! Jess asks me about Lumeon raising a $30M Series D for their care orchestration centers, Nurx raising a $22M Series C to develop out its online pharmacy presence, Thirty Madison getting $47M and Johnson & Johnson is an investor this round, Bodyport closing an $11.2 M Series A for their weighing scale platform that can detect early cardiovascular disease, and Kumanu raising a $3M Series A to grow out its platform that helps people figure out their lives’ purpose.

Joining Matthew Holt today are some of our regulars: policy & tech expert Vince Kuraitis, MD turned leadership coach Maggi Cary, patient advocate Grace Cordovano, and Consumer advocate & CTO of Carium Health Lygeia Ricciardi. It was a great conversation surrounding the patients' role in all the technology being deployed, how providers can work to close the gap in care, and whose duty is it really to ensure a person is "healthy". Give it a listen below if you missed the live show

Today on Health in 2 Point 00, Jess and Matthew cover all the deals that got overshadowed by the big news of Teladoc and Livongo’s merger. First up is Ginger, the mental health provider which raised $50 million in a D round bringing their total up to $120 million. Infermedica, an AI enabled symptom checker and triage tool, raised $10.25 million in a series A. Next, Xealth landed a $6 million investment from Cerner and LRVHealth, partnering with Cerner and bringing their digital health prescribing tool to Cerner in addition to its current integration with Epic. Finally SOC Telemed is going public through a “reverse” merger with Healthcare Merger Corp.