- DarioHealth Corp. is an digital therapeutics (“DTx”) pioneer supplying remote health condition monitoring technology to caregivers and their patients
- The company recently reported a successful private placement funding transaction that provides Dario with $28.6 million in aggregate gross proceeds to build Dario’s operational strategy
- Dario’s technology allows clinical care providers to remotely observe data related to patients’ chronic conditions and also may “nudge” patients to sustain their own care
- The novel coronavirus pandemic has increased the popularity of remote patient monitoring (“RPM”) services as a means of avoiding infection risks in public healthcare settings, and legislative changes have made it easier to receive insurance reimbursement for those services
Modern technology has opened the door for a revolution in healthcare services, allowing many patients with chronic diseases to lead full and active lifestyles that may take them far from their medical providers without significant fear of repercussions thanks to communication media that support expansive health networks and, of late, telehealth and remote patient monitoring measures.
DarioHealth (NASDAQ: DRIO), a digital therapeutics innovator dedicated to providing such technology to hospitals and other medical facilities to help ensure patients receive a proper standard of care even if they are not in-clinic, recently announced a round of successful fund-raising that will help the company make its product platform more available.
The private placement transaction with accredited investors brought in approximately $28.6 million in aggregate gross proceeds (before expenses related to the offering) from healthcare funds and institutions across the United States and Israel. The company states that the new capital, combined with existing balance sheet cash, puts the company in its best financial state since its founding (http://ibn.fm/uKWvc).
“We are pleased to have the confidence of our largest shareholder and several new highly regarded healthcare investors as we expand our commercial to manage existing and anticipated near-term agreements with health care payers,” Dario CEO Erez Raphael stated. “The adoption rate of digital therapeutics has been accelerated by the current pandemic. Dario’s efficacious, value-oriented solution is well-positioned to compete in this largely untapped U.S. market.”
In this year’s report on telehealth policy, the Center for Connected Health Policy noted that telehealth policies are changing on an almost daily basis as a result of the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic. CCHP’s comprehensive analysis of state Medicaid telehealth policies and laws throughout the United States was published in the spring just as COVID-19 was beginning to provoke restrictions on public events and found at the time that no two states are alike in how telehealth is treated despite some similarities in the language used.
“This variability creates a confusing environment for those who use (or intend to use) telehealth, especially health systems that provide health care services in several states,” a summary of the report states (http://ibn.fm/BsyWf).
The report notes, however, that since the report was researched and published, the pandemic has led to the creation of many temporary waivers and changes to telehealth policy across the nation. The changes include several bills passed by the U.S. federal government to support remote patient monitoring services such as those facilitated by DarioHealth’s smartphone-centered platform defined within telehealth policies (http://ibn.fm/KUQf2).
“The fear of contracting coronavirus has discouraged many people from visiting hospitals for non-Covid-19 health concerns,” Aliyah Farouk, a medical devices analyst at data analytics and consulting company GlobalData, stated in an International Travel and Health Insurance Journal interview (http://ibn.fm/eFrup). “The FDA [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] has published guidance allowing companies to expand the distribution of hospital devices for use in patients’ homes.”
Although the legislative measures encourage the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to better reimburse healthcare providers for certain RPM services, in most cases the changes do not reflect a permanent shift in telehealth policy and may only be in effect through the duration of the health emergency.
Nevertheless, RPM devices that allow clinical providers to monitor patients’ conditions, ranging from apnea to diabetes and heart disease even across international boundaries, have seen a significant rise in popularity as a result of the pandemic and that may leave the door open for insurance reimbursement policy changes beyond the pandemic, which may in turn sustain further growth of RPM services.
DarioHealth is optimistic about its prospects as it pursues a long-term strategy of expanding its operational focus from the direct-to-consumer channel to a B2B2C pipeline in which working with health plans and employers grant it access to vast member, employee and patient populations. Dario believes such a model will ultimately lower customer acquisition costs and provide higher profit margins and recurring revenues.
For more information, visit the company’s website at www.DarioHealth.com.
NOTE TO INVESTORS: The latest news and updates relating to DRIO are available in the company’s newsroom at http://ibn.fm/DRIO
