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Cuts at Medtronic follow promises made in February to pursue “aggressive cost reductions” in the face of larger economic headwinds and inflation as well as the impact of fluctuating foreign currencies. After seeing flagging sales across its segments during the past three quarters, Medtronic has begun moving forward with layoffs that will span its international businesses. With about 100,000 employees worldwide, the process of notifying people whether they still have a job could take months, the company said in a statement to Fierce Medtech. “These decisions are never easy, and we’re taking great care to treat all impacted employees with dignity and respect,” the company said. “Medtronic will follow fair, consistent processes and provide comprehensive transitional resources to impacted employees during this time.” The final impacts and overall timelines will vary “by team, region and country,” per an email sent to staff by CEO Geoff Martha as reported Tuesday by the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Medtronic has not confirmed the total number of employees that will be let go.  The cuts follow promises Medtronic made in February to pursue “aggressive cost reductions” in the face of larger economic headwinds and inflation as well as the impact of fluctuating foreign currencies, both of which contributed to reported year-over-year declines in revenues for the company’s diabetes and surgical divisions. Last year also saw dips in cardiovascular and neuroscience sales. During its most recent earnings call for the third quarter of its 2023 fiscal year, Medtronic Chief Financial Officer Karen Parkhill said significant cost reductions that had begun in the months before would continue into the company’s fourth quarter, which wraps up at the end of April. The company has also looked to limit travel and slow hiring, and has offered employees voluntary early retirement as a way to cut costs, according to Martha’s email. At the same time, Medtronic has looked to unload some of its business units entirely.  Through a joint venture with the dialysis giant DaVita Kidney Care, Medtronic spun out its renal services division earlier this month under the new banner Mozarc Medical. Both companies provided initial investments of $200 million for its launch and are splitting ownership of the newly created company. The move was largely a “lift and shift” of Medtronic’s previous kidney care business, including about 1,700 employees worldwide. Meanwhile, Medtronic has been courting buyers of its patient monitoring and respiratory care outfits—including its catalog of hospital ventilators that saw widespread demand during the first phases of the COVID-19 pandemic. Potential suitors have included ICU Medical, GE HealthCare and Siemens, according to reports. The company also quietly combined its surgical robotics and devices units in an internal reorganization that took place earlier this year. The newly christened $6 billion surgical operating unit sits within Medtronic’s larger medical surgical portfolio.  More recently, Medtronic disclosed plans to close down a Silicon Valley-area facility obtained through its 2019 acquisition of the heart ablation devicemaker Epix Therapeutics, resulting in layoffs of 59 employees. The company said it had made its plans known to move the manufacturing of Epix’s DiamondTemp catheter from Sunnyvale, California, to Ireland as early as October 2020.

A new report from the American Hospital Association Center for Health Innovation explores how retail companies and tech giants like Apple and Google will drive transformational change in healthcare delivery in 2023 and beyond. WHY IT MATTERS With billions of dollars invested this past year, such as CVS Health's purchase of Signify Health , the AHA report highlights retail healthcare companies having grabbed significant market share in primary care, concierge medicine, virtual care and in-home medical services. They've also broadened their reach into pharmacy benefits management, behavioral health and other areas, said AHA researchers in the report . One example is Amazon. While the company is in the process of buying concierge primary care provider One Medical for $3.9 billion – a transaction the Federal Trade Commission may move to block – the online giant recently launched RxPass. The new service allows Amazon Prime users in 42 states to pay $5 monthly for 50 generic medications . Amazon is also pushing innovation that increases access to diagnostics and next-gen digital therapeutics. AWS has partnered with GE Healthcare on artificial intelligence solutions and is backing several digital health startups through its Healthcare Accelerator program. Amazon may look to scale its primary care operations to compete with the major retailers and could seek to expand its relationships with hospitals and health systems, according to the report. "The online retailer has launched Amazon Clinic, a message-based virtual care service available in 32 states for the treatment of more than 20 common health conditions," the researchers said. Meanwhile, CVS Health's integrated care strategy is taking root, and leaders are taking calculated steps to further round out the portfolio, say AHA researchers. The retailer has already leveraged its ownership of Aetna to incentivize the use of CVS Health services. It is connecting consumers with CVS care teams and expanding virtual mental health and home health services. AHA advises hospitals, health systems, providers and payers to watch for further engagement from the retail chain this year. "The company plans to spend $3 billion to make further digital enhancements to improve the customer experience," the researchers said. Walgreens too is expected to have a pivotal year with its "all-in approach" to healthcare, according to the AHA report. With a $5.2 billion investment in primary care provider VillageMD, controlling interest in CareCentrix, which serves patients with complex or chronic conditions, and other investments, the company expects its healthcare operations to profit as it continues to build out a primary care presence. Meanwhile, Apple and Google are looking outside the primary care market with their foray into the healthcare space. The tech giants will use their technology to build partnerships with payers, health systems and others, AHA says. The question is, "Will patients be willing to consistently share personal health data they collect and own?" THE LARGER TREND The steady and often rapid advances by large retailers in healthcare delivery are challenging for traditional care delivery organizations. "The net result is hospitals and health systems are caught behind the eight-ball on this transformation – in terms of geographic convenience, advanced supply chain, right-sized skilled staffing and marketing," according to Laura Kreofsky, vice president of strategy at Pivot Point Consulting, a healthcare advisory company. In May, she told Healthcare IT News that health systems need to move to a proactive posture where they have inherent competitive advantages to leverage in their digital transformation . "CIOs and other leaders will have to be more visionary and be willing to explore partnerships and platforms at a scale and speed that just two or three years ago seemed unimaginable," she said. ON THE RECORD "As these companies execute their respective strategies, they all share some common aspirational goals in contributing to the delivery of care that is easier to access, coordinated and affordable," said AHA researchers in the new report. Andrea Fox is senior editor of Healthcare IT News. Email: afox@himss.org Healthcare IT News is a HIMSS Media publication.

GE HealthCare has a vision for how it wants to shape the future of ultrasounds. The company wants ultrasound technology to be “used by nearly every clinician in nearly every situation in nearly every country around the world,” Karley Yoder, chief digital officer of GE HealthCare’s ultrasound division, said in an interview. Last week, GE HealthCare announced a deal that Yoder thinks will bring the company closer to achieving that vision. The firm unveiled its plan to acquire Caption Health, a company that sells AI software designed to guide cardiac imaging. San Mateo, California-based Caption was founded in 2013. The Food and Drug Administration cleared the company’s software, called Caption Guidance, in 2020. The agency said the clearance marked the first software ever authorized to guide users through cardiac ultrasound image acquisition. Caption’s guidance technology — which the FDA has cleared only for use in cardiac ultrasounds —aims to make ultrasound exams easier and faster, as well as allow a broader set of healthcare professionals to conduct basic echocardiography exams. It’s helpful to think of Caption’s technology like Apple Maps for ultrasound novices, said CEO Steve Cashman. The software enables non-experts to capture images and videos of diagnostic quality by emulating the guidance of an experienced sonographer. The technology communicates instructions via prompts on a screen-based interface — these prompts help users throughout the ultrasound process, such as guiding them on where they need to move the ultrasound probe or telling them how they can adjust controls on the device. This allows more medical professionals to quickly conduct cardiac ultrasounds, which could lead to the earlier detection of heart disease. “This technology allows novice users, as well as expert users, to be able to get to the right image in less time with higher confidence. And that’s really a paradigm shift in ultrasound, especially in the space of point-of-care ultrasound. It’s extremely important for folks who don’t use ultrasound nonstop everyday to have confidence that they can use this device,” Yoder said. There are multiple applications of AI, including AI-powered medical devices, cleared by the FDA to guide their users. For example, Eko earned FDA clearance for AI helps clinicians better detect heart murmurs and atrial fibrillation, and Cognita Labs won clearance for a smart cap that patients can put over their asthma inhalers to guide proper use. Caption’s technology is unique because it’s the first to assist in the acquisition of cardiac ultrasound images — good quality images are key to better diagnostic and even clinical outcomes. The healthcare system deals with heart failure in a “very reactive way” because patients need an ultrasound image in order to be diagnosed, Cashman pointed out. By democratizing the use of ultrasound imaging so it is not limited to people with technical expertise alone, more patients with heart failure can get diagnosed promptly — and therefore get started with their care plans — sooner. “Today we do breast cancer screening and colon cancer screening for earlier detection, but the leading cause of death in the world — heart disease and heart failure — is a reactive business.” Cashman declared. “By lowering the barrier to acquire the data that’s needed and a picture of the heart, we actually can do this more routinely in early care for patients that are at risk.” Lowering this barrier is especially important considering that there are only about 70,000 sonographers working in the U.S. — patients usually have to wait weeks to schedule an echocardiography exam with a sonographer, Cashman pointed out. Knowing how deadly heart disease can be, it’s imperative that the process of obtaining this image gets sped up, he said. Though GE The deal’s financial terms are not being disclosed, but GE HealthCare said it intends to fund the transaction with cash on hand. GE HealthCare looked at other companies in the point-of-care ultrasound AI space, but Yoder declined to name any. She said what really stood out about Caption is that it was the first in the field to build this AI guidance technology for echocardiograms and obtain FDA clearance for it. GE Healthcare also spoke with Caption’s customers, and Yoder said there was “real excitement about what the technology meant for their workflows and for their users.” In the future, Caption hopes to expand beyond the echocardiogram use case and into other kinds of ultrasound images, Cashman said. 内容来源于网络，如有侵权，请联系删除。