How much easier would it be if you didn’t need to actually be in front of a doctor to be treated? What if there was a solution for patients with chronic diseases to turn to? Introducing the new Oculus CCM which comes to the aid of patients, doctor-free. With complete compliance with HIPAA, Oculus Health has already had their CCM allowed by Medicare and aren’t stopping there.
Sridhar Yerramreddy, CEO and Co-Founder, gives the skinny on their startup ahead of BluePrint Health’s upcoming Demo Day.
Tell us about the product or service.
Our software platform empowers patients to lead the management of their chronic diseases through a revolutionary new model of collaboration with clinicians. We have built our product based on proven methodologies and evidence that our innovative approach will yield unparalleled improvements in experience, outcomes, and cost.
We provide a turn-key solution called Oculus Chronic Care Management (Oculus CCM). It enables physicians to provide 24×7 non face-to-face care for patients with chronic conditions, for example cancer, diabetes, or heart disease.
Beginning in January of this year, Medicare began allowing physicians to bill for CCM, roughly $500 per patient per year. CCM can generate a very substantial new revenue for physician practices, while helping patients improve their health through better care adherence, and improved care collaboration among patients, caregivers and providers.
How is it different?
We are different in a few ways.
First, Oculus CCM is a true turn-key solution to help people with chronic conditions improve their lifestyle and get better care. We incentivize people to follow their care plans, and motivate them to report back to us.
Second, our platform intelligently collects health related longitudinal data (vitals, etc) about patients, and can alert providers on particular thresholds based on rules set forth in the system. We are the “data” in the new paradigm of “data-driven medicine”.
Third, There is very little a physician’s practice needs to do offer Oculus CCM to their patients, beyond providing us with a list of patients. Once we receive the list, we can begin enrolling patients the same day. We have a team of trained nurses & medical assistants who follow up with patients 24×7 on their care plans, and create the documentation needed by physicians and by Medicare for billing.
Oculus has developed an innovative digital platform to manage 24×7 messaging with patients. While we can provide pure phone support for less technical patients, those who are more comfortable with PCs and smartphones can take advantage of an easy-to-use platform, with a wide range of features. Users of FitBit ™ and other digital health apps will be very comfortable with our tools.
Finally, we’ve developed a simple, effective way to connect with practice EMR systems to capture episodic health information. We’re able to exchange data in a way that avoids costly, time-consuming integrations. It enables us to connect with over 700 different EMR systems (and growing). Solving the EMR integration problem also makes it possible for us to provide physicians, patients, and even patient caregivers a single view of all medical data from all sources.
What market are you attacking and how big is it?
The market for Chronic Care Management is very large. There are 55 million Americans on Medicare. According to the US Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), two-thirds of these patients, or roughly 36 million have two or more chronic conditions and so qualify for Chronic Care Management. At $500 annually per patient, and assuming only half are eventually enrolled, this is a $9 billion market.
What is the business model?
We offer turn-key patient care concierge services to patients on behalf of their providers. Because it’s turn-key, providers don’t have to do any incremental work or change their workflow.
Practices are able to bill Medicare for CCM $43 per patient per month, on average (rates vary by location). Roughly half is paid to Oculus by the physician or practice.
Tell us about the experience participating in BluePrint Health…
BluePrint has been a valuable contributor to our business growth and funding process. I’ve made invaluable connections that would have been difficult otherwise. The people I’ve worked with have been very forthcoming with ‘lessons learned’; they’ve helped us to avoid a lot of common mistakes. BluePrint has also helped us discover several partnership opportunities, and of course ‘Demo Day’ is a terrific way to reach many potential investors.
What are the milestones that you plan to achieve within six months?
We plan to close on a seed funding round by the end of October, enabling us to expand our sales and marketing. We plan to make substantial progress toward our 1,000 physician goal by April of 2016. We also expect to launch at least one new product – we have several on the drawing board.
If you could be put in touch with one investor in the New York community who would it be and why?
I’m not sure there is one investor in particular – for Oculus it’s been a combination of many new contacts, and the opportunity to present at this year’s Demo Day.
Why did you launch in New York?
I’m here for the BluePrint experience and connections. New York is a great place with vibrant people who are passionate about digital health. It also has an incredible group of potential investors and experienced entrepreneurs.
Where is your favorite place to visit in the area in the fall?
If I had more time, it would be the Lakes Region in upstate NY. The Chautauqua Lake area is beautiful in the fall. It’s hard to find the time, though, when managing a start-up. In NY city, the Grand Central area is pretty in the fall, and I really enjoy the Italian restaurants in the area, for example Lupa. Fall is the perfect time to enjoy New York’s fantastic Italian cuisine.
