Health M&A up
Spending on health care acquisitions rose 11 percent last year, according to Irving Levin Associates Inc., which tracks the sector.
The Norwalk-based company tallied $227 billion in health care mergers in 2011 across 980 deals, the fourth highest dollar level of the past decade, and said the total could grow in the next few weeks as public companies disclose additional deals as they report their annual results.
Of 13 subsectors tracked by Irving Levin Associates, medical groups had the biggest increase in deal volume at 60 percent, while home health services companies saw the biggest contraction at 36 percent.
“Election-year wrangling will tend to lengthen the period of due diligence in deal making as buyers and sellers attempt to see which way the political winds are blowing,” Stephen Monroe, managing editor at Irving Levin Associates, said in a statement. “Deals in provider sectors dependent on government payments will be particularly vulnerable as changes to reimbursement protocols, real or threatened, are bandied about. Deal makers clearly prefer non-volatile markets.”
SHU launches health IS degree
Sacred Heart University is starting a new graduate program in health care information systems starting next fall.
The Fairfield school”™s program is tailored both for those with experience in the area as well as IT professionals looking to transition to the health care industry.
Stephen Burrows, a former information systems manager at New Milford Hospital, is director of the new program. Burrows holds a bachelor”™s degree from City University of New York and a doctorate from Barry University School of Podiatric Medicine.
Maplewood adds on-call MD
Maplewood Senior Living entered into an agreement with New England Medical Associates, a practice was formed to provide health care services exclusively to Maplewood residents at their request, including for emergency on-call service.
Both companies are based in Westport. New England Medical Associates hired as medical director David Marks, who most recently was chief medical officer at the Jewish Home for the Elderly in Fairfield and before that chief resident at the Yale University School of Medicine/Greenwich Hospital internal medicine program.
Health complaints tops
Retail health and diet products generated more complaints to the Connecticut Better Business Bureau than any other category in 2011, knocking much-maligned buying clubs as the top kvetch among Nutmeg State denizens.
For the second straight year, dotcoms were the second biggest problem for people contacting BBB, which has its main Connecticut office in Wallingford.
IMS buys PharmARC
IMS Health acquired PharmARC Analytic Solutions Pvt. Ltd., a Bangalore-based company specializing in varying business services for 15 of the top 20 global pharmaceutical companies.
Based in Danbury and controlled by Texas-based TPG Capital, IMS Health provides a range of services to life-sciences companies, including data on drug sales used for competitive benchmarking.
Separately, IMS Health is selling off promotional and audit businesses it picked up in its 2011 acquisition of its Plymouth Meeting, Pa.-based rival SDI Health, a conditional requirement for the deal. Burlington, Mass.-based inVentiv Health Inc. is buying the units.
