Bendcare was established to fulfill the unmet need for a new approach to specialty care in which the physician and patient co-create their experience and outcome. Currently in the rheumatology specialty, Bendcare takes the hassle out of healthcare for independent physicians by offering a suite of products, services, and education to standardize and simplify their practices and drive improvements in quality and cost of care, patient satisfaction, and practice performance optimization.
By investing in its S.T.E.P. model over the years, which encompasses Services, Technology, Education, and Purchase power solutions, the company has developed a uniquely innovative and disruptive model for specialty care to return the control back to both stakeholders (patients and providers). Bendcare delivers 21st century technology infrastructure to effectively manage the business demands of running an independent physician’s office while providing compassionate and service-oriented business and clinical support. Bendcare will soon expand to other specialties as well.
The company believes that data is the “new currency in healthcare” and created Columbus, which is the largest, prospective, and real-world rheumatologic data repository that captures and analyzes data from more than 3,000,000 patients. The data is then measured to assess trends, key performance indicators, and benchmarks for a healthy practice to create comprehensive visual analytics regarding business strategy, compliance, pattern recognition, research, and clinical decision support for all major rheumatic diseases. Their proprietary technology platform was built to deliver infrastructure to effectively manage the business demands of running a private practice.
Bendcare integrates algorithms and targeted education through the company’s Bridge edutainment platform. The Bridge is a digital repository of educational modules and resources available for providers and their care team to promote collaboration across all of S.T.E.P. The courses available on the Bridge cover a variety of topics, ranging from Compliance and HIPAA training to disease- and medication-specific education. The modules are highly interactive and engaging in order to support a dynamic educational experience and facilitate the success of providers and their care team.
For chronic inflammatory patients, Bendcare has tailored the Oasis Health proprietary product line, formulated by Rheumatologists, for an ageing and active population. “Oasis Health, our proprietary nutraceutical product line tailored for the chronic inflammatory patient, was established to address and overcome the challenges of purity and quality in the dietary supplement market,” says Andrew S. Ripps, CEO, Bendcare. Each product is formulated and tested to have potency based on science, purity consistently validated by third-party testing, and packaging designed for convenience while providing additional tools for the physician to complement the patient journey.
The company also created its Centralized Purchasing Organization (CPO) to aggregate purchasing volume and use that leverage to negotiate direct manufacturer contracts to mitigate the middleman role in conventional group purchasing. This enables all savings to be returned to the practice to reinvest in quality service and care. The company created each of its purchase power solutions in direct response to market and consumer challenges. Lastly, Bendcare developed Bendfusion to support the optimization of state-of-the-art in-office infusion suites in rheumatology practices across the country by simplifying and mitigating the risks commonly found in providing in-office infusions and assisting the office in compliant coding, billing, and denial management. We are also the low-cost, high-quality alternative to the hospital setting while also filling the gaps for other specialty patients.
Currently located in 25 states and growing, the company’s national physician development team is expanding the number of offices within each of those current states while continuing to strategically bring in new states with opportunities for rapid expansion. With an annual growth of 40% of its physician network, Bendcare is going to take this infrastructure and pivot to other specialty providers in healthcare.
