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Humana (HUM), Inovalon Expands Ties for Vaccine Adherence Efforts

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Humana Inc. (HUM - Free Report) recently extended ties with Inovalon Holdings, Inc. (INOV - Free Report) , a renowned cloud-based platform provider, in a bid to execute the Inovalon ONE Platform Vaccine Adherence Program with an intensified focus on vaccine adherence of health plan members.

Notably, the relationship between the two companies can be traced back to early 2019, wherein a configured Inovalon ONE Platform was utilized to offer Humana’s Commercial members with enhanced and data-driven insight about member conditions.

Coming back to the latest move, Inovalon will utilize established healthcare ecosystem connectivity, data integration, normalization and analyses for implementing the above-mentioned adherence program. This, in turn, will determine the clinical applicability and adherence of Humana’s health plan members to the immunization schedules and guidelines of Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), which guides Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) with recommendations on usage of vaccines.

With the aid of analytical insights obtained upon implementation of the Inovalon ONE Platform Vaccine Adherence Program, member engagement and disease education efforts will be promoted thereby leading to enhanced health outcomes for members. The same program also paves way for substantial economic benefits from lower incidence of vaccine-preventable disease incidence and related treatment expenses.

Humana has turned to Inovalon time and again in order to aid its members. Followed by the early 2019 implementation of the configured platform, Humana added Inovalon’s ScriptMed Cloud offering during later 2019. The company started making use of the capabilities of Inovalon’s Virtual Health Visit in early 2020. The Inovalon ONE Platform, which was earlier restricted to Humana’s Commercial members, was extended to the Medicare members in later 2020.

On the part of Humana, the latest move seems to be a time opportune one considering the fact that vaccination efforts have been ramped across the United States. In addition to innumerable health woes induced by the COVID-19 pandemic, new variants of the virus have added to the woes of Americans thereby necessitating vaccination in order to bolster immunogenic response against the virus. As a result, various healthcare providers have developed vaccines to fight the COVID-19 virus, with the Pfizer (PFE - Free Report) -BioNTech one, the Moderna one and the recent COVID-19 vaccine of Johnson & Johnson getting the Federal regulators’ approval.

Shares of Humana have surged 72.8% in a year compared with the industry’s rally of 58.2%.

Moreover, Humana has stayed pretty active and undertaken a plethora of measures for protecting members since the coronavirus outbreak. The healthcare provider has recently introduced the CenterWell brand, which will bring together Humana’s senior-focused primary care centers for devising personalized health care plans for senior patients, keeping an aging American population in mind. It is poised well to benefit from a strong Medicare business through which the company has been providing enhanced health care services and foraying into areas not delved before thereby expanding its U.S. footprint.

The company has also encouraged increased use of telehealth services, which offered the much-needed healthcare services for members sitting at home amid the coronavirus crisis. At the same time, these services eliminated physical contact between members and healthcare providers thereby curbing chances of virus spread.

Another healthcare provider, UnitedHealth Group Incorporated (UNH - Free Report) , has also been actively developing its telehealth services.

Humana currently has a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell).

You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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