PromptCare: ‘Stay away from the fads’ 

NEW PROVIDENCE, N.J. – PromptCare’s recent acquisition of New Orleans-based Coastal Infusion Services will give the provider a blueprint to add ambulatory infusion suites to its offerings, says CEO Paul Jardina. 

While PromptCare, which offers home infusion, specialty pharmacy and complex respiratory services, has had a limited number of infusion suites for the past several years, it hasn’t been a focus, he said. 

“We thought they had done a really good job of putting it together and rolling out, and we see that as something we want to do in our other markets,” he said. “It’s a win-win. If patients don’t want a nurse coming to their home, they can go to a center and socialize with other patients. From our standpoint, we gain economies of scale with respect to staffing and cost.” 

Coastal Infusion Services cares for patients at six AISs strategically located throughout southern Louisiana. It also provides at-home services throughout the southern U.S. 

For PromptCare, which started as a mom-and-pop DME in 1985 and has grown to serve patients with chronic and complex health conditions through 40 states, the acquisition of Coastal is a good example of the company’s acquisition strategy of acquiring smaller companies that have a shared vision for providing patient care and bring additional capabilities to the table to accelerate organic growth, says Jardina. 

“I’ve been in health care a long time and have seen that when you try to grab revenue and profits you are not going to build true capability and you are not going to be successful in the long run,” he said. “The challenge is to stay away from the fads; stay focused on what you do best. We take the tough cases. We work with the doctors to make sure those patients get very responsive service. These are the neediest patients in health care, and they are, frankly, the ones that drive the biggest cost if providers like us aren’t there.” 

The infusion market is a good place to be, Jardina says, despite the usual host of challenges, including intense competition, labor shortages and reimbursement challenges, thanks, in large part, to a steady stream of emerging drug therapies. 

“That’s the world we live in – costs will continue to rise, and reimbursement rates will not increase in a commensurate manner,” he said. “But given all those challenges, because we’re in the lowest cost setting, we believe the industry will continue to support home infusion and home respiratory care. Whenever you are on the right side of the cost curve in health care, you are in a pretty good space.”