Rhythm resolves to increase adoption

CLEARWATER, Fla. – Rhythm Healthcare has launched a new program called Rhythm Resolve to address one of the major roadblocks to wider adoption of portable oxygen concentrators. 

Under the program, if a Rhythm POC “goes down” within its three-year warranty period due to a manufacturer defect, the company will just replace it, says Doug Francis. 

“The provider has a fear that a POC business model will be disruptive to the patient,” said Francis, president and CEO. “If it breaks down, the provider has to go get it; they have to send it to a repair center, where it will be for a period of time; and then they have to bring it back to the patient. Providers have said to us, ‘What we’re looking for is a frictionless warranty policy.’” 

The warranty applies to Rhythm’s entire line of POCs: The P2 (1L), the soon-to-be released P2-E7 (1.4L) and the P2-E6 (1.2L).  

With the program, providers can keep a fleet of Rhythm’s POCs in stock and if a unit breaks, they just bring the patient a new unit and send the broken unit back to the company. Rhythm then sends them a new unit to replace it, Francis says. 

“We send (broken units) back to our manufacturer facility, and they are reworked, but they’re not brought back to the U.S.” he said. “There is a market in Asia that the products are supplied to. In the U.S., we only sell new units.” 

What makes the program possible is that Rhythm’s POCs are competitively priced and their failure rate is less than 3%, Francis said. 

“We’ve been fortunate that we’ve found that sweet spot,” he said. “Our product is reasonably priced, and it has proven over time that it’s dependable, and that’s why we can get behind it like this.” 

Rhythm entered the oxygen market in 2020, the same year the COVID-19 pandemic broke and supply chain challenges spiked. The company, which now has about 300,000 to 400,000 active units in the market, was able to make inroads with providers during that time by keeping their products in stock, Francis said. 

“We were never out of stock for more than five days,” he said. “We took extreme measures, like air shipping, that were expensive to do, but we were in the mode of gaining market share and we knew if we could make our products available, they would become sticky.” 

For Rhythm, entering the oxygen market was always about “going after” those 61% of patients who are discharged from hospitals with tanks, Francis says. 

“If you can give patients a modality that inspires 24/7 use and 20 minutes of ambulation a day, they double their life expectancy, according to the NOTT study,” he said. “They die with the disease not from the disease.”