Athenahealth Unveils AthenaInsight, Focuses On Opioid Abuse

athenahealth Inc. (NASDAQ:ATHN) recently introduced athenalnsight, a daily news hub which will keep track of the activities of 80,000 healthcare providers and 81 million ‘de-identified patients’. This will help share comprehensive information pertaining to the healthcare industry with a much broader audience.

With this launch, athenahealth is set to look into factors that are affecting the nation’s ‘high-performing health systems’ and ‘public health wellness’, thanks to threats from Zika, flu virus and opioid (a painkiller drug).

Notably, opioid abuse is a mounting problem in the U.S. and athenahealth has collaborated with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to launch the ‘Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain’ to deal with this crisis. In fact, the company, with its newly launched platform, plans to carry out detailed investigations, conduct expert interviews and study the varied aspects of the crisis (with the help of data-backed charts and relevant infographics).

Coming to share price movement, athenahealth gained a nominal 0.5% to close at $121.64 following the news.

Our Take

We believe athenaInsight will be the ideal platform to address the issue of ‘information asymmetries’ in the American healthcare industry. The latest development promises to provide a clear picture of healthcare industry data and leadership insights of the care givers which is expected to exclusively fortify the company’s position in the Healthcare & Information Technology (HCIT) market.

Notably, the HCIT market has gained much investor’s focus of late on its forecast to reach a worth of $228.7 billion by 2020, at a CAGR of 13.4% (Markets And Markets), a major positive for athenahealth.

athenahealth has already marked its prominence as an Electronic Health Record (EHR) usability leader. In fact, the company is enhancing its growth trajectory with a strong product portfolio, growing physician base, solid R&D focus and unique business model. In addition to these, the recent development is a significant milestone for the company in our view.

Zacks Rank & Key Picks

Currently, athenahealth has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Better-ranked stocks in the broader medical instrument sector include USANA Health Sciences Inc. (NYSE:USNA) , Edwards Lifesciences Corp (NYSE:EW) and Amphastar Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ:AMPH) . Notably, all the three stocks sport a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

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