Ensign Group Inc., a Mission Viejo-based nursing home operator, is making good on its promise to buy more facilities in 2010.
Ensign’s most recent deals came earlier this month, when it bought two nursing homes in Texas and an Idaho-based home healthcare and hospice agency. The company didn’t disclose purchase prices.
Heritage Gardens Healthcare Center of Texas, Silver Springs Healthcare Center in Houston and Idaho’s Horizon Home Health and Hospice now are part of the Ensign lineup.
The company said the deals bring its holdings to 81 healthcare facilities, two hospice businesses and a home health business.
Last year, Ensign got more money to make deals when it mortgaged six of its facilities for a five-year, $40 million loan with General Electric Co.’s finance arm.
Ensign is making deals because “the pipeline looks good, but we do recognize that we’ll be comparing acquisition opportunities to the opportunities we have in our existing portfolio right now,” Chief Executive Christopher Christensen said on Ensign’s first-quarter conference call.
The company gets some 76% of its revenue from Medicare, the federal healthcare program for the elderly, and Medicaid, a federal and state program that serves the poor and disabled.
As for Ensign’s first-quarter performance, it reported a $9.5 million profit on revenue of $154.2 million, exceeding Wall Street’s expectations of $9.1 million in profits on revenue of $148.9 million.
Ensign also reiterated its profit and earnings guidance for 2010.
The nursing home company said it expects a profit of $36.9 million to $37.7 million on revenue of $605 million to $615 million.
Analysts are looking for Ensign to post a full-year profit of $37.1 million on revenue of $612.7 million.
Ensign is the smallest of Orange County’s three publicly traded nursing home operators. The others are Irvine-based Sun Healthcare Group Inc., which has 205 facilities, and Foot-hill Ranch’s Skilled Healthcare Group Inc., with 100 facilities.
Valeant’s Drug Approval
A venture involving the Canadian unit of Aliso Viejo drug maker Valeant Pharmaceuticals International will be marketing a recently approved cancer pain drug.
The drug, Onsolis, is made by BioDelivery Sciences International of Raleigh, N.C., and just got approval from Canada’s regulatory agency, Health Canada.
Onsolis, which also is known as Bema Fentanyl, already has Food and Drug Administration approval. It’s designed to manage pain in adult cancer patients.
Meda Valeant Pharma Canada Inc., a venture of Valeant Canada Ltd. and Meda AB, a Swedish drug maker that’s BioDelivery’s commercial partner, will sell Onsolis.
The drug will be launched in the third quarter, BioDelivery said.
Masimo’s Foundation
Irvine medical device maker Masimo Corp. has established a nonprofit foundation.
Masimo, a maker of patient monitors and supplies, said its Masimo Foundation for Ethics, Innovation and Competition in Healthcare will facilitate its corporate philanthropic efforts.
The Masimo Foundation will encourage and promote activities, programs and research opportunities designed to improve patient safety and deliver advanced healthcare to people worldwide, it said in a release.
The foundation’s purpose is to promote research designed to improve patient safety, to deliver healthcare to people who may not have access to it, and to promote healthy competition within the healthcare industry, among other causes.
The device maker donated $10 million to establish the foundation. Masimo said that money came from a $30 million payment it received in January from longtime rival Covidien Ltd., which operates out of Massachusetts.
In 1999 Masimo began tangling with Covidien division Nellcor Puritan Bennett Inc., which had about 89% of the market for devices that measure oxygen in patients.
Seven years later, Masimo settled all litigation with Nellcor, winning a $265 million settlement, $65 million in advanced royalties and an agreement that Nellcor would pay Masimo royalties for its technology.
Bits and Pieces:
Quality Systems Inc., an Irvine-based healthcare information technology company, made a presentation last week at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch healthcare conference in New York. Philip Kaplan, the company’s chief operating officer, made the presentation … ChromaDex Corp. of Irvine said it received a $3.5 million investment from the Frost Group LLC, a Miami investment firm. ChromaDex, which makes research tools used by the food and dietary supplement industries, said it would use the money for clinical studies and a botanical compound that could be used as a dietary supplement … Two University of California, Irvine, scientists have received grants totaling $2.6 million from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine. Marian Waterman and Aileen Anderson will look at the underlying biology of stem cells aimed at treating spinal cord injury, cancer and other disorders.
