Irvine-based St. Joseph Hoag Health’s emphasis on “population health management” is one of the driving forces in its participation in Newport Beach-based landlord Irvine Company’s new Kinetic project.
The first Kinetic location is at 600 Newport Center Drive in space previously occupied by 24 Hour Fitness. It combines a Wellness Corner medical office operated by St. Joseph Hoag; a private fitness center for tenants of Newport Center, the high-end office market surrounding the Fashion Island shopping center; and a fitness training center operated by Sausalito-based Active Wellness LLC that will be open to the public.
A health entity, under population management, is responsible for offering and coordinating care for a certain group, according to Dr. Richard Afable, the integrated delivery system’s chief executive.
“We said all along … how wellness in the community cannot be done alone.”
St. Joseph Hoag and Irvine Co. are “taking it to a whole another level” with Kinetic and the addition of the exercise and fitness centers, Afable said. He also noted that the new concept allows for wider participation by Newport Center tenants’ employees and their families.
St. Joseph Hoag has “learned a lot in the last couple of years, and we’ve refined our messaging and our product offering,” said Annette Walker, executive vice president, strategic services of St. Joseph Health, which is also based in Irvine. St. Joseph Health is a partner in St. Joseph Hoag Health with Newport Beach-based Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian.
Walker was referring to September 2014, when the first Wellness Corner opened to serve residents of Irvine Co.’s Village and Park luxury apartment complexes.
There are plans to expand Kinetic to other locations in California.
“I don’t believe there’s anything like this in Orange County or maybe even all of Southern California,” Walker said.
Afable hinted at the possibility of Kinetic centers in other locations once St. Joseph Health completes its affiliation with Renton, Wash.-based Providence Health and Services, which they project will wrap up in the second half of the year.
Masimo Monitor Cleared
Irvine-based patient monitor maker Masimo Corp. received Food and Drug Administration clearance this month for its Root patient monitoring and connectivity device.
Root uses noninvasive blood pressure measuring developed by Morrisville, N.C.-based SunTech Medical Inc. and a temperature module by Skaneateles Falls, N.Y.-based Welch Allyn Inc.
The device enables clinicians to measure arterial blood pressure of adult, pediatric and neonatal patients with spot-check, automatic-interval and stat-interval measurements.
Masimo said in a news release that Root is “enhanced” with Masimo Patient SafetyNet software that allows data to be sent directly to a patient’s electronic medical record, as well as forwarding alarms and alerts to the clinician.
Aeolus Progress Report
Mission Viejo-based drug developer Aeolus Pharmaceuticals Inc. is moving along with a series of investigational drug applications.
The Food and Drug Administration removed a clinical hold on its investigational new drug application, Aeolus said in a regulatory filing.
Chief Executive John McManus said the company “completed the necessary work to file our response to the clinical hold placed on our investigational new drug applications for the lung syndrome of acute radiation exposure” by the FDA’s medical imaging products division.
Aeolus also raised “sufficient capital to fund the work necessary for the filing of investigational new drug applications for compounds,” he said.
The undisclosed amount of capital is funding applications for potential treatment of Parkinson’s disease, cystic fibrosis and infectious disease, as well as initial human studies of Aeolus’ AEOL 10150 compounds in treatment of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and in radiation therapy for cancer.
TherOx Hits Development Milestone
Irvine-based TherOx Inc. said this month that it enrolled its first patient in a confirmatory study of its second-generation medical device that delivers supersaturated oxygen to treat heart attacks. The privately held company is conducting the study to support a premarket device approval submission to the FDA.
Supersaturated oxygen is a solution of highly oxygenated saline mixed with the patient’s blood and delivered through a catheter to the targeted area of the heart. It’s designed to salvage damaged heart tissue.
“This study moves us another step closer to our goal of improving treatment options in the U.S. for physicians to provide to their heart attack patients,” said TherOx Chief Executive Kevin Larkin in a news release.
