CarePayment Technologies, Inc., a healthcare financial services company in Portland, Ore., has acquired San Francisco-based Vitality Financial, which provides hospital payment solutions to providers and patients.
CarePayment will continue Vitality Financial's operations at its San Francisco headquarters, and some members of Vitality's executive team will remain with the company. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
CarePayment assists hospitals in identifying self-pay patients and offers financing options to help them pay for healthcare services. The program is designed to enable patients to pay for hospital services with no interest charges over an extended period of time, while providing hospitals with immediate funding for patient-pay receivables.
The acquisition of Vitality Financial expands the patient-centric product and service offerings currently offered by CarePayment, said Jim Quist, CarePayment's CEO.
"The joining of Vitality's services and management team allows us to expand our offering targeted solutions to better cater to the needs of the patients and, subsequently, the providers themselves," he said.
Chris Chen, CEO of Vitality, said the merger makes Vitality the only company in the industry that offers both a recourse and non-recourse financing product.
According to Quist, as insurance deductibles and unemployment rise, healthcare coverage will become more restricted and patients will increasingly be faced with the need to pay out-of-pocket for medical treatment.
"CarePayment creates partnerships with hospitals and health systems, which allows for greater efficiency as we offer innovative solutions to individuals burdened with liabilities from healthcare services," he said.