Indiana health-related companies were somewhat absent from the lobbying bonanza that gripped Washington, D.C., in 2009. For
all the heat and light about health reform, major Indiana companies actually spent slightly less to lobby Congress.
What would you do with $10 million? Indiana Health Information Technology Inc. wants to spend it to link
five medical records exchanges that operate separately around the state. The statewide organization received the money from
programs created by the federal stimulus bill. The group will link existing exchanges operated in and around Indianapolis,
Bloomington, Cincinnati, Fort Wayne and South Bend.
What’s this? A health insurance company trying to compete against Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in central Indiana?
Consumer Life Insurance Co., a subsidiary of Medical Mutual of Ohio, has opened an office in Carmel with
intentions to sell group and individual policies. Consumers Life, which operates primarily in southern and northeastern Indiana,
has been expanding its network of doctors and hospitals in an attempt to reach statewide. The company has negotiated rates
with 44 hospitals and 5,000 physicians, and now employs 13 at its Carmel office, with plans to add more. It intends to extend
its SuperMed provider network statewide by the end of 2010.
Attaboy, here’s another contract. The Indiana State Department of Health awarded a $434,000 contract to the University
of Indianapolis Center for Aging & Community to lead an initiative to reduce infections acquired in health care
facilities. The new Indiana Healthcare Associated Infection Initiative will target such things as infections acquired from
catheters that aren’t completely sterile or from side effects of antibiotic use. The 15-month Indiana program will begin
in July and include at least 80 hospitals, nursing homes and home-health agencies. The latest initiative is modeled on the
Indiana Pressure Ulcer Prevention Initiative, which UIndy also oversees under a state contract. The first round of the pressure
ulcer initiative involved more than 160 hospitals, long-term care centers and home-health care providers and decreased the
incidence of pressure ulcers by 30 percent.
St. Francis Hospital & Health Centers has acquired a six-doctor orthopedic surgery practice that operates
in St. Francis’ Mooresville hospital. Joint Replacement Surgeons of Indiana fully integrated with St.
Francis on Monday, the hospital system announced. The physician group will be called St. Francis Medical Group-Joint Replacement
Surgeons. The doctors will continue working out of the St. Francis-Mooresville campus and the St. Vincent Indianapolis
Hospital campus on West 86th Street.
Eli Lilly and Co. paid $50 million for exclusive rights from Acrux Ltd. to an underarm testosterone lotion
called Axiron for men with limited sex drive due to low levels of the hormone, according to Bloomberg News. Indianapolis-based
Lilly will also pay Acrux, based in West Melbourne, Australia, $3 million when manufacturing assets are transferred. Acrux
may earn $87 million more if U.S. regulators approve the drug for sale, an additional $195 million in commercial milestone
payments, and royalty payments on future sales.
Clarian Health is expanding its LifeLine Critical Care Transport service to Lafayette and Muncie, making
its Clarian Arnett and Ball Memorial Hospital into regional centers for critical care. When the new cities come online in
July, LifeLine will operate from six bases. Its other locations are in Indianapolis, Columbus, Kokomo and Terre Haute. Each
LifeLine team includes a pilot, nurse, and a flight paramedic or respiratory therapist, depending on the needs of the patient
being transported. LifeLine conducts more than 1,500 flights annually.
Indianapolis-based Nyhart Co. has acquired ASAP Flex Plans, a 7-year-old firm that helps
smaller employers administer employee flexible spending accounts, health savings accounts, health reimbursement accounts and
COBRA benefits. ASAP owner John Baird will join Nyhart as a consultant, spearheading a rollout of new flexible spending accounts
by year’s end. ASAP’s 150 clients will be served under the Nyhart name.
Companion Diagnostics Inc. moves from Connecticut to the IU Emerging Technologies Center, hopes to create 30 high-paying jobs
by 2014.
Netherlands-based Synthon Pharmaceuticals is seeking U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval to sell a copy of the medicine.
The organization last year closed 11 business expansion or attraction deals, netting 2,950 new jobs in the process.
This is the wrong time, in my opinion, and I may not have all the facts, to open up Eli Lilly to an outside takeover.
Eli Lilly and Co. discovers, develops, manufactures and sells pharmaceutical products for humans and animals.
Beginning July 1, employees will be able to bring guns to work. A labor lawyer says employers will need to get creative.
Drugmakers and insurers could gain millions of customers under the legislation, but the industry also will pay new fees and
face stricter rules that may shrink profit and fuel mergers.
Sweeping changes phase in slowly for most, but insurers, hospitals, drug companies, employers, workers, medical device makers
and more will eventually feel impact.
Monday’s decision throws out a $65.2 million patent-infringement verdict won by Ariad for royalties on Lilly’s osteoporosis
drug Evista and sepsis medicine Xigris.
You win some, you lose some, and you go to court again. That was the story for Eli Lilly and Co. in the
past week. The Indianapolis-based drugmaker suffered the biggest theft of pharmaceuticals in history when $75 million worth
of drugs were stolen from a Connecticut warehouse. The company expects its insurance to cover the losses. Meanwhile, Lilly
won a court appeal against Massachusetts-based Ariad Pharmaceuticals Inc., according to Bloomberg News. That decision nullified
a $65.2 million verdict won by Ariad for royalties on Lilly’s osteoporosis drug Evista and sepsis medicine Xigris. But
Lilly plunged into a new patent dispute, this time suing the U.S. unit of Dutch drugmaker Synthon BV to prevent it from selling
a generic version Adcirca. The drug, which was approved last year, uses the same active ingredient as Lilly’s anti-impotence
pill Cialis to treat lung problems.
The Fairbanks Institute for Healthy Communities has created a repository in Indianapolis for scientists
to research diseases associated with aging and ideally help develop more effective medicines. The INbank stores biological
samples along with the history and clinical outcome of the corresponding patient.
The Alfred Mann Institute for Biomedical Development in West Lafayette is funding work by two Purdue University
professors that could allow for almost immediate readings on the concentration of a drug in a patient’s blood. The technology,
being developed by Zheng Ouyang, a professor of biomedical engineering, and R. Graham Cooks, an analytical chemistry professor,
could be used in hospitals, doctor's offices or as part of clinical trials. Also, by not sending the blood sample to an
off-site lab, the test could cost far less.
Indianapolis-based Diversity Accords LLC and the Indiana Health Industry Forum have formed
a partnership to help minority-owned suppliers identify and respond to opportunities within the health and life sciences industries.
Members of the Health Industry Forum can receive a discount off Diversity Accords’ monthly association fee. Diversity
Accords has been tapped by such companies as Illinois-based Hospira Inc. and California-based Kaiser-Permanente to meet their
objectives on using minority-owned companies as suppliers.
John Lechleiter, CEO of Eli Lilly and Co., was elected treasurer of the board of PhRMA, the powerful industry
association that represents large pharmaceutical and biotech companies. Lechleiter has been on the board of PhRMA for two
years.
Indianapolis-based Simon Property Group Inc. named former WellPoint Inc. CEO Larry Glasscock to its board
of directors. Glasscock, 61, also serves as a director at Warsaw-based Zimmer Holdings Inc. and Sprint Nextel Corp.
The Indiana Health Industry Forum elected two members to its board of directors: Mark Deuser, CEO of Techshot,
a technology development company based in Greenville, and Todd Vare, an intellectual-property attorney at
the Indianapolis law firm Barnes & Thornburg LLP.
Once the nation’s wealthiest foundation, Indianapolis-based Lilly Endowment now ranks ninth among its grant-making
peers. The endowment’s value fell 15 percent last year, to an estimated $4.8 billion.
Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly and Co. sued rival drugmaker Hospira Inc. to prevent it from selling a generic version of the
cancer drug Gemzar before a patent on the medicine expires in 2013.
Eli Lilly is interested in assets that may be offered for sale as a result of Sanofi-Aventis SA and Merck & Co.’s plan to
combine their veterinary units.
Vonnegut Memorial Library Inc. will move into 1,100 square feet at 340 N. Senate Ave. The Arts Council of Indianapolis will
occupy 5,400 square feet at 922 N. Pennsylvania St.
The site, created by TrendyMinds, is aimed at out-of-town job candidates, who might be unaware of the city’s cultural
and entertainment offerings.
Deal with unit of Massachusetts-based Thermo Fisher Scientific would keep many of the employees working in same
location.
