HealthStream strengthens home health offerings

HealthStream today announced a deal to expand its home health and hospice courseware offerings. The Nashville health care learning and research firm has formed a partnership with The Corridor Group Inc. to provide the Kansas-based company’s coursework on its HealthStream Learning Center platform. The Corridor Group’s offerings include a home health library of 19 online courses with 27 continuing education credits and a hospice library of 16 online courses and 18 continuing education credits. The agreement strengthens HealthStream’s offerings in the home health and hospice verticals, where the company already offers some basic regulatory courseware and CMS-required patient satisfaction surveys. HealthStream CEO Bobby Frist told NashvillePost.com in August the company was looking to grow through expansion in vertical markets like home health and hospice. The company's stock (Ticker: HSTM) recently hit a 10-year high and has continued to climb. Shares were exchanging hands at $5.23 per share Wednesday morning.

Sticktoitiveness

Our lead business story in this week's City Paper takes a look at how Bobby Frist and his team at HealthStream have persevered in the 10 years since the online health education provider went public just as the dot-com bubble was popping. And while the company's shares (Ticker: HSTM) are still well below their IPO price — courtesy of a sickening post-IPO slide from $9 to $1 — they have handily beaten the Nasdaq over just about every other time frame since then.

Health care reform's trickle down effect

"Reform seems to be good for hospitals, and what's good for our customers we think is probably good for us." That was HealthStream CEO Bobby Frist Jr.'s response to the health care industry's question du jour — how will health care reform impact your business — on his company's first quarter earnings call this morning. The health care learning and research business grew revenue by 9 percent in Q1, and Frist said the company's top line could continue to grow as hospitals feel the impact of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The idea is, if hospital patient volumes increase, they may add more staff, and that could mean more subscribers to HealthStream's products. The company's stock (Ticker: HSTM) was trading slightly higher Tuesday morning.