The Dallas-based private equity firm Havencrest Capital Management has its home care platform. That’s Avid Health at Home, which has aggressive growth plans from the outset.
The company was first unveiled in early August. It was created in conjunction with Havencrest’s acquisition of For Papa’s Sake Home Care, which is a personal home care provider in the Chicagoland area.
Avid Health at Home is an example of a platform creation, an increasingly popular way for private equity companies to get into home-based care without significant risk.
Tabbed to lead Avid Health at Home is Havencrest Operating Partner Jennifer Lentz, who will serve as Avid Health at Home’s CEO. Lentz was a longtime veteran of Premier Home Health Care Services, where she worked her way up to COO.
“I just believe home care has got such a tremendous future in U.S. health care delivery,” Lentz told Home Health Care News. “It feels fantastic to be able to lead a team of qualified, amazing individuals that I am starting to get to know really well. I’m excited about the opportunity and really thrilled to continue to take care of our seniors.”
While Havencrest did look at larger companies to acquire as the foundation of the new venture, For Papa’s Home Care ultimately made the most sense given its size and quality, Lentz told Home Health Care News.
“What we found was that it would be harder to go in and really change [things], when it comes to being tech-enabled, when it comes to best practices and policies,” she said. “We weren’t really too excited about some of the things we had looked at. So we opted to pivot and go for the platform, looking for smaller, quality agencies – that really have a unique perspective on the communities that they serve – to bring them up into the larger entity.”
Part of the reasoning behind acquiring a smaller agency at first, and then expanding, is that Lentz and her team did want to build a new type of home care provider.
They want Avid Health at Home to be tech- and data-driven, first and foremost.
“Data transmission from the home being first and foremost,” Lentz said. “We want to be really looking at what’s happening with our clients in their homes, and then be able to leverage that.”
In the future, the company wants to work with home health and hospice providers to help curb readmissions and ED utilization.
Proving its capabilities – for provider and payer partnerships – is front of mind from Day One, Lentz said.
Next, however, is M&A. The company is looking to “aggressively roll up acquisitions.” Those transactions could take place anywhere – but sights are set on the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic and Mountain West regions.
Another consideration is the self-directed or family caregiver model that’s gaining more popularity in the U.S. Lentz sees that as an area that home care providers will have to be proficient in moving forward.
“I think it’s critical for a home care company to consider it as a revenue stream, and as a part of your service delivery model,” she said. “You have to be both, you have to be able to balance out, because people are going to need you whether you have an agency staff member or whether you’re helping to support a family member under the Medicaid program.”
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