Experity Client CRH Healthcare Named to Inc. 5000 List

It all started in 2012 with two business partners and a PowerPoint presentation. Only five years later, CRH Healthcare, which stands for “Consumer Retail Healthcare,” has made the 2017 Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing private companies in the U.S.

CRH Healthcare CEO Bill Miller and CFO Andrea Malik Roe were business partners in a private equity fund before venturing into the urgent care business together. Because of their background in health care investments, they understood the urgent care industry from a macro perspective but wanted to learn about all of the minute details that go into running an urgent care practice. Their strategy was to get demos of the leading EMRs on the market to develop the best urgent care practice workflow. This process led them to Dr. David Stern, founder and CEO of Experity.

Miller and Roe were initially drawn to Experity because it was built by urgent care physicians for urgent care practices. They understood that clinical needs drive the urgent care business and wanted an EMR built with a clinical mindset so it’d be easy for their clinicians to use. However, they also quickly found a helpful industry veteran in Dr. Stern because of his urgent care, revenue cycle management and coding background as well as his willingness to share that expertise. As an example, in those early days, Dr. Stern joined CRH’s provider meetings and offered personalized training on the EMR. A partnership formed, and Experity has advised CRH on a number of fronts since their first acquisition in 2013. CRH initially used Experity’s PiVoT modified EMR in conjunction with the PVM practice management software but now uses Experity’s fully integrated urgent care software.

Today, CRH has 28 urgent care centers in three states – three in Alabama, 18 in Georgia and seven in Florida – providing urgent care, occupational medicine and primary care services. Combined, their clinics see 750-1,000 patients per day depending on the time of year. For more complicated cases, CRH’s Georgia centers have a partnership with Emory Healthcare Network, linking CRH’s urgent care centers to Emory’s EMR to facilitate a more seamless referral experience. As a result of these efforts, CRH achieved a 1,999% growth rate based on revenue from 2013-2016, landing CRH as number 217 in the Inc. 500 list overall, 17 in the health care industry and number one in the urgent care industry.

Although their growth has been exciting, making the Inc. 5000 list wasn’t necessarily on CRH Healthcare’s radar.

“We didn’t set out in the beginning to grow really quickly and get on the Inc. 5000,” says Roe. “It’s certainly nice validation for what we’ve achieved. Normally we’re very ‘heads down’ working on the business, whether it’s trying to improve some process or grow in some way. This [recognition] gives us an opportunity to really thank the team for all of their hard work for making this growth a reality. It’s really a conduit for the rest of team to understand how hard work reaps some rewards.”

Roe credits CRH’s mindset of continuous improvement for the company’s success. She and Miller have built a culture around the five Cs – caring, convenient, courteous, competent and compliant – as well as consistent, repeatable processes. Above all, CRH emphasizes a culture of accountability in which no one ever says “that’s not my job.” In fact, Roe and Miller did almost every non-clinical job when they first started in the business, from negotiating payer contracts to plunging toilets. Leadership’s willingness to get involved on every level has encouraged staff to always look for ways to do things better.

Experity is proud to continue to provide urgent care EMR services to CRH. The relationship between the two companies has come a long way since 2013, with CRH now offering Experity constructive feedback to make their products and services better.

“We’re trying to push PV to be better and vice versa,” says Roe. “The improvements help both parties.”

As CRH Healthcare looks into the future, Roe says they plan to continue laying the foundation to grow, improve and expand.