Refresh Mental Health Scaled to 300+ Locations. PIMSY Kept Up.
Refresh Mental Health grew from 9 organizations to 300+ locations across 37 states in four years. PIMSY was the EHR underneath that expansion.
We needed an EHR partner that was scalable, cost-effective, and flexible. Something else that set PIMSY apart was their dedication to our success early on. Their role in our successful nationwide expansion highlights the power of a strategic partnership.
Steve Gold, Founder and former CEORefresh Mental Health
Challenge
When Refresh launched in 2018, every acquisition arrived with its own EHR, workflows, and billing setup. Standardizing that across 37 states, different service lines, and different payers was more than most systems could handle, and some months they needed to bring on as many as six practices at once.
Solution
Refresh chose PIMSY after a competitive review, including a look at how fast Comprehensive MedPsych Systems had gone live. PIMSY built one Refresh instance each new brand could join, with custom reporting, a billing matrix for multi-state payers, clinical templates for outpatient through IOP and PHP, and an API that connected Tableau, ADP, and FHIR/HIE systems.
Results
Over four years, users on PIMSY grew 453.5%, services performed grew 431.7%, and clients served grew 236.8%. PIMSY onboarded 60+ brands without a fresh build for each one. In 2022, Optum acquired Refresh.
A parent company, not a single clinic
Steve Gold was not building one practice. Refresh acquired established local behavioral health brands and ran them as a parent company, so clinical partners could stay on care while Refresh handled billing, payroll, reporting, and compliance.
The EHR problem showed up immediately. Each brand came in with its own documentation habits and payer setup. Outpatient therapy, IOP, PHP, substance use treatment, eating disorders, medication management, TMS, and neurofeedback all had to live in the same system, without forcing every brand into one rigid mold.
Most EHRs stall on that kind of mix. They need a custom build for every new market, or they slow the acquisition calendar down. Refresh’s calendar did not slow down. Some months, six practices had to go live.
One instance every acquisition could join
The CMPS go-live mattered in the evaluation. That 146-person practice spanned two states and more than one time zone, and PIMSY had brought them up in record time.
PIMSY then stood up a standardized Refresh instance. Custom reporting gave the corporate team a live view across locations. The billing matrix covered multiple payers, state rules, and contract structures without a new build for each market.
On the clinical side, the note builder and a shared treatment plan library kept documentation consistent from brand to brand. IOP and PHP automation covered group notes. ePrescription, with EPCS and PDMP, kept medication management compliant in each new state.
The API connected the rest of the stack: Tableau for analytics, ADP for payroll, and FHIR/HIE systems as interoperability needs grew. WhiteGlove onboarding and on-site Go Live support got each location live without pulling clinicians off patients.
PIMSY improved the user and clinicians’ experience, productivity, and KPIs and built out a universal API to partner with existing software.
Kristen Scheel, COO, Refresh Mental Health
The expansion held
Refresh started with 9 behavioral health organizations. Four years later it was 300+ locations in 37 states and 60+ brands, with up to six acquisitions in a single month. Administrative cost stayed down because a new practice plugged into a system that already worked.
Claims paid grew 46.5% over that same stretch. In 2022 Optum acquired Refresh and pointed to operational efficiency as part of why. The EHR was a real piece of that.
| Measure | Change |
|---|---|
| Locations | 9 organizations to 300+ across 37 states |
| Brands onboarded | 60+ |
| End users | Up 453.5%, to 4,000+ |
| Services performed | Up 431.7% |
| Clients served | Up 236.8% |
| Claims paid | Up 46.5% |
Ready to scale your practice?
Growing a behavioral health organization is complicated enough without your EHR slowing you down. Whether you’re adding a second location or building toward something larger, PIMSY scales with you.
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