Assure Holdings Corp.

Please stand by, your program is about to begin. Good day, everyone, and welcome to this shareholding's third quarter 2022 earnings call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, you will have an opportunity to ask questions during the question and answer session. You may register to ask a question by pressing star and one on your touchtone phone. Please note this call may be recorded. It is now my pleasure to turn today's program over to Scott Kozak, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Hello, everyone. Thank you for participating in today's conference call to discuss Assure Holdings financial results for the third quarter 2022. On the call today are Executive Chairman and CEO John Farringer and CFO John Price. After market closed this afternoon, the company issued a press release announcing its results for the third quarter 2022. The release and investor presentation are available on the investor section of our website. Before we begin the prepared remarks, I would like to remind you that some of the statements made will be forward-looking and are made under the Private Securities Divigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those projected or implied due to a variety of factors. We refer you to Assure's recent filings with the SEC, including our quarter report on Form 10-K for the fourth quarter and full year for a more detailed discussion of the risks that could impact the company's future operating results and financial conditions. Also on today's call, management will reference certain non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe provide useful information for investors. For reconciliation of these non-GAAP measures, please consult the most recently filed 8K associated with the filing of the earnings release for the three months ended September 30th, 2022, which is available on the SEC website. Finally, I would like to remind everyone who dialed in to the call by telephone, you may want to join our webcast or download our third quarter 2022 earnings presentation on Assure's investor relations site found at ir.assureneuromonitoring.com in order to see the slides referenced today. This call will be recorded and made available for replay via link and on the company's website. Now, I would like to turn the call over to the Executive Chairman and CEO of Assure Holdings, John Farringer.

John? Thank you, Scott. Hello, everyone, and thanks for joining us today. On slide three in front of you, you'll see the agenda of key topics we'll cover on today's earnings call. I will begin with a review of recent corporate developments and then talk about the Interoperative Neuromonitoring Industry Environment, before transitioning to a discussion on cash receipts. And our CFO, John Price, will go through finance results and discuss accounts receivable trends. I will wrap up with a discussion around fourth quarter 2022 expectations. Assure's third quarter results improved operationally. However, these results were masked by the diminishing effect of accounting basis-related challenges and charges. Overall, Assure is laying the foundation for what we believe will be further improvement in the fourth quarter of 2022. Assure has continued growing our managed case volume and maintained accelerated cash collections during the quarter, underscoring the underlying strength of the business. To support these results, the company utilized market intelligence, and data warehousing analytics we did not previously possess to inform our decision to exit slower-performing markets that were dragging down our average revenue and margin per case. Our go-forward strategy is anchored on achieving the benefit of scale in geographies underpinned by the above-average commercial health insurance reimbursement obtained. These combined actions are expected to lower our 2022 managed cases from 25,000 to a range of 21 to 22,000, while at the same time improving the company's utilization, margin, and profitability. To be clear, Assure was on track to perform 25,000 cases in 2022, but management chose to forego a segment of volume in order to focus on profitable growth and improving margins. And even with the reduced forecast, our managed case volume in full year 2022 is expected to increase between 21 and 26% compared to 2021. In addition, a key focus for Assure in the fourth quarter of 2022 will be on reducing the company's average cost of delivery for providing our services both on the technologist and the remote neurology portions of our business. We've also taken steps to become leaner and more profitable, continuing a strategic cost reduction effort that will yield more than $5 million of annualized savings compared to the first quarter of this year. Assure expects to further reduce cash burn in the fourth quarter of 2022, This reflects our focus on becoming self-sustaining from a cash flow perspective in the near term. Assure reported substantial progress on its accounts receivable reserve, reporting $2.1 million in the third quarter after reporting a combined $14.1 in the first half of this year. In addition, Assure strengthened its financial position and created runway to capitalize on on our most promising growth opportunities by closing an underwritten public offering with net proceeds to the company of approximately $5.8 million. Despite macroeconomic headwinds and a challenging environment for microcap stocks, I'm pleased to report that this financing was completed as a straight-up sale of equity without warrants. Finally, we're also pleased to extend our footprint into the state of New Jersey, which also demonstrates a very strong reimbursement profile. Our blade-secure new business with a surgeon of the stature of Dr. Mark Levine reflects the strong reputation that we have built in the IOM industry, which is really focused on providing outstanding clinical care. On slide five, I will relay an update on the interoperative neuromonitoring industry. The reimbursement environment in the interoperative neuromonitoring industry has shifted significantly. we've begun to see contraction in the technical bill even before the COVID pandemic began. And over the past 12 months, as commercial insurance payors sought to leverage their position ahead of the implementation of the No Surprise Act and the ramping up of federal arbitrations, including the dispute resolution processes intended to help level the playing field between payer and payor, we have seen payors play hardball to try to force the interoperative neuromodeling providers to take unfavorable in-network agreements or accept delayed payment or even non-payment for services. This is particularly felt on the technical bills and the technical portion of our business, which, as a reminder, is compensation for technologists providing interoperative neuromodeling services in the operating room. From Assure's perspective, The amount of AR relating to the technical claims dropped from 18.9 million at December 31st, 2021 to 9.5 million at September 30th of 2022. The value of the AR has dropped because payors have pushed down the associated levels of reimbursement for technical claims. As a result, the Shares moved aggressively to maximize collections on the professional bill, or more specifically compensation for remote neurology services provided by Assure. We're also moving away from the master services agreement or MSA model so that we can keep all collections from the professional bill. We are accelerating this initiative during the fourth quarter. Anticipating this trend, Assure had already been moving in the direction with the launch of our remote neurology business services in the second quarter of 2021. Our focus is leveraging a dedicated platform to provide neurology services to make sure we are able to fix costs and ensure margin. Where this is heading from industry perspective is that interoperative neuromodeling providers with sophisticated revenue cycle management will know with a high degree of certainty what they are going to receive for services provided. The next steps for sure are clear. We are aligning our costs with updated managed case revenue expectations. We're adding scale in favorable markets. We are leveraging state and federal arbitration programs and augmenting and supporting those with data-driven revenue cycle management functions that will lead to, ultimately, signing in network agreements to speed up cash flow and improve participation rates. And lastly, we want to leverage and take advantage of an opportunistic M&A environment in an industry that appears likely to see substantial near-term consolidation. On slide six, you will see assures in total cash collections over a trailing 6, 12, and 24-month period. 100% on Assure Entities, the company is collecting approximately 65% of its cash in the first six months and 85% in the first 12 months. Both of these figures maintain the record rates the company has generated in recent quarters. Importantly, we are collecting what we are accruing on the front end. Assure is driving higher participation rates, shortened cash cycles, and better collections. Accelerating our cash flow reduces our need for working capital and also serves to minimize reserves in the future. Cash collected also supports our accrual rates and supports earnings. The company has built a sophisticated, data-driven revenue cycle management function in-house, and we are collecting rapidly. In contrast, most of our competitors in the neuromodern space, they'll depend on third-party billing providers. The last point I will add on cash receipts is that Assure has far better data and visibility on reimbursement than we had previously. We are leveraging that information to inform and educate ourselves on what markets we should be scaling. States like New Jersey, which we are now entering. And we're also identifying new states and ranking and prioritizing them as we expand in the future. Juris focused on identifying and adding scale where we can achieve the best margin, work with the best payors, and collect reimbursement with the least friction. Further, we expect to see improvement in their operating or monitoring reimbursement rates as the distinct resolution process associated with the No Surprises Act federal legislation that will be effective this year begins to have an impact during the fourth quarter of this year and into 2023. Next, John Price will walk us through the quarterly financials.