Nuance agrees to buy health information management business

By Chris Reidy, Globe Staff

Nuance Communications Inc., a Burlington company known for its Dragon speech recognition software, said Thursday that it has agreed to buy Quantim, the health information management business of QuadraMed, a provider of information technology services to the health care industry.

A Nuance press release did not provide financial details of the proposed transaction with Virginia-based QuadraMed.

Quantim provides hospitals and health care organizations with software and services designed to maximize the productivity of health information management professionals while ensuring appropriate financial reimbursement to the institution, Nuance said.

The integration of Nuance’s clinical language understanding technology with Quantim’s computer-assisted coding expertise will “fuel a more efficient coding workflow and speed related reimbursement,” the release said.

Earlier this month, Nuance announced plans to buy Ditech Networks Inc. of California, which offers such voice technology services as PhoneTag voicemail-to-text services. Nuance said PhoneTag will enhance its voice-to-text business.