We’ve all seen digital innovators disrupt certain industries, such as video and record stores, neighborhood movie theaters, and travel agencies. Photographic film giant Eastman Kodak, which once held his No. 18 spot on the Fortune 500, has been supplanted by digital photography. However, some industries and players are successfully fending off digital competitors and incorporating their innovations into their daily operations.Ann economist The article notes that the average large bank is 138 years old, even though most banking has moved online. Walmart, the world’s largest brick-and-mortar retailer, is also the second-largest online retailer.
While healthcare delivery relies heavily on data, the slow adoption of new technologies makes it easy to jump to the conclusion that we are ripe for digital disruption. Indeed, it is clear that U.S. health care requires significant transformation. The cost is too high, the quality is not what it should be, and when it comes to access, millions of people live hundreds of miles from the nearest hospital or don. I don’t have a family doctor.
But it is likely that tech-savvy new entrants with powerful digital tools and novel business models will displace and disrupt the existing healthcare system with a philosophy of better, faster, cheaper. Does that mean?
They haven’t so far and we don’t expect them to. Despite some Big Tech moves, such as niche entry by app-based therapists and online Viagra sellers, and Amazon’s move into primary care with its acquisition of One Medical, the U.S. health care system We predict that the provision of all types of medical care will be largely maintained. Massive care.
However, this does not mean that healthcare systems can ignore digital advances. To remain financially viable and grow in an era when more demands are placed on the people we care for, we need to use the methods used by successful incumbents in industries such as banking. strategy should be followed. That means leveraging our historical strengths, while adopting new technologies and changing our business models to make the most of these innovations.
current superpower
When we hear patients complain (usually understandably) about a particular experience, it’s easy to assume that healthcare delivery is ripe for disruption. But in reality, many factors stand in the way of new players and new models. They include:
Fragmentation and complexity
There are many interdependent players in the industry, and their relationships can be complex and difficult to understand. Patients receive services, but in most cases they do not pay. Employers pay for services but do not receive them. Physicians can be both suppliers and customers, depending on whether they are employed by a hospital or refer patients to a hospital from an independent practice. Throw in payers, regulators, suppliers, support services such as billing and IT, and it is the rare new entrant who can even navigate this entrenched relationship, let alone significantly change it.
ambiguous business model
Healthcare delivery occupies a gray area: part commercial industry, part philanthropy. He says only one in four community hospitals are for-profit. Nonprofit hospitals need to make a profit to sustain operations, but they often rely on research, community health improvement initiatives, free medical care, etc. to justify property tax exemptions to stay in the black. There is also a need to provide sufficient social benefits. This ambiguity is a natural fit with the profit machine aspirations of technology innovators.
Loyalty to local brands
Many health systems have strong local brands that date back decades or even centuries. (Philadelphia’s Pennsylvania Hospital, which still operates today, was co-founded by Benjamin Franklin in 1751.) Hospitals are also often the area’s largest employers. Trying to separate patients from trusted local health care providers may be more trouble than it’s worth.
time
It takes years to prove the effectiveness of innovations in medical practice to medical boards and professional societies that determine standards of care. Some digital innovations, such as teaching AI to read radiology images, require clinical trials and approval from regulatory authorities such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). And once the innovation is proven, insurers must agree to pay for it.
Digital innovators steeped in concepts such as “first mover advantage” and “fail fast” feel trapped in quicksand, but this “slow pace” of change is well understood, for better or worse. It is accepted by most medical systems. . While this long approval process and medical fragmentation slows the pace of innovation, it also means that health systems have more time (though not infinite time) to transform themselves.
transformative experience
While the industry may seem boring and stereotyped, healthcare providers need to regularly reinvent themselves, with changes in reimbursement, the need to implement electronic health records, and the coronavirus pandemic. Infectious disease pandemics and the need to expand beyond medicine to address the social determinants of health (food access, healthy environments, public safety). They may be good at transforming themselves, but they are not new to this challenge.
how to succeed
These factors allow health systems to fend off digital insurgents from outside the industry. However, many people face an uncertain future if they refuse to change themselves. We need to reduce the cost of care, improve quality, and expand access. Otherwise, it will eventually collapse and lose its status.
The resources, insights, and technology of digital innovators can help avert these disasters. Existing health systems need new technologies and new business models to solve their most vexing problems, such as high operating costs, staff shortages, poor communications, and data deficiencies.
Technological innovators need existing health systems to scale innovation, grow markets, and leverage health system data and investments in equipment and physical plants. We also need the support of national health care leaders to drive the adoption of new approaches to care delivery.
Strategies that help health system incumbents succeed can be a win-win for both parties. Below are some approaches health systems use to leverage the strengths and capabilities of digital insurgents.
technology partnership
Some health systems have extensive and deep technology partnerships with electronic health records companies and “tech giants” such as Apple, Google, Microsoft, and Amazon. Far beyond the typical IT vendor-client relationship, these have given rise to potentially revolutionary new applications of AI, big data, and remote patient monitoring. In 2019, Mayo Clinic and Google announced a 10-year strategic partnership that leverages Google’s cloud services and technology skills and Mayo Clinic’s care delivery and medical research capabilities.
Providence St. Joseph Health’s partnership with Microsoft uses AI to help clinicians manage messages from patients, allowing them to “dictate” and summarize discussions during patient visits. It focuses on reducing the administrative burden on clinicians.
Digital Health Innovation Program
Health systems can invest in digital health companies and develop their own digital innovators, and several companies, including Providence, Boston Children’s Hospital, Massachusetts General Brigham, Intermountain Health, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, and Cleveland Clinic, are doing just that. That’s what we’re doing. Start-ups can gain funding, management support, clinical expertise for the system, and testbed facilities. Health systems will be the first to understand this technology and could influence its direction.
For example, Providence has invested in 26 digital health companies and incubated several companies in areas such as consumer engagement (Praia Health), digital discovery and access optimization (DexCare), and non-pharmaceutical digital prescribing (Xealth). I am. Cedars Sinai has successfully spun off innovations in medical products ranging from cardiology to imaging to organ transplantation with clinical decision support companies like Zynx and Stanson.
Partnership with digital infrastructure
Chain retailers such as Walmart, Walgreens, and CVS are making inroads into the simpler aspects of the health care sector, including drop-in clinics that provide a core of inexpensive services such as vaccinations, workplace and school health screenings, and urgent care. Meanwhile, the health care system has been watching with alarm. Although these clinics are convenient for patients, they also have serious drawbacks. The already fragmented and siled patterns of care in the United States are becoming even more fragmented. Doctors do not know which vaccines their patients have already received or which vaccines they need. If a CVS physical exam reveals a problem, it is the patient’s responsibility to decide where and how to seek more elaborate care.
The solution is digital. Partnerships between health systems and large chain retailers using a common information sharing platform can provide continuity of information for each patient. Retailers can attract foot traffic with basic services, health systems can receive referrals for advanced diagnostics and treatments, and patients can rely on all health care providers to have the information they need for appropriate treatment. Masu. Examples of partnerships include those between Walmart and Orlando Health and CVS and MedStar Health.
consortium
Health systems are working together to form consortia and collaborate with digital startups to develop and implement new applications. Aegis Ventures recently announced a consortium of health systems working to develop and implement new digital health products. Health Assurance (launched by General Catalyst) works with a network of healthcare systems to help guide and implement their digital health technologies provided by his portfolio companies. Truveta is a group of health systems that pools combined electronic health record data to support clinical research and develop large-scale language models for healthcare.
. . .
At their best, health care providers are very good at caring. Tech companies are really good at technology. The two need each other to blend into what is sometimes called “phygital” care – the fusion of the physical and the digital. These partnerships are necessary for healthcare providers to meet challenges and deliver the care patients want. Technology companies need these partnerships to grow and succeed.
Healthcare delivery systems and technology companies work together to preserve what works and disrupt what doesn’t to improve quality, expand access, reduce costs, and be better for everyone. can transform healthcare delivery systems.
