An Impending Hanging: Will Health 2.0 Be Compromised By The Economic Downturn?

BRIAN KLEPPER

First published on THCB.

Nothing focuses the mind like an impending hanging. -- Samuel Johnson

I've been preparing for tomorrow's 3rd Health 2.0 conference in San Francisco, where I'll join my pals Matthew, Indu Subaiya, Jane Sarasohn-Kahn and Michael Millenson amid a Who's-Who cast of health industry luminaries. I spent part of Monday reviewing the attendee and sponsor lists, impressive indeed, testament to how seriously this topic is being taken throughout health care.

The meeting is sold out at 950 participants. It's worth remembering that, before the first Health 2.0 conference 13 months ago, Matthew, who with Indu took enormous professional and personal financial risk to pull this off, told me he'd be surprised if 75 people showed up. There were almost 500, many of them with genuine influence.

Health Care and the Broader Economic Crisis

BRIAN KLEPPER

First published on THCB.

I used to worry that the economic turmoil resulting from health care's relentless cost explosion would cascade into all other economic sectors. Now it appears that the credit crisis could push health care over the edge. The silver lining is that a sudden spike in the pressure on health care organizations could facilitate a transition to the meaningful reforms that are necessary to resolve the crisis.

Over at HealthLeaders, Dr. Richard Reece and I have an article, Will Primary Care Be Re-Empowered By An Ailing Economy?, arguing that the turmoil in the larger US economy – and particularly the tightening of credit – is going to significantly enhance the pressures on purchasers and industry players, and grease the wheels of meaningful change throughout health care.

Will Primary Care Be Re-Empowered by an Ailing Economy?

Richard L. Reece, MD, and Brian Klepper, PhD

First published in HealthLeaders Media. 

For some time, we have speculated that America's health system is sliding towards a financial crisis that could spill over into the general economy and bring it down.

The logic goes like this: explosive growth in the cost of healthcare is pricing rank-and-file Americans out of the coverage market and reducing the system's (inflation-adjusted) available revenues. All the while, service demands have continued to increase, creating a mounting resource-demand mismatch.

An Interview with Virginia Mason Health System CEO Gary Kaplan MD, On The VM Production System

Chastened and More Sober, Harry and Louise Return

BRIAN KLEPPER

First published on THCB

A clever new ad sponsored by powerful DC-insider groups features a reformed Harry and Louise, this time hoping that Congress will make the changes that they opposed during the Clinton years. But reform is unlikely unless the nation's most powerful power-brokers - non-health care business - galvanize and mobilize to drive it.

From Description to Action: The Future of Health 2.0 Tools

BRIAN KLEPPER

First published on THCB.

Health 2.0 ventures will rapidly evolve from merely describing biological, clinical and financial processes, to using knowledge and data to recommend action.

Last week, The Health Care Blog ran two articles about new wiki sites that will develop and continuously update medical information. A wiki is a “content collaborative” that allows anyone (or anyone authorized by the site) to contribute or modify content; Wikipedia is the best known example.

Health Systems' Ferocious Challenges

BRIAN KLEPPER

First published on THCB.

 

America's health systems are facing an increasingly hostile marketplace. Keeping our hospitals intact will require changes in how we treat them and how they manage themselves.

Lately, I've had interesting discussions with a thoughtful exec. at a major Western health system about the ferocious challenges facing hospitals and health systems. Her organization's internal conversations at the moment are centered, in part, on what they should do to become "reform ready," not only for policy changes that could be in the wings, but more importantly, for emerging market dynamics that will change the ways hospitals work. She asked me to catalog some of the trends I think health system managers will have to deal with, along with five recommendations for action. Here's some of what I told her.