Healthcare Disrupted — A Book Review by Philip Edgcumbe
I just finished reading “Healthcare Disrupted — Next Generation Business Models and Strategies” by Jeff Elton and Anne O’Riordan. I recommend the book for anyone that would like a better understanding of how digital transformation is changing the business model of healthcare. Check out my review of the book below.
The authors of Healthcare Disrupted helpfully break down the healthcare business models into four categories of Lean Innovators, Around-the-Patient Innovators, Value Innovators and The New Health Digitals. I found the study of how The New Health Digitals (eg: Apple, Google, etc) are getting into the healthcare space to be particularly fascinating. Another interesting observation in the book is that the lines between payers, providers and manufacturers in healtchare are blurring. Further, companies are offering to sell their devices/medications based on the value they generate for the system (eg: less hospital readmissions). In the final chapter, the authors make some exciting predictions about the future of healthcare. Namely, they predict that in the future the care part of healthcare will occur in the home and the workplace, care will be more preventive, and we will pay for the outcomes of the care provided — not just the procedures. After reading the book, I expect you’ll understand and agree with the predictions that are made. I have two critiques: Fristly, I would have appreciated a more robust argument for why healthcare systems will inevitably transition to a value-based healthcare. I understand that the fee-per-service model and volume based approach of 20th century healthcare seems unsustainable, but why is value-based healthcare the inevitable answer? Secondly, as a physician-in-training I would have appreciated a slightly more detailed discussion about how this new era of Healthcare Disrupted will change the practice of medicine.
This is definitely a business book — so only read this book if the business model of healthcare is something that you are interested in. If you are interested in how your own patient experience is going to change in the new era of healthcare we are entering, I recommend Dr. Eric Topol’s book, The Patient Will See You Now. If you want to understand the underlying business forces that are driving the change that Dr. Topol describes, then read this book!
—
Philip Edgcumbe, PhD
University of British Columbia MD Candidate
BASc (Engineering Physics)
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/philip-edgcumbe/
Twitter: twitter.com/Philip_Edgcumbe
Website: http://www.xprize.org/visioneers/teams/alzheimers-disease
Philip’s Katapult Future Fest Talk: Crowdsourcing Better Healthcare
Philip and Lisa Genova’s Alzheimer’s XPRIZE Presentation: The End of Alzheimer’s
I prize brainspan that matches lifespan. What do you prize?