healthcare reform

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Worldwide Pricing and Healthcare.

June 11, 2010 in Healthcare Marketing | 0 Comments

I’ve posted before about a concept called worldwide pricing (Google whatstheidea+worldwide pricing),  applauding its emergence.  Basically, thanks to the Internet, worldwide pricing allows anyone with a Web connection to shop the world to find the best prices. Healthcare, because it has been insulated by insurance companies and hasn’t yet supported digital patient records, is one place where shopping for best price has been nonexistent.  That’s changing thanks to companies like Castlight, who just received a second round of funding. 

Have you ever received a bill in the mail from a healthcare provider for a couple hundy saying your actual bill exceeded your overage? Who hasn’t?  Imagine if you could have a read-out of every medical procedure and expense you’ve ever generated over your lifetime — from that first broken bone is 4th grade to your most recent blood test. Imagine also, being able to see next to that expense the nationalized average cost of that service. It would be an interesting exercise. 

Price Variability

Price variability for medical procedures in the U.S. is all over the place. That’s going to change…and it’s a good thing.  Companies like Castlight are seeing to it by employing a little search engine technology and the help from some medical partners like the Cleveland Clinic.  As healthcare reform become more real (thank you voters and gov’t), we will start pairing information technology and healthcare record keeping in a way that will not only help U.S. GDP but improve patient outcomes.  Worldwide pricing is coming to your local doctor. Stay tuned. Peace. 

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Healthcare Reform. The Brand.

February 24, 2010 in Marketing | 0 Comments

The brand planner in me looks at the brand “healthcare reform” and sees everything out of control. No wonder we can’t break through the stasis.   The Dems have not managed the discussion, argument or conversation well.  They have allowed the GOP to obscure the focus on the good: covering more people, more efficiently, with a systematized, measured approach to healthcare improvement.

Smartly, the Republicans have framed the argument in simple terms: healthcare reform = higher taxes and higher debt.  In a time of financial distress, this is an effective strategy. They’ve moved away from “the gov’t shouldn’t be making decisions for doctors” rally, but that was a good ploy. It, with a variety of other shots, added confusion to which the Dems felt a need to respond. President Obama and the Democrats are acting like hockey goalies – fending off shots rather than managing the “healthcare reform” brand.

 

Healthcare Problems

Most every voter would agree healthcare is fouled up. Been to an emergency room lately? Had to call an insurance company to resolve a bill? Noticed all the paper jockeys in the doctor’s office? Know someone paying COBRA? Had to answer 4 page questionnaires at a doc’s office every time you go? (Can you say computer?) Malpractice insurance? Let’s not even go there.

The reality is the Democrats need to manage the healthcare reform brand like a package of cookies. Focus on the positive and put power and focus behind the message. Healthcare reform is about making Americans healthier. It’s easy to demonstrate, discuss, and prove. It just needs to be organized around an idea. Stop playing politics. Stop defending. Start managing the positive (that’s branding.)

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The Future. G.E. G.M. Healthcare.

December 16, 2009 in Marketing | 0 Comments

No dopes G.E.  Jeffrey R. Immelt announced to shareholders Tuesday his strategy to focus on two business sectors: healthcare and energy. By divesting of NBC Entertainment and paring back G.E. Capital, he’s amassing a war chest of $26B for 2010 (I love saying twenty ten) so that G.E. can put some serious Benjamins against Energy 2.0. 

Had Mr. Immelt done this 20 months ago, G.E. would have been in a much better place today but shareholders would have balked and he may have been ousted.  Even if you can see the future, it’s still the future.  The American car industry needed to make a bold move – focusing on more energy efficient gasless cars – 4 years ago but didn’t have the nerve. You just know there were nerds and young engineer types (without vesting) walking the halls of corporate car companies pleading for carbon neutral, low energy cars back then. But the car guys didn’t want to be first to push the plug.  So now we have to wait for the Chevy Volt and when it does arrive, it won’t be available in great numbers. (Mistake.)

The future isn’t going anywhere.  It can be predicted.  Humans and human behavior, short of a mutation or two, are pretty easy to understand. Maslow was right.  What’s holding up healthcare reform right now is capitalism, a touch of greed, and the inability to see the future. It will get done, but there will be bandages along the way.

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