Categories
healthcare system

Healthcare System: Value and Sustainability

The current healthcare system is unsustainable in terms of affordability, quality, accessibility, and personalization. There are three broad tasks that can improve the current system: expand choice, improve affordability and quality, and speed up the conversion of volume to value. Value is important in any business model (Osterwalder, Pigneur, & Clark, 2010). It’s the “difference between what a customer gets from a product, and what he or she has to give in order to get it” (“What is value?”, 2017). The way a customer perceives value closely resembles Maslow’s hierarchy of needs in that they hold physiological and safety needs at the utmost importance (Almquist, Senior, & Bloch, 2016). Organizations that are focused on their customers and deliver value will succeed in the dynamic, ever-changing healthcare system. Let’s challenge the big systems that say we have a certain disease. Let’s rise up and challenge the diagnoses that we receive. I’m not saying that we should challenge logic. Let’s challenge the response that the current system gives us and respond with a questioning attitude.