Food-as-Medicine Update: How SNAP Members Face Greater Chronic Illness and a “Hunger Cliff”
The pandemic worsened food insecurity for many people in the U.S., putting more people at risk for not only hunger but for chronic diseases that can be managed with access to nutritious, fresh food. In Helping SNAP Consumers During Economic Headwinds from Numerator, we get a current read on food security, the SNAP program, and the challenges of chronic health management that are intimately tied. To set some context on this current challenge to peoples’ health, the U.S. is facing the official end of the pandemic emergency on May 11, 2023. At that point, support for government-sponsored programs that have supported
The Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns for 2023 Are About Social, Mental and Behavioral Health
Ten years ago, ECRI named the top 10 health technology hazards for 2013: they were alarm hazards, medication administrative errors using infusion pumps, unnecessary exposure and radiation burns from diagnostic radiology procedures, patient/data mismatches in EHRs and other HIT systems, interoperability failures with medical devices and health IT systems, and five other tech-related hazards. In 2014, ECRI pivoted the title of this annual report to “patient safety concerns,” a nuance away from health technology. Fast forward to 2023 and ECRI’s latest take on the Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns 2023. While technology is embedded in this list, the headlines have more
Growing DTC for Health Beyond the Rx – the New Health/Care at Home
As our homes and health care services continue to converge, we can see signposts of direct-to-consumer strategies from the pillbox (where DTC is a mature thing) to clinical care in peoples’ hands (and on their preferred technology platforms). Some examples this week make this point, which taken together demonstrate the portfolio of ways more people – as health consumers and caregivers – can engage in their health, well-being, and clinical care. Start with Best Buy’s announcement that they will collaborate with the health system Atrium Health to bolster hospital-to-home effectiveness and activation between hospitals
The Patient Is Still the Payor – And May Skip Paying for Prevention (Eyes on the ACA & Texas)
Many health citizens in the U.S. would likely skip receiving preventive health care services if the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) coverage for them goes away, a Morning Consult survey found. The first chart illustrates the top-line of this research: that most U.S. adults would not pay out of pocket for several preventive services including tobacco cessation, drug use screening, weight loss measures to prevent obesity-related illnesses, as well as screening for depression or HIV. One of the key benefits embedded in the ACA was “free” without co-pay shares for preventive care. These
How Consumers and Physicians View Digital Health – An Update from the Consumer Technology Association
Most consumers are bullish on the benefits that digital health technologies can play in their health. Most health care practitioners are also positive about the potential of digital health — recognizing room for improvement for better data integration, interoperability, and the opportunity to bridge gaps to achieve health equity and bolster access. So assesses the Consumer Technology Association in the report, Driving Consumer Adoption of Digital Health Solutions, To paint this profile, CTA engaged Ipsos to poll 1,000 U.S. consumers 18 years and older, 300 health care providers (HCPs), and 12 health tech company stakeholders in August and September 2022.
We Are All Health Consumers Now – Toluna’s Latest Look at Consumers’ Health & Well-Being
The challenging financial climate at the start of 2023 is impacting how people, globally, are perceiving, managing, and spending money on health and well-being, based on the latest (Wave 21) Global Consumer Barometer survey conducted by Toluna, a sister company of Harris Interactive. Globally, one-third of health citizens the world over are confronting greater stress levels due to the higher cost of living in their daily lives. One in two people say that rising cost of living is negatively impacting their health and well-being. On the positive side, one in three people believe
Enabling better health care, everywhere – my conversation with Microsoft
I am grateful to have been given the opportunity to brainstorm omnichannel health care for people to enable better health care for all, anywhere and everywhere, with Team Microsoft. Key opinion leader Molly McCarthy and I covered a lot of ground in this webcast conversation as part of Microsoft’s series of three “Expert perspectives on trends driving change in healthcare.” Molly and I covered a lot of ground here, starting with the key forces shaping and accelerating virtual care across the continuum. While these were in place before the COVID-19 pandemic, the public health
People Using Health Apps and Wearable Tech Most Likely Track Exercise and Heart Rate, Sleep and Weight – But Cost Is Still A Barrier
Over one in three U.S. consumers use a health app or wearable technology device to track some aspect of their health. “The public’s use of health apps and wearables has increased in recent years but digital health still has room to grow,” a new poll from Morning Consult asserts, published today. Among digital health tech users, most check into them at least once every day in the past month. One in four use these tech’s multiple times a day, the first pie chart illustrates. Eighteen percent of people use their digital
The American Hospital Association Looks at Retail and Tech Health Care Disruptors
Ever since Clayton Christensen explained the concept of disruptive innovation in 1995, health care became one of the poster children emblematic of an industry ripe for disruption. Nearly 30 years later, disrupting health care continues to be a theme which, in 2023, seems open for those slow-moving tectonic driving forces to finally re-form and re-imagine health care delivery. So in today’s Health Populi we turn to a new report, Health Care Disruption 2023 Outlook, part of AHA’s “The Buzz” market scan initiative. The American Hospital Association is taking disruption seriously right here, right now, as the U.S. hospital sector is
The Future of Love and How It Could Shape Health, Well-Being, and Daily Living
“The future of love is bound to the institutions that have historically shaped and defined it,” Ipsos’s What the Future: Love report begins. Consider: religion, government, financial institutions….and the health care ecosystem, as well. On this Valentine’s Day 14th February 2023, it is a good time to consider this convergence as health politics, financial well-being, and emerging technologies will be re-shaping institutions and consumers in the coming months and near-term. The Ipsos researchers have been assessing the future of many aspects of our lives over the past couple of years, such as the future of wellness,
Bayer at The Big Game LVII: the Heart Health Ecosystem is Ripe for Self-Care and DIY Health at Home
Joke if you must about Big Game cuisine being typically packed with calories and fat and carbs….and as such, not-so-great for health. For me, the ads are the attraction during The Big Game (along with the Philadelphia Eagles). In this year’s ad line-up, health will be featured in high-priced spots as it has for the past few years. Last year, I was intrigued by a female-focused 30-second spot from Hologic, educating viewers on cervical cancer, discussed here in Health Populi. This year, my eyes are on Bayer Aspirin’s campaign “encouraging sports fans to keep their heart
The Reputation of Pharma Among U.S. Consumers Is Tied More to Pricing Than to Innovation
In the U.S., price and the cost of medicines is tied to how people feel about the pharma industry, evidenced in the Global Pharma Study 2023 from Caliber. Caliber, a reputation and corporate strategy consultancy, fielded survey research among over 17,000 health consumers including U.S. adults between 18 and 75 years of age as well as health citizens living in Brazil, China, France, Germany, Japan, and the UK. Caliber assessed the reputation of 16 industries, globally, finding that pharma ranked 10th among the 16, just below automotive and just above chemicals (and well
Wellness in 2023 Is About Connections, Mental Health and Science – Global Wellness Summit’s 2023 Trends
Consumers’ wellness life-flows and demands in 2023 will go well beyond exercise resolutions, eating more greens, and intermittent fasting as a foodstyle. It’s time for us to get the annual update on health consumers from the multi-faceted team who curated the Global Wellness Summit’s annual report on The Future of Wellness 2023 Trends. In this year’s look into wellness for the next few years, we see that health-oriented consumers are seeking solutions for dealing with loneliness and mental health, weight and hydration, travel-as-medicine as health destinations, and — not surprisingly —
Medscape Diagnoses Worsening Burnout and Depression Among U.S. Physicians
In the organization’s annual study into physicians’ wellbeing, Medscape has diagnosed worsening burnout and depression among America’s doctors. Over one-half of U.S. physicians say they are burned out or depressed, the chart from the U.S. Physician Burnout & Depression Report for 2023 calls out. “I cry but not one cares,” is one of the represented color comments provided by one of the physicians included in the survey of 9,175 physicians polled online between June and October 2022. The study covered 29 specialties, finding most burned out physicians worked in emergency medicine (65% saying
The US Healthcare System Outspends and Underperforms While Most People Live Paycheck to Paycheck
The U.S. is an outlier in the world for high health care spending, as well as in low achievement for life expectancy at birth — 3 years less than that in peer OECD countries — discussed in U.S. Health Care from a Global Perspective, 2022: Accelerating Spending, Worsening Outcomes, the latest look into American health system performance in a global context from The Commonwealth Fund. Another study published in JAMA this week talks about the Organization and Performance of US Health Systems, calling out the fact that, “Small quality differentials combined with large price differentials suggests that health systems have
What Are Patients Looking for in a Doctor? It Depends on Who You Ask…and Their Race
While the same proportion of Black and White patients say they are looking for a doctor with empathy and compassion, there are relatively large differences between patients based on their race, found in the Everyday Health-Castle Connolly Physician-Consumer study. The survey was conducted in December 2022 among a group of 1,001 U.S. consumers and 277 Castle Connolly health care professionals. As the first bar chart illustrates “where patients differ, “Black people were nearly twice as likely as white people (41 percent versus 22 percent) to completely agree that they would be more comfortable and
Your Grocery Store as Health/Care Destination: Welcome Kroger to the Clinical Trials Community
Our grocery stores were essential touchpoints for us during the COVID-19 lockdown era and thereafter, addressing our basic needs for food and medicines and even social health from early 2020 and since. Grocery stores have been morphing into health/care destinations for the past decade, in the best cases bolstering nutrition, supporting medication adherence and patient outcomes, and helping us curate healthy grocery carts with nutritionists as part of the store pharmacy team. Now Kroger continues to expand its health/care footprint and capabilities, becoming a clinical trials channel as announced in its January 24th press
Quick, Accessible, Inexpensive Health Care – A Retail Health Update from Amazon and Dollar General
Two announcements this week add important initiatives to patients’ growing choices that speak to their consumer-sides’ sense of value and personal healthcare cost-containment: Amazon launched RxPass, a generic medicines subscription service; and, Dollar General promoted its mobile health service powered by DocGo on demand for health visits, “right outside the store.” These two programs come from outside of the legacy health care system of so-called incumbents — hospitals, health systems, health insurance — leveraging two brand-names beloved to many consumers for convenience, price transparency, and sheer cost. First, check out Amazon Pharmacy’s RxPass. Amazon
Integration is the New Innovation for Healthcare in 2023: Reflections on CES2023 and JPM2023
The peak of venture investment for digital health was in 2020 and 2021, precipitously declining later in 2022. And the outlook for 2023 is practical and Show-Me: that is, demonstrate clinical outcomes and return-on-investment before “I” (for investors) can take a leap of faith to spend a dollar, a Yen, a Euro, or British pound on a shiny new-new healthcare thing. If it’s January, then CES and JP Morgan convene their influential annual meetings which feature health technology for globally engaged health industry stakeholders — investors, surely, but also providers, innovators, analysts, and insurers. In my January
Record Numbers of People in the U.S. Putting Off Medical Care Due to Cost – A New “Pink Tax” on Women?
More people in the U.S. than ever have put off medical care due to cost, according to Gallup’s latest poll of patients in America. Gallup conducted the annual Health and Healthcare poll U.S. adults in November and December 2022. This was the highest level of self-rationing care due to cost the pollster has found since its inaugural study on the topic in 2001. This was also the most dramatic year-on-year increase of postponing treatment due to cost in the study’s history. Note the substantial difference in women avoiding
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Each year, NCQA updates the HEDIS data set - and for 2023, the upgrade focuses on health equity and stratifying the right data for good. In my latest essay for Medecision (February 2023), I explore the new HEDIS upgrade, weaving in an insightful conversation I had with Michael L. Millenson, health care quality and accountability expert, along with great expectations for Techquity at VIVE 2023. Please check into this content which is super-timely in our post-pandemic health care world...
Jane continues to cross the Atlantic every few months to work with health/care stakeholders in the US, the EU and the UK. From mid-April to mid-July, I'll be spending most of the time on the Euro-side of the Pond collaborating with clients across the health/care ecosystem.