A blog covering the health/care ecosystem and people.

With non-communicable diseases (NCDs) killing two-third’s of the Earth’s residents — not malaria, HIV or other infectious diseases — the World Health Organization calls lifestyle-borne chronic conditions a “slow-motion catastrophe.” The solution for addressing this global challenge isn’t just about deploying more doctors and medical technology in hospitals and bricks-and-mortar institutions. The real health reform is about infrastructure-independent care and feeding that bolsters peoples’ health where they live, work, play and pray, as characterized by the U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin in the Los Angeles Times on March 13, 2011. Today I’ll be participating on the eHealth track at the J.

Representatives from eight U.S. Federal government agencies, including the FDA and Veterans Administration, among others; health financiers (VCs, angels); health tech start-ups; providers, life science companies, and analysts, attended the Health Care Innovation Day DC sponsored by West Wireless Health Institute on April 28, 2011. The meeting had the tagline, A Discussion with the FDA, setting the stage for a day-long consideration of the role of regulation vis-a-vis health innovation. The $2.5+ trillion question (annual spending on health care in the U.S.) is: can innovation drive making health care “cheaper?” This was the underlying theme of the panel on which I sat

Anyone attending a Health 2.0 or health IT meeting in the past 18 months has (hopefully) been exposed to the force known as  Todd Park, Chief Technology Officer of the Department of Health and Human Services, and his mantra of “Data Liberación.” Data Liberación is the act of freeing data — in this instance, health data — locked within data silos, to be ‘liberated” allowing it to move about so that analysts can learn from it and develop strategies to better manage health for individuals and populations. Now there’s a force advocating for “Social Media Liberación” in Health: health activists, the most engaged patients

If you are a person with heart disease and you have received treatment at the Mayo Clinic, you’re certainly a fortunate health citizen. The hospital was just ranked #2 best hospital in the U.S. by US News & World Report. However, if that’s you and the costs of post-op treatment — namely prescription drugs — are out of your financial reach, then you might skip them; thus, undoing your top-notch acute care. This scenario is discussed in the April 2011 issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings, which describes a study by Mayo researchers among 209 patients with heart failure who were prescribed

As we are in the midst of the Hype Cycle for mHealth, the answer to the question, Health – is there really an app for that? has a loaded answer. This will be evident during the panel on which I’m participating on Sunday 3/13/11, the first full day of health hosted as part of the legendary South by Southwest conference. I am absolutely gob-smacked thrilled to be sharing the stage with John DeSouza, President and CEO of MedHelp; BJ Fogg of the Stanford Persuasive Technology Lab; and, Margie Morris, clinical psychologist and senior researcher at Intel Labs. We’ll be shepherded by Gigi Peterkin of Edelman, who

“Life well shared” is the tagline for Reader’s Digest. The publication began in 1922 and was, until 2009, the #1 best-selling magazine in the U.S. (losing its position to Better Homes and Gardens). How does a magazine that’s over eight decades old stay relevant? More digital offerings appeared in 2010. And, in 2011, Reader’s Digest is collaborating with one of the most well-used and -respected online health social networks, OrganizedWisdom (OW). How did this collaboration come to be? I spent some quality time in February 2011 with Unity Stoakes, co-founder of OW with Steven Krein, in New York City, the geographic HQ of OW.

Remote health monitoring, which enables people to track health and daily living metrics when they are in one place and communicate those measures to another node via some communications platform, is not a new concept. Telehealth, telemedicine, consumer-facing health electronics like USB-ported blood pressure monitors, and some mobile apps can all fall under the broad umbrella of remote health monitoring. There are strong market forces converging to enable health citizens to connect to their providers, institutions, payors, health coaches, caregivers, and each other. Still, a balanced look under the remote health monitoring hood reminds us that old saw taught to me by colleagues

EURO RSCG has polled 1,000 online Americans’ views on romance through the lens of digital media, publishing results in a paper, Love (and Sex) in the Age of Social Media. This ‘digital love’ survey was conducted in January 2011.  [It’s interesting to note that EURO RSCG won the business for the Durex condom line in November 2010.] In its introduction, EURO RSCG suggests that, “the Internet is the most powerful erogenous zone that the world has ever known.” There are five aspects to digital love, based on these findings: 1. Observing love online. As more people do more daily activities online like banking,

February is American Heart Month. The month also features Eating Disorders Awareness Week, Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy Awareness, and National Condom Week. It also feels like mobile health month. I’ll be speaking three times this month at meetings featuring mobile health themes, in very different venues. On February 8, the Health|Tech|Food event will be held at the Paley Center for Media in New York City as part of Social Media Week. I’ll set the stage at the meeting for mobile health, sharing my perspective on the role of social media and mobile health, and how together these can combine to address health

1 in 2 people who use the internet to seek health information do so to self-diagnose; this is highest in China, US, UK, Russia, and Australia. Furthermore, health citizens in emerging economies including India, Russia, China, Brazil, and Mexico, may rely more on online health searches than people in developed countries. In these regions, health seekers face high costs of face-to-face visits with medical professionals. These global findings come out of the report, Online Health: Untangling the Web, from Bupa. Bupa is a health company based in the UK that serves 10 million members in 190 countries, and another 20 million

One in 3 managers in life science companies — including biotech, pharma, medical device and diagnostics firms — have no plans to engage with online social networks, according to a survey conducted by Deloitte. The key reasons for shying away from social networks include lack of guidelines offered by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA), concerns about consumer privacy, and low or uncertain return on investment. On the other hand, 41% of life science execs already use social networks, and another 21% plan to do so. There are many benefits for life science companies in using online social networks, including using them for

Federal Express and Ketchum, the communications firm, have benchmarked best practices in social media and brands and published their findings in Leading Brands and the Modern Social Media Landscape. Interviews with chief communications officers were conducted between August and October 2010. Four key insights were identified in the study for regulated industries, which include health care, financial services, energy, among others: Research the rules regarding disclosure and reporting Manage internal stakeholder expectations and identify internal champions from across the enterprise Establish a business case and ongoing management plan with Legal/Compliance teams In risk-averse cultures, consider focusing social media outreach on a specific

Most caregivers involved with home care services would be inclined to dialogue with other caregivers in an online forum or social networking site, according to a  survey, How the Web and new social media have influenced the home care decision-making process, from Walker Marketing, Inc. Furthermore, 91% of caregivers would be likely to conduct research after receiving a provider referral by a professional source; while 78% would rely on a physician for recommendations, caregivers ultimately make their own decisions on long-term care providers. Websites are generally considered highly credible by caregivers, and are important sources of information for engaged caregivers on sources

At least one-third of American adults use social media for some aspect of health. Most seek health information online, and increasingly via mobile platforms. While many physicians engage in social networks on a peer-to-peer basis in Sermo and Ozmosis, among others, most physicians have avoided social networks where their patients and health citizens interact. The American Medical Association (AMA) released guidelines to help physician members enter the social media fray. There are five areas of recommendations: Protect privacy: using settings to protect personal information and content on social networking sites Monitor internet persona: routinely monitor presence on the internet to ensure that information is accurate

“Freeing health data from silos” and fostering collaboration between patients and providers can save costs and improve health quality for employers who sponsor health benefits. The bottom line: employers can benefit from using social media tools for employee health management, according to a report from Healthcare Performance Management in the Era of “Twitter” from the HPM Institute. As employer health care costs continue to annually escalate in the high single or low double digits, benefits managers have focused on tinkering with health plan design: looking into 2011 health plan strategies, employers are planning to implement Another prescription for dealing with runaway

The oracle (and I use the word here in the classic sense) of health internet statistics, Susannah Fox (@susannahfox on Twitter), along with the Pew Internet & American Life Project and the California HealthCare Foundation, find that 17% of mobile phone users look up health information online — and nearly 1 in 3 young adults 18-29 do so, while between 5-6% of people 50 and seek health information via mobile. The Mobile Health 2010 report tells the story. Beneath these macro statistics are the ones shown in the chart: people who have used cell phones to look up health information, which is a larger base

In a ballroom at the Hilton Union Square in San Francisco on October 6, 2010, several hundred people shared ideas, debated, and painted a multi-faceted picture of the NewPatient: the networked patient. The meeting was convened, in “unconference” style, in conjunction between the Health 2.0 Conference and Gilles Frydman, founding father of ACOR, the Association of Cancer Online Resources. Gilles knows a lot about the NewPatient: he’s organized people focused on cancer for over 15 years through his organization, which has helped tens of thousands of health citizens connect to clinical trials, researchers, information, and each other – all seeking to

The ePatient Connections (ePC) conference convened this week in the City of Brotherly Love, my town, Philadelphia. And indeed, the eHealth love did flow between health citizens and organizations that seek to serve them: technology developers and health providers, alike. My flying fingers recorded nearly fifty pages of notes, and these don’t even include two tracks’ worth of presentations — social networks in health and health games — because I was the emcee for mobile health track. However, this gave me the opportunity to get to know the 11 mHealth presenters and their organizations up-close-and-personal and to brainstorm with track attendees

The fact that physicians access health information digitally is not big news; but, where they’re going online may surprise some health marketers who are shifting educational and promotional resources to online portals.   4 in 5 physicians access health care professional sites, the most visited online sources for physician seeking health information online; these sites get nearly one-half of physicians’ time online, and 1/3 of total visits among all health categories, according to a report from the comScore/ImpactRx Physician Behavioral Measurement database. However, one of the long-standing sources of information for doctors — medical journals — only reaches 30% of physicians, and doctors spend

“If you build it, he will come,” Shoeless Joe whispers to Ray in the baseball class movie, Field of Dreams. Ray then takes a leap of faith, building a baseball field on top of his corn fields there in the middle of Iowa, and miracles happen. Will it take a miracle for people to adopt health apps? A panel, now in the midst of PanelPicking as one of many Interactive sessions for South-by-Southwest 2011 (SXSW), will respond to that question. The panel is called, Health: Is There Really an App for That? Voting ends midnight CDT on Friday, August 27,

A decade ago, I was engaged by a consumer health company to lead a scenario planning exercise on the future of the health consumer. We developed four scenarios, one of which was called something like “MicrosoftMerckGEGenMills.” In that futureworld, several Big Organizations would come together to serve consumers in caring for themselves outside of traditional care settings, like hospitals, doctors’ offices, and nursing homes. The beauty of scenario planning when done well is that, if you’ve done it for a long time, you sometimes get one right. Witness the New Deal between GE and Intel, partnering up to develop solutions

Most consumers give thumbs-up to “fair and balanced” information on risks and benefits delivered in prescription drug ads on TV. But online? Not so much. This finding comes from one of the most highly anticipated surveys in the pharma business, the annual Prevention Magazine consumer survey on direct-to-consumer advertising (DTC). The FDA takes this survey seriously and its results inform FDA approaches to regulation. The 13th annual poll was published on July 15, 2010, titled, Consumer Reaction to DTC Advertising of Prescription Drugs. Most consumers find that “fair balance,” which is FDA required for presenting risks and benefits, is indeed “fair and balanced” on broadcast and in magazines. However,

This week’s issue of Advertising Age magazine dated June 28, 2010, includes cover stories about fast food advertising buoying cable TV revenues, car companies changing ad agencies, the Cannes advertising festival focusing on creativity and ROI, and…hospitals and health reform? Why do hospitals and health reform appear on the cover page of Ad Age? It’s the “new front of medical marketing,” Rich Thomaselli, Ad Age editor, calls it. With upwards of 30 million Americans gaining health insurance coverage under the Patient Protection and Affordability Act (PPACA, or “health reform” broadly writ), hospitals are competing for new business, along with aging baby

The Health 2.0 Conference convened its first meeting in Washington, DC, today, with public sector health leaders and private sector innovators coming together in a Great Big Kumbayah. This conference featured two prominent and key players absent from previous Health 2.0 Conferences: patients on every panel, and the  Federal government punctuating the start, the middle, and the end of the day’s agenda. The over-arching message: Data Liberación! says Todd Park, the DHHS Technology Officer. This follows last week’s launch by DHHS of the Community Health Data Initiative (which Park wants to rename with your help here). [More about the CHDI herefrom Health Populi] 

1 in 2 global health citizens looks first to the Internet for advice to make health decisions; then, they look to doctors. This virtual tie for ‘first place’ in health information that supports health decision making is the New Second Opinion for at least one-half of the population, according to data gleaned through PricewaterhouseCoopers‘s Health Research Institute’s Global Consumer Survey. Traditional media, including print (newspapers and magazines) and broadcast (TV, radio) are go-to health information sources for about 1 in 4 health consumers. Social networking websites were found to be useful health information decision-support sources by 17% (say, nearly 1 in 5 people). Health

While 2 in 3 American adults with no chronic health conditions go online to access health information, only 1 in 2 chronically ill people seek health information online. This irony here is that those who most need access to online information, support and tools don’t use them as much as people who are healthy. “The Internet access gap creates an online health information gap,” say Susannah Fox and Kristen Purcell of the Pew Internet & American Life Project in their landmark report, Chronic Disease and the Internet. It’s not that sicker people aren’t interested in accessing health information; it’s that

The book Connected was recommended by my colleague, intellectual beacon and friend, Susannah Fox of the Pew Internet & American Life Project. In the midst of late nights analyzing health reform scenarios and medical microeconomics, I’ve made the time to read this book in its entirety. It’s been a worthwhile investment. Previously, the authors of Connected, Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler, found evidence on connectedness in health in the areas of obesity, smoking cessation, binge drinking, and other lifestyle behaviors that directly impact good or bad health.  This week, another team of innovative thinkers led by John Caccioppo from the

There’s a groundswell driving social media in health care in America, from Silicon Valley to Boston, Miami to…Omaha? Strategy& (former Booz and Company) and the Center for Health Transformation convened a roundtable discussion in Omaha, Nebraska, in March 2009 following up a discussion the company had in 2008 with stakeholders in diabetes. In that meeting, the opportunities generated by social media in the field of diabetes were explored, with respect to improving peoples’ access to information for health and wellness, as well as how to use social media to influence policy and positive health behaviors. As I pointed out in my

Nearly 1 in 2 women put off seeking health care because the cost was too high. The kinds of services delayed included visits to the doctor, medical procedures, and filling prescription medications. The fourth annual T.A.L.K. Survey was released this week by the National Women’s Health Resource Center (NWHRC), focusing on the declining economy and its impact on women and three dimensions of their health — physical, emotional, and fiscal. 40% of women say that their health has worsened in the past five years due to increasing stress and gaining weight, according to the survey. One of the most interesting

Johnson & Johnson (J&J) has acquired the online health coaching company, HealthMedia. This will move the health supply company up the health care value chain further into the provision of health services. Nine years ago, I teamed with a Big Pharma on a scenario planning exercise about consumers and health care. One of our scenarios told the future-story of the consolidation/integration of information technology, pharma/life sciences, and health services to benefit consumer health. We now meet up with this future-story, and it’s J&J’s to tell.   I’ve written here in Health Populi about Walmart’s move toward pharmacy benefits management and

The key to longevity isn’t about taking vitamins or consuming health care or yogurt…it’s staying connected to family, friends, and world events.   That news comes to us from the third Evercare 100 @ 100 Survey which details ultra-seniors’ views on politics and the good life. Evercare surveyed in-depth 100 centenarians. Collectively, their views challenge stereotypes of the oldest Americans alive today. There are 84,000 of them, according to the U.S. Bureau of the Census. For example, 19% of centenarians use cell phones, 7% email, and 3% online date. Google is a boon to looking for old, lost friends.  

Renenber the hair product ad for Clairol Herbal Essence shampoo that ran in the 1980s where one woman tells another, who tells another, who tells another about the merits of the shampoo? Social media behaved in just this way when women share their personal stories about allergies they developed when wearing the same style of bra. Here’s the post from December 23, 2007, from Catherine145. She says, “I recently bought a Victoria Secret padded demi bra. I am also dieting so when my top began to itch I originally associated it with the fact that everything was shrinking.” She then spoke with

There’s a growing cadre of older people online, and they’re an attractive demographic, according to Focalyst, a joint venture of the AARP and Millward Brown, a market research and branding company. The researchers found that “matures” spend 750,000,000 minutes a day on the Internet (sounds like a song from Rent–the AARP version of 525,600 Minutes). Focalyst calls the group of people age 62 and over “Matures Online.” The Insight Report: April 2008 finds that matures are just as likely to be persuaded by an Internet ad as younger consumers. Is this what Martha would consider a “good thing” or not-so-good?

Older Americans are healthier and more prosperous than previous generations. Furthermore, older people want to adopt technologies that will help them age well in their homes. Two new reports together provide a new look into aging in America. Older Americans 2008: Key Indicators of Well-Being is a wide-reaching data compendium which paints a current profile on aging in America through 38 measures that depict the well-being of older Americans. Measures include demographics, economics, health status, health risks and behaviors, and the cost and use of health services. The Chartbook is well worth reviewing to gain insights into this fast-growing population