A blog covering the health/care ecosystem and people.

To get to be 100 years or older requires exercise, social connectedness, and good sleep, according to a majority of centennarians polled in UnitedHealthcare’s 100@100 Survey, 2012 Report of Findings. The key findings of this fascinating survey are that: Centenarians have better eating and sleeping habits than Boomers. One-half of centenarians regularly exercise. The most common forms of exercise are walking or hiking, muscle strengthening, gardening, indoor cardio exercise, exercise classes, and yoga/Tai Chi or other mind/body/spirit forms. Social networks bolster health, with most old-old people communicating with family or friends nearly every day And, laughter is a vitamin, with most

There’s a long-held belief among us long-time health industry analysts that Americans spend more time shopping around for cars and washing machines than for health plans and doctors. Consumer Reports is betting that’s going to change, now that Consumers Union has decided to lend its valuable, trusted brand to developing report cards on physicians, having already rated hospitals and heart surgeons. CR will call their version of the doctor’s report card Patient Experience Ratings. CR has first entered the competitive medical market of Massachusetts, and has unveiled reports on 500 primary care physicians in the state. CR worked with  physician survey

On May 23, 2012, Pfizer announced its teaming with EatingWell magazine to launch a mobile app for patients on Lipitor. Eight days later, on May 31, 2012, generic versions of Lipitor will hit the market. Lipitor is the best-selling drug in pharmaceutical history, to-date. Sales of the product top $125 billion. While generic atorvastatin has been available in the U.S. since November 2011 from two manufacturers, low prices for the generic will drop to $10 or less for a month’s supply at the end of May. This is Pfizer’s first foray into a prescription drug-affiliated app. The free mHealth app,

“Knowing they may need to return at some later time, patients felt they were vulnerable and dependent on the good will of their physicians. Thus, deference to authority instead of genuine partnership appeared to be the participants’ mode of working,” asserts a study into physician-patient relationships published this week in Health Affairs. The study’s title captures the top-line research finding Authoritarian Physicians and Patients’ Fear of Being Labeled ‘Difficult’ Among Key Obstacles To Shared Decision Making.  Researchers at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation Research Institute analyzed data on patients participating in focus grooups, from the age of forty and over, from

Nearly 1 in 2 U.S. adults now uses social media in health, according to Manhattan Research’s latest look into Cybercitizens, fielded in Q311. That 45% of U.S. health consumers use social media in health is a significantly higher percentage than recent studies fielded by PwC and Deloitte, which have found about 1 in 3 consumers using social media for health. Manhattan Research defines social media use in health as having created or consumed health-related user-generated content on blogs, social networks, health ratings websites, online health communities and message boards, or patient testimonials. Key findings are that, 14% of health-social media folks are

One in 3 Americans uses social media for health discussions. Health is increasingly social, and PwC has published the latest data on the phenomenon in their report, Social media ‘likes’ healthcare: from marketing to social business, published this week. PwC polled 1,060 U.S. adults in February 2012 to learn their social media habits tied to health. Among all health consumers, the most common use of social media in health is to access health-related consumer reviews of medications or treatments, hospitals, providers, and insurance plans, as shown in the graph. Social media enables people to be better health “consumers” by giving them peers’

Employers expect total health costs to reach $11,664 per active employee this year, over $700 more than in 2011. Employees’ share of that will be nearly $3,000, the highest contribution by workers in history. In 2012, workers are contributing 34% more to health costs than they did 5 years ago. The metric is that for every $1,000 employers will spend on health care in 2012, workers will pay $344 for premium and out-of-pocket costs. Still, health care cost increases are expected to level off to about 6% in 2012, that’s still twice as great as general consumer price inflation. with

While the vast majority of people find value in electronic health records (EHRs) — both those whose doctors currently use them and those patients whose personal health information still resides in paper-based systems — most remain concerned about their patient rights, privacy and security of that data.  Making IT Meaningful: How Consumers Value and Trust Health IT, a report based on a survey from the National Partnership for Women & Families (NPWF) published in February 2012, weaves the story of an American public, keen to have their PHI digitized, but deeply concerned about their rights to access and protect that

comScore has issued its annual report on the state of the American digital consumer in U.S. Digital Future in Focus 2012 and the topline is that mobile and Facebook are redefining communication in both the digital and physical worlds. This disruptive phenomenon has transformational implications for health and health care. comScore’s macro observations are that: – Social networking, and especially Facebook, is capturing a growing proportion of online users’ time, thus redefining how brands and organizations must interact with customers offline and on-. – Google remains the search leader but Bing has grown, surpassing Yahoo! as #2 in 2011. –

She’s likely to be female, Facebooking, smartphoning, and digitally shopping. She’s the Connected Consumer, and she’s a lot older than you might expect: on average, 40 years of age, and with a mean household income of $63,000. And Connected she is: in addition to having a PC or laptop computer, 43% have a smartphone, and 16%, a tablet. Meet the Connected Consumer is a report from Zmags, a digital design company. Zmags surveyed 1,500 U.S. adults in November 2012 who owned a tablet, a smartphone and/or a computer, asking people their views on shopping, apps and the digital lifestyle. Connected

Cue up the song “Hey Big Spender” from the Broadway hit, Sweet Charity, when you read the January 2012 AHRQ report with the long-winded title, The Concentration and Persistence in the Level of Health Expenditures over Time: Estimates for the U.S. Population, 2008-2009.” The report’s headline is that 1% of the U.S. population consumed 20% of all health costs spent in the U.S. in 2008 and 2009, illustrated by the chart. These Big Health Spenders tend to be in poor or fair health, older, female, non-Hispanic whites and people with only publicly-provided health insurance. Their mean expenditure was $90,061. The top 10%

People enrolled in consumer-directed health plans (CDHPs) are more likely than enrollees in traditional health insurance products to be cost-conscious. In particular, CDHP members check prices before they receive health care services, ask for generic drugs versus branded Rx’s, talk to doctors about treatment options and their costs, and use online cost-tracking tools. Furthermore, CDHP members are also more likely to use wellness programs offered by their employers, and are offered “carrots” to participate in them in the forms of financial rewards and other incentives, as well as reduced health care insurance premiums. The 7th annual Employee Benefits Research Institute

This week’s mHealth Summit in Washington, DC, features scores of presentations, posters, and corporate announcements demonstrating the typical chaos of emerging technology markets: the Big Question at this stage on S-curves for new tech is always, “what’s the timing of the pace of change,” or for you mathematically-inclined readers, “what’s the slope of the mHealth adoption curve?” Before we address that question, let’s be transparent about the fact that there are several definitions of just what ‘mHealth’ is: purists may conceive it as covering only those health tools and applications that ‘go’ mobile–that is, that are deployed via mobile phones and

More people with higher levels of concern about their health feel they are in good health, see their doctors regularly for check-ups, take prescription meds “exactly” as instructed, feel they eat right, and prefer lifestyle changes over using medicines. And 40% of these highly-health-concerned people have also used a health technology in the past year. At the other end of the spectrum are people with low levels of health concern: few see the doctor regularly for check-ups, less than one-half take their meds as prescribed by their doctors, only 31% feel they eat right, and only 36% feel they’re in

“56 million U.S. Consumers Access Medical Information from Electronic Health Records,” asserted Manhattan Research’s press release of October 12, 2011. This statistic, fresh out of the firm’s 2011 Cybercitizen Health survey, is among several stunning numbers that demonstrate a growing trend: U.S. health citizens’ embrace of their personal health information in digital formats, via electronic channels. To kick the tires on the survey a bit, I spent time on the phone with the “3 M’s” of Manhattan Research — Meredith Ressi, President; Monique Levy, VP of Research; and, Maureen Malloy, Senior Healthcare Analyst who can recite the survey data backwards and forwards. Together,

Health professionals are go-to sources for medical diagnoses, information about prescription drugs and alternative treatments, and recommendations for doctors and hospitals. On the other hand, health information seekers turn to fellow patients, friends and family for emotional support in dealing with health issues, and quick remedies for everyday issues. And increasingly, those health information searches are going mobile, with 17% of U.S. adults having ever used their cell phone to look up health or medical information. This proportion nearly doubles for 18-29 year olds, and is also higher for wealthier people, Latino’s, college graduates, and urbanites. 1 in 10 people with a

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.

Differences in race, ethnicity and income drive online health disparities, according to a poll from The Washington Post/Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF)/Harvard University Race and Recession Survey, based on data from early 2011. The underlying issue here is the online digital divide, which still persists for African Americans and Hispanics of lower socioeconomic status. Overall, 84% of U.S. adults use the Internet or email at least occasionally. However, only 69% of African Americans and 64% of Hispanics with less than $40,000 annual income use the Internet or email. However, income flattens Internet/email use: for people who earn over $40K a year, 95% of whites, 94% of African

There’s cameraphone hacking that morphs the phone into a blood test device. Embrace Labs in India builds an incubator for $25. Micro- mobile payments are financing health care on the ground in emerging economies.   At SXSW in Austin, TX, on March 12, 2011, a globally experienced quartet of panelists shared their observations of working with highly constrained budgets in developing countries during the session, Mobile Health in Africa: What Can We Learn? The answer is: plenty. Doug Naegele of Infield Health moderated the panel, which included Patricia Mechael of the Center for Global Health and Economic Development at the Earth Institute, part of Columbia University; Josh

“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.

With mobile health (“mhealth,” for short) at the top of the Gartner Hype Cycle, and the annual HIMSS meeting gearing up for next week’s countless announcements about mHealth solutions for health providers and patients, how can someone get a true read on the intersection of mobile and health? What’s practical, what’s real, and where are ‘we’ in mobile health in February 2011? If you can’t be in the room with me on the morning of Thursday 17 February 2011 in the small group meeting at unNiched in New York City, let me share with you one lesson learned just last week at the

We technology market data junkies look to several thought leaders throughout the year for updates on their forecasts: one of these, for me, is Mary Meeker. Now with KPCB (who some of you know as Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Myers, the Silicon Valley venture capital company), Meeker has surveyed the morphing field of mobile and finalized her snapshot in Top Mobile Internet Trends, along with her colleague Matt Murphy.  Meeker’s Top 10 (drum roll, please) are that: 1. Mobile platforms have reached c4itical mass 2. Mobile is global 3. Social networking is accelerating growth of mobile 4. Time shifting is driving mobile use

I’m talking today at the 2011 Annual PPO Forum held by the American Association of Preferred Provider Organizations (AAPPO) on the track called, “Technology Changing the Face of Health Care: What Does 21st Century Care Look Like?” It looks like consumers connecting for health, which is the topic of my discussion. People already DIY-many aspects of daily living online, from financial management through Schwab and eTrade online to buying travel via Priceline and shopping for shoes on Zappos. A growing number of health citizens are engaging with health online — way past the tipping point for health search online, as Susannah

Bet on it, live from Las Vegas at this week’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES): the new home health hub is digital, mobile and personal. More consumers are morphing TV and video watching from the “set” to the computer and mobile platforms, and DIYing more activities of daily living. Health (for both wellness and sickness care) is transforming in this process. This transformation is enabled through consumers’ adoption of technologies that they’re using in their daily lives for entertainment, household management, and communications. Broadband and wireless provide the infrastructure for health care to move beyond the doctor’s office and the hospital, so engaged patients who choose to do

It’s year-end, so the forecasts abound whether we’re talking about trends in technologies, products and services. Gartner says cloud and mobile computing are hot, but managing customer expectations will require heavy lifting  On the food front, Epicurious predicts that food halls will be all the rage (think Harrods in London or Takashimaya in Tokyo), Korean cuisine in demand, and sweet potatoes crowned the vegetable of 2011. For colors, Pantone is Queen and they see that honeysuckle (a salmon-pink) is the new black. In health technology, there’s no better list to read than CSC’s The Future of Healthcare: It’s Health, Then Care, which offers up top 10 technologies

I posted here yesterday on Practice Fusion‘s survey on consumers’ views of remote health monitoring, discussing a key finding that older Americans are less keen on the idea than younger people. The company sent me more detailed survey data which I’ve dug into, and discovered a counter-intuitive finding worth exploring: “Influential” people appear less interested in remote health monitoring than the mainstream American. Who are these “Influentials?” GfK Roper, who conducted the study on behalf of Practice Fusion, bases this consumer segment on an index built on political and social activities engaged in over the past year: writing a letter to

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

6 in 10 U.S. households connected to the Internet via broadband in 2009, rising from 9% in 2001. In the U.S., the gap in the adoption of broadband between lower-income households and higher-income people is 33% — 61% of people with $25,000 to $50,000 household income connect to the Internet at home via broadband; that proportion is 94% for households with over $100,000 a year. Adoption gaps in broadband persist in the U.S. based on income, urban/rural location, race, education, and level of disability. Differences in socio-economic and geographic characteristics explain much of the broadband adoption gap associated with disability

Sex, drugs, rock and roll, Victoria’s secret bras manufactured with formaldehyde, motivating kids to move about more, and texting potential sex partners your latest STD test results: the 2010 Health 2.0 Conference in San Francisco was more about real, whole health and the person-patient than about cool new tech. Furthermore, the Health 2.0 Conference turned a lot of preconceptions on their head on October 7 and 8, 2010, in a standing-room–only ballroom at the Hilton Union Square. Who could have predicted that government employees would light the room up with high energy and innovative thinking more than a panel of illustrious

Most patients and doctors alike are currently using some type of online tool in the “understanding, management, and guidance” of health care, according to a survey from IMI Healthcare – Voice of the Market. Virtually all physicians, and 73% of patients, are using some kind of online health tool. Based on the IMI Healthcare survey methodology, these tools include health content sites, used by 57% of patients and 77% of doctors  (e.g., WebMD, mayoclinic.com); general search sites (e.g., Wikipedia), used by 48% of patients and 68% of doctors; health association sites (e.g., American Heart Association), used by 19% of patients and

40% of U.S. consumers are willing to pay for remote health monitoring devices and services that would send their medical data to doctors, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Healthcare Unwired (PwC). 51% of consumers would not buy mobile health technology. The uses of mobile health most attractive to consumers are monitoring fitness and welling (cited by 20% of consumers), physician monitoring of health conditions (for 18% of people), and monitoring a previous condition (for 11%). 88% of physicians would like to see patients monitoring various parameters at home, their highest priorities being weight (65%), blood sugar (61%), vital signs like blood pressure (57%),

“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,

People trust the Internet “cloud” to manage many parts of their personal information, especially photos, e-mail correspondence, contacts, and videos. But personal health and financial information? Not so much. The chart illustrates that only 1 in 5 global citizens use the cloud to manage personal health information. KPMG‘s report, Consumers & Convergence IV,  highlights peoples’ feelings about privacy and security of their personal information, from vacation pictures to 401(k) statements. The verdict: most people trust of the cloud to store and share most kinds of their information except for their medical and financial information. Two-thirds of people globally use cloud computing applications,

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,

Most health consumers define the value of drugs in terms of safety and efficacy first, then quality of life and cost second. These priorities are similarly shared by both biopharma executives and managed care management. Where consumers diverge with the two health industry stakeholders, though, is with respect to their power: while about 1 in 3 biopharma and managed care execs believe that patients will be influential in the success or failure of new therapies over the next five years, only 11% of patients say that “people like me” will be influential over what new drugs will be available in the

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

Without trust, health consumers won’t engage with organizations who want to cure them, sell to them, promote to them, help them. Here’s what I told a group of  pharmaceutical marketers at The DTC Annual Conference in Washington , DC, on April 9, 2010. Let’s start with the World Health Organization’s definition of health: that is, the state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing, and not just the absence of disease. This definition is being embraced by health citizens long before the silos in the health industry – including pharma – get it. That’s an important mindset to take on as

I’m in a country this week where 66% of health providers have adopted 9 of 14 critical electronic health applications, according to a study from The Commonwealth Fund. According to the same study, only 26% of U.S. providers have opted into these functions.    As I amble across cobblestoned and craggy streets, looking up to frescoe’d facades on 500 year old palazzi, church domes and the bluest sky ever, the signs of the Italian Renaissance are everywhere in walkable Florence, Italy.     But it’s not all art and architecture, gelato and chianti for me this week. It’s also the techno-reality

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

Welcome to the new influence landscape, says Universal McCann (UM), the global media agency. In When Did We Start Trusting Strangers: The How the Internet Turned Us All into Influencers, UM analyzed the online behaviors of thousands of Internet users in 29 countries. UM found that today, we trust strangers as much as close friends. Furthermore, “friendship is no longer local or face to face: it’s becoming distant and virtualized,” the report asserts. Most importantly, the power of social media affords everybody with access to the Internet to be an influencer. Social media adoption in this study includes: Read blogs/weblogs

Consumers, at least Californians, do a lot of looking for health information on the Internet — but very little health management.   California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF) has taken a snapshot of Californians’ use of the Internet in health care. The profile is presented in CHCF’s report, Just Looking: Consumer Use of the Internet to Manage Care.   Topline: insured, more affluent, and younger people use the Internet in health searching.   The most popular care-related uses on the Internet include searching for information about conditions and drugs, finding a physician, checking ratings, and looking for claims and benefit information online.

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

4 in 5 moms go online at least once a month, according to My Mommy’s Online. The report is based on 2007 data from Simmons Consumer Research Survey published by eMarketer. “Being a parent makes going online almost a necessity,” according to eMarketer. 40% of all women who go online in the US are mothers with kids under 18. There are 35 million of them (including me). Intriguingly, virtually all women who are pregnant (94%) use the Internet, and half of the mothers surveyed use the Internet more since having a child. What do Moms do online? 94% visit portals

I “leave” you for the year with some great, good, and less-than-sanguine expectations for health care in 2008. These are views filtered through my lens on the health care world: the new consumer, health information technology, globalization, politics, and health economics.  Health politics shares the stage with Iraq. Health care is second only to Iraq as the issue that Americans most want the 2008 presidential candidates to talk about, according to the latest Kaiser Health Tracking Poll. Several candidates have responded to the public’s interest with significant health care reform proposals. But major health reform – such as universal access