Serious and costly performance problems riddle U.S. health care. Because of overuse, under use, and misuse of health care, researchers at the Juran Institute and elsewhere estimate that about 30 percent of health care costs are generated by poor quality. Therefore, poor quality medical care will cost about $720 billion in 2008 (30% of $2.4 trillion).

Poor quality also reduces productivity. For every dollar of health care spending caused by poor quality, poor care costs an estimated 50 cents in lost productivity. When applied to the $822 billion in care provided through employer-sponsored insurance, this translates to an additional $123 billion in costs.

A recent study by the Health Research Institute at PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that wasteful health care spending costs $1.2 trillion annually. Analyzing findings from a wealth of published studies, the PwC researchers looked at the cost of waste from clinically inappropriate care and overt errors, individual behaviors leading to costly health problems, and antiquated operational processes that add costs without providing any value.

Making matters worse, research on the care patients receive from physicians, hospitals, and other providers paints a frustrating, even scary picture. For example, studies conducted by the respected RAND Corporation show that Americans receive clinically inadequate or inappropriate care at shockingly high rates.

Specifically, RAND's research shows that acute care for insured adults is appropriate only 53.5 percent of the time on average. In other words, about 46 percent of acute care is clinically incorrect. Similarly, about 43.9 percent of chronic care and 45.1 percent of preventive care is inappropriate according to accepted medical standards. Children receive 68 percent of recommended care for acute medical problems, 53 percent of recommended care for chronic medical conditions, and 41 percent of recommended preventive care.

The bottom line is health care - whether for adults or children - is inappropriate or unnecessary about half the time. Basically, it's a coin flip.

Root Causes of Poor Quality, High Costs:

Ultimately, three immutable laws of economics explain the underlying causes of this poor performance:

1. Price is what you pay but value is what you get:

Taking a page from Warren Buffet's playbook, buyers of health benefits must focus on value, not price. Price is an important part of the equation but meaningless if you don't know the value of what you are receiving for that price. Unfortunately, in health care we obsess on unit prices. In no other marketplace or domain of life do Americans - corporations, consumers, federal and state policymakers, news media - pay so much attention to price and so little to value.

2. You get what you pay for:

Today, we pay for quantity, not quality. Poor performers are sustained and rewarded. The best performers are financially penalized and professionally demoralized. The consequences are all too obvious.

3. You can't fix what you can't see:

In sharp contrast to virtually every other industry, health care is highly opaque. American health care is full of decision makers - consumers, physicians, and other providers, health plans, public officials - who lack the information needed to make decisions.

Five Steps to Higher Performance:

The problems are daunting but solvable. To improve the quality and cost effectiveness of health care delivery, purchasers and payors must tightly focus on strategies to expect, measure, disclose, reward, and support results:

1. Expect Results:

2. Measure Results:

3. Disclose Results:

4. Reward Results:

5. Support Results:

Support the infrastructure and processes essential to results-driven health care. These include:

More purchasers and payors are moving away from simplistic cost-driven drug benefit designs to formularies and cost sharing based on value. The impact of value-based drug benefit designs on manufacturers will depend on how quickly individual firms adapt their business thinking and communications strategies.

Until recently, the path to success for a drug manufacturer was based largely on product novelty, physician-centric marketing, and revenue strategies balancing unit prices and concessions against formulary position.

To maximize market share and margins in the world of value-based drug benefit designs, drug manufacturers will need to:

(1) Demonstrate the clinical and economic case for each product and each therapeutic class with an indication,

(2) Build absolute and comparative evidence on a continuous basis,

(3) Develop new value-based pricing models and market partnerships, and

(4) Communicate far more effectively with public and private payors.

For many firms, this will require a significant, even scary change in thinking and tactics; payor-centric communications; comfort with a massive increase in transparency; and a greater willingness to partner. Therefore, while the financial risks of moving to a value-based world are daunting, ultimately the greatest challenges are intellectual.

Value-based drug benefit designs will pose the greatest challenges to manufacturers with product lines (or pipelines) dominated "me too" drugs; rigid, risk-adverse organizational silos; and out-dated, prescriber-centric communications.

In health care, states serve as the nation's laboratories of reform - able to test innovations in financing, coverage, regulation, and care delivery. In 2007, states are leading the way on health insurance coverage expansion, leveraging a mix of policies including universal coverage, individual mandates, tax credits and Section 125 plans, and insurance "exchanges" or "connectors" to facilitate buying of affordable health plans.

Because so much is going on and since I do a fair amount of workin this area, several readers of the Piper Report asked me to post some resources on what's going on in the states. So here you go.

State Health Reform Commissions:

Several states have created task forces or study committees to examine options for coverage expansion and make recommendations. Most are appointed by the governor or governor and legislative leaders. A few are special committees of the legislature. Here are states with health reform commissions:

Governors' Health Care Reform Initiatives:

Several governors have announced detailed health reform proposals. Most focus largely or entirely on coverage expansion but several also thankfully include initiatives to improve quality of care, combat medical errors, and/or increase transparency of provider prices and performance.

More Resources on State-Based Health Reform:

Massachusetts, of course, started the ball rolling with its groundbreaking, bipartisan reform initiative in 2006. To learn more, here's an excellent article from BNA's Health Policy Report on the impact of Massachusetts health reform on coverage expansion efforts in others states (PDF).

The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) maintains a helpful list of legislative bills on universal coverage proposed in states.

For the best books on health reform, Medicaid, and other hot topics in health care, please visit my book recommendations.

For latest state-specific data on health care coverage and spending, check out the free, easy-to-use tools on StateHealthFacts.org.

Questions on State Health Reform:

Feel free to contact me if you have questions on what's going on in the states.

In the Deficit Reduction Act (DRA), Congress made a series of significant changes to pharmaceutical pricing, Medicaid best price rebates, and Medicaid payments to pharmacies for prescription drugs. The new policies, which are expected to save the feds and states $8.4 billion over the next five years, create major challenges to both pharmaceutical manufacturers and pharmacies.

DRA Drug Pricing Changes in a Nutshell:

While the DRA has many moving parts, in general the new policies will:

1. Drive more Medicaid drug spending toward generics and reduce the market advantages of authorized generics.

2. Make Average Manufacturer Price (AMP) - a key measure of drug prices in the marketplace and the metric used in determining Medicaid rebates - transparent to the public. Previously, AMP was confidential and known only to government officials.

3. Lower AMP on many prescription drugs, putting drug makers under increased cost pressures and increasing Medicaid rebates to states.

4. Increase the compliance risks of drug manufacturers.

5. Reduce Medicaid reimbursement to pharmacies.

6. Put another nail in the coffin of Average Wholesale Price (AWP) by moving Medicaid pharmacy reimbursement systems from AWP to AMP.

Federal Proposed Rules:

Today, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released proposed rules on implementing the DRA drug pricing policies. Final rules are expected in June 2007.

However, because key provisions are effective on January 1, 2007, pharma companies must come into compliance based on incomplete guidance and be prepared to make major changes again this summer.

DRA Changes to Average Manufacturer Price (AMP) and Medicaid Best Price:

The law requires significant changes to how drug manufacturers calculate Average Manufacturer Price (AMP) and Medicaid Best Price (BP), reducing the market power of some key price concessions used by manufacturers:

Drug manufacturers must report AMP on a monthly basis starting January 2007. More importantly, average manufacturer prices on all drugs will publicly posted on CMS' website starting Spring 2007 after CMS resolves some data and systems issues. Previously, reporting was quarterly and confidential by law.

DRA also mandates significant changes to the federal upper payment limit (FUL) for multiple source drugs. The feds are widening the definition of what is a multiple source drug and setting FUL at 250% of AMP. Previously, FUL was set at 150% of the Average Wholesale Price (AWP). This will further increase pricing pressure on brand drugs when generics are available.

Operational Challenges of DRA for Pharmaceutical Industry:

The drug industry faces many practical, operational challenges in meeting the new requirements for 2007:

1. Incomplete federal guidance. Until the final rules arrive, the drug industry must implement the DRA changes with limited federal guidance. Key factors still unclear include class of trade designations, treatment of administrative and service fees, adjusting for lagged price concessions and returned goods, correcting and restating AMP, and a variety of baseline AMP issues.

2. Moving from quarterly to more complex monthly reporting, plus adjusting for each month's transactions.

3. Adapting data, systems, staff, and reporting to accommodate different pricing methodologies required by CMS. For example, calculating and reporting AMP under Medicaid vs. calculating and reporting Average Sales Price (ASP) under Medicare Part B.

Financial Challenges of DRA for Pharmaceutical Companies:

The new DRA policies also pose significant financial challenges for pharma companies. For example:

Compliance Challenges of DRA for Drug Manufacturers:

The DRA changes present new or expanded compliance challenges for drug manufacturers. Given the frequency, changes, and overall complexity, there are many ways to inadvertently screw up federal reporting. Ensuring compliance will require heavy reliance on other parts of company and on external partners. Transparency of pricing will likely lead to new regulations, audits, and Congressional hearings. Finally, while over time DRA reporting may make it easier to defend against suits, companies should expect dramatic increase in whistleblower suits under federal and state False Claims Acts.

Learn More:

For the DRA statutory changes affecting drug pricing, click here (PDF).

For the proposed rule, click here (PDF). For CMS' fact sheet on the proposed rule, click here (PDF).

Read the OIG's recommendations to the HHS Secretary on DRA implementation issues. The OIG report includes useful background information.

For more information or a briefing, feel free to contact me.

In the Deficit Reduction Act (DRA), Congress authorized the new $150 million Medicaid Transformation Grant Program to help states design and implement reforms to increase quality and efficiency of Medicaid. This is a unique opportunity to help states restructure and modernize Medicaid, save taxpayer dollars, and improve services. But states must act fast to take advantage.

State Medicaid agencies may submit grant proposals to CMS by September 15, 2006. For grants, CMS has a total budget of $75 million in FFY 2007 and another $75 million in FFY 2008. The amount of each grant will vary and will depend on the number of applications received. State matching funds are not required.

While states have wide discretion in proposing projects and may propose multiple projects in a single grant application, CMS is encouraging states to look at ways to improve Medicaid program operations and efficiency.

In the area of improving Medicaid program efficiency, CMS is particularly interested in grant projects to:

CMS is also interested in projects to improve the effectiveness of Medicaid. Examples include projects on:

In the arena of improved care delivery, CMS is particularly interested in grant proposals to:

This is a unique, one-time opportunity for states but, with grant applications due in six weeks, the timeline is tight. States needing help or advice in writing an application may contact me or my friends at Sellers Feinberg for assistance.

Patient-centered care - one of the new buzz phrases in health care - is all about aligning the delivery of medical care with the needs and preferences of patients. Research shows that the practices and tools of patient-centered care result in:

Unfortunately, despite overwhelming support of the medical community and patient advocates, only 22 percent of physicians practice patient-centered care.

Patient-Centered Care Defined:

Patient-centered care is one of the six essential components of high quality medical care, according to the Institute of Medicine (IOM), the respected healthcare arm of the National Academy of Sciences. The IOM defines patient-centered care as:

Health care that establishes a partnership among practitioners, patients, and their families (when appropriate) to ensure that decisions respect patients' wants, needs, and preferences and that patients have the education and support they need to make decisions and participate in their own care.

Key Components of Patent-Centered Care:

At its core, patient-centered care is all about improved patient-provider communication, where patients and providers collaborate for the benefit of the patient. Ideally, patient-centered care delivery involves an array of tools and practices, including:

To learn more, check out these resources:

The Commonwealth Fund's excellent initiatives on patient-centered care.

Report from the Economic and Social Research Institute on the key components of patient-centered care that are unique to underserved populations.

Tools from the HHS Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).

The world's leading guru of competitive strategy, Michael Porter, Ph.D., has turned his sights on explaining the fundamental cause of high costs, poor quality, consumer dissatisfaction, uneven access, and skyrocketing premiums in American health care.

In Redefining Health Care, Porter and innovation expert Elizabeth Teisberg, Ph.D. provide a thoughtful, groundbreaking framework to use competition to drive dramatic increases in quality and efficiency.

Unlike many wonks who foolishly believe that health care is not a market, Drs. Porter and Teisberg see competition " of a sort " in operation. They show us that the current competitive environment in health care is designed to "shift costs, accumulate bargaining power, and restrict services." That is, what we have now is dysfunctional, zero-sum competition serving to limit, even reduce value for patients. And they see all this taking place "...at the wrong level-among health plans, networks, and hospitals " rather than where it matters most, in the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of specific health conditions."

Focusing on how to move American health care to positive-sum competition based on economic and clinical value for patients, Redefining Health Care provides a series of specific recommendations for the key players " including physicians, hospitals, health plans, employers, Medicare, and Medicaid.

To learn about the Massachusetts health care reform initiative, here are two podcasts on this groundbreaking new program to cover virtually all the uninsured in the Commonwealth.

For Sellers, Feinberg and Associates, the lead consultants on the Massachusetts reform project, I host a biweekly podcast on hot issues in Medicaid. These concise audio briefings help state leaders and business executives keep tabs with Medicaid on Capitol Hill and CMS.

In Part 1 of the special audio briefing on the Massachusetts health reform initiative, Marty Sellers, President and founder of Sellers Feinberg, describes the key components of the Massachusetts initiative, how it was developed, and implications for other states and the healthcare market.

In Part 2, Peggy Handrich, the former Wisconsin Medicaid director and now leader of Sellers Feinberg's strategic Medicaid consulting practice, describes the key financial and programmatic characteristics of the Massachusetts health reform.

To listen directly on your computer, click here for Part 1 and here for Part 2. The podcasts are in the popular MP3 format, so you may also right-click to save and upload them to your iPod or other MP3 player for listening on the road.

For a useful two-page fact sheet on the Massachusetts health care reform plan, click here (PDF).

To subscribe to receive the free podcasts on Medicaid, please contact Sellers Feinberg. The folks there are working with a number of other states on health reform and Medicaid restructuring initiatives.

Medical errors are rampant in American health care, particularly in physician and hospitals services. The human and economic costs are extraordinary. And because these mistakes are virtually 100 percent avoidable, so are the deaths, injuries, pain, and cost.

A diverse range of players - policy makers, thought leaders, researchers, consumer groups, purchasers, and clinicians - are working to reduce error rates and promote the use of safer systems and practices. However, reformers continue to hit the great blue wall of medical secrecy. Physicians, hospital administrators, and other health professionals are extremely reluctant to disclose or discuss a harm-causing mistake.

This is not surprising, of course. No one likes to talk about his or her mistakes, especially mistakes that result in injury or death. These conversations are awkward and painful for all concerned. What's more, disclosuring the truth can lead to lawsuits, disciplinary action, embarrassment, self-doubt, and diminished status in society and among peers. But ethically, all this is beside the point. Patients and their surviving family have a right to the unvarnished truth, something they rarely get absent costly and protracted lawsuits. And the health care system cannot fix what it cannot see.

Medical Errors and Medical Narcissism - a groundbreaking book by John Banja, PhD, assistant director of health services and clinical ethics at Emory University - examines the concept of "medical narcissism." Specifically, Dr. Banja explains why a health professional's need to preserve his or her self-esteem often robs patients and their families of the truth and perpetuates high-error medicine. He describes the "common psychological reactions of healthcare professionals to the commission of a serious harm-causing error and the variety of obstacles that can compromise ethically sound, truthful disclosure."

In Medical Errors and Medical Narcissism, Dr. Banja explains how and why talented, hard working medical professionals often fall into narcissistic traps. Living in a world of intense stress, long hours, and high, often unfair expectations, the "medical narcissist" works hard to maintain the respect of patients and colleagues. As Dr. Banja says:

When a medical error occurs, that world of competence, adequacy, and ability is turned upside-down. It is no wonder that even when such persons want to do the right thing and disclose error, they might do it clumsily and make an already bad situation worse.

This fascinating, thoughtfully researched book includes detailed recommendations, including advice on how to:

It is an immutable truth of economics. Transparency is an essential ingredient for a market to function with any semblance of efficiency or effectiveness. Lack of transparency - what economists call asynchronous information - leads to rapid inflation, gross inefficiency, gaming and abuse, ignorant consumers, poor quality, rampant error rates, and misaligned resources. In other words, you get America's $1.9 trillion health care system.

After years of behind the scenes work by top health care thought leaders, the White House and key Congressional leaders are jumping on board and calling for reforms to ensure transparency (read public reporting) of health care provider prices. While prices are only part of the information needs of patients, purchasers, and payors, nationwide transparency of medical prices is essential. Health Savings Accounts and other consumer-driven health reforms such as Medicaid Health Opportunity Accounts are largely pointless in a health care system otherwise rooted in incomplete, inaccurate, and inaccessible information.

As leaders contemplate specific measures to promote transparency of prices, they should also consider sending every Medicaid and Medicare beneficiary a quarterly report on the cost of their care. (I am not talking about Explanation of Benefits [EOB] notices. EOBs don't give a picture of their overall costs or utilization and offer no comparative, trend, or historical information.)

Using simple, colorful charts and tables and an emphasis on decision relevant information, a well-designed report would show them what care they received, what providers charged, what public programs paid, how much they paid in cost sharing, and how their medical costs compare to their peers (age group, sex, health status, and geography).

For Medicare beneficiaries, the reports could help bust a core myth of Medicare financing by showing what Medicare has paid for their care compared to what as an individual they paid in Medicare taxes and cost-sharing to date. In Medicaid, the reports would be invaluable to state efforts to move toward consumer-directed models where chronically ill or disabled patients and their families take active control of their medical lives. It would also help low-income families better understand the health care system. For dual eligibles - the 6.3 million Americans with annual health costs of a quarter trillion dollars - these personalized reports would be truly eye opening for patients and their families.

Over time, the reports could help Medicaid and Medicare beneficiaries see how their providers, health plans, and drug plans compare on measures of quality, errors, and cost effectiveness. And they could include simple health reminders.

Of course, not every benie would read the reports much less change their behavior based on the information. But the vary act of creating the reports would require Medicare and Medicaid to modernize information systems, turn transaction data into genuine decision-relevant information, and begin thinking of program beneficiaries as consumers in need of more than monstrously dull doorstops masquerading as handbooks.

Americans, including Medicaid and Medicare beneficiaries, are not stupid. But when it comes to health care costs, they are too often ignorant or oblivious. That must stop. Yes, there is a learning curve and some people prefer the bliss of ignorance to the dilemmas of judgment. Nonetheless, as consumers, as Americans, as human beings we are entitled to the information we need to make decisions. Keeping Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries and their families in the dark is as costly as it is insulting.

1. You get what you pay for.

2. Price is what you pay but value is what you get.

3. You can't fix what you can't see.

4. Incentives matter, whether you intend them to or not.

5. No matter what they say, it's always about money and autonomy.

6. There are no essential providers, only essential services.

7. More is rarely better and often worse.

8. Health care providers are not your children. You are under no obligation to treat them the same for different performance.

9. If you pay them, they will come. If you don't pay them, they'll come anyway and it will cost you.

10. Never let a health plan or provider do what you would do if you were they.

11. Uninformed choice is not choice.

12. It's all in the execution and in the communication of the execution.

13. Health care is a game of chess. The player who thinks the most moves ahead wins.

14. Health care policy making is like puppetry. If you can see the strings it doesn't work.

15. In health politics, complexity and chaos can be your friends or you enemies. Your choice.

16. Death is always cheaper than life but rarely preferable.

17. Until they award a Nobel Prize for health policy, style rules substance and perception rules reality.

18. Health care policy is an art - but more sculpture than painting. What you leave out is more important than what you put in.

19. Get paid for what is in your control but only pay for what is outside theirs.

20. Results matter. Period.

By Michael H. Bailit, MBA
President of Bailit Health Purchasing, LLC

Introduction

The serious problems in our health care system have been more than adequately documented in this journal and many others over the two past decades. Rates of uninsurance rise with a steadiness fueled by costs that seemingly know no bound. Quality varies with little or any relationship to cost, and ill-informed consumers cannot be confident that they are receiving the care that they need.

It initially appears astounding that that these problems are not getting resolved despite the well-intended efforts of many, many people. In fact with respect to cost growth and insurance coverage, the problems with our health care system are getting worse. Much worse. We who work in the field of health policy have failed.

Yet, the reasons for this failure are not difficult to understand. The health care industry represents a whopping 14.9% of the GDP (Levit, Smith, Cowan, Sensenig, and Catlin, 2004). It is an economic monolith, that becomes larger and, hence, more difficult to change every day. There are two sectors which foot the growing health care bill, neither of which is up to the challenge of curbing the expansion: government and employers.

Government

"One person's waste is another person's income.' (Wasson, 2004)

Federal and state government pay the largest share of the health care bill. They fight valiantly to control health expenditure growth, but rarely, if ever, by addressing the problem. Instead government purchasers often end up shifting costs to private payers. States and the federal government also reduce covered health care services in times of profound economic hardship. Finally, state and federal government assume loans (especially the federal government) and cut other service expenditures to meet the growing demand for health care dollars.

Ultimately, however, government fails to manage the growth of health care costs for two primary reasons. First, constituting a large economic sector, health care employs many Americans, thus creating a mission conflict for those elected and appointed to serve us. Reductions in healthcare expenditures result in lower income and potentially reduced employment for many Americans, including some who are politically influential. Second, most Americans don't want health cost growth restricted since the impact of costs is not directly visible to most Americans. That is, American taxpayers don't appear to appreciate how growing health care costs reduce available funds for other government programs and contribute to government debt.

To continue reading, click here.

Medicaid health plans are the Ginger Rogers of managed care. They have to do everything commercial and Medicare health plans do but have to do it backwards and in high heels. Despite dealing with more complex requirements and the toughest, most vulnerable patient populations, Medicaid health plans often provide higher quality and better access to care than their commercial counterparts.

To reward the highest performing health plans, state Medicaid agencies are increasingly using a new tool - performance-based auto-assignment. Auto-assignment is when new Medicaid beneficiaries are automatically assigned to a health plan when they don't voluntarily select a plan within the required time frame. While a state may simply assign new patients randomly among available plans, it may also use auto-assignment to incentivize the best health plans with increased enrollment. The better the perform, the greater the plan's proportion of auto-assigned enrollees.

Michael Bailit, CEO of Bailit Health Purchasing LLC and a leading expert on Medicaid and employer managed care, says for auto-assignment to work as an incentive additional assignment volume must be desired by the health plans. States must also:

- Establish clear goals at the outset and involve stakeholders early in the process.
- Focus on data that is reliable and measures that can be audited.
- Revisit measures on a regular basis and view the algorithm as something that is modifiable.
- View auto-assignment as an incentive strategy that can be use in complimentary fashion with other incentive strategies.

With the help of Bailit Health Purchasing, California Medicaid (MediCal) is developing a performance-based auto-assignment program. Starting in 2005, MediCal will use the approach to reward health plans with superior performance (relative to other health plans in the county), create a quality improvement incentive for all plans, and support the preservation of the safety net. Medicaid programs in Michigan and New York state already have experience using auto-assignment to drive quality improvement.

When the new Medicare prescription drug benefit begins in January 2006, 7 million dual eligibles (persons enrolled in both Medicare and Medicaid) will receive their drug benefits through prescription drug plans (PDPs). If they don't select a PDP, Medicare will auto-assign them into a plan. Given the positive experience of state Medicaid programs, Medicare may wish to consider using performance-based auto-assignment to help drive drug plan quality.

Escape Fire is collection of compelling speeches by one of America's leading crusaders for health care quality and patient safety - Don Berwick, MD, founder and president of the Boston-based Institute for Healthcare Improvement.

Each year, IHI hosts the National Forum on Quality Improvement in Health Care. The influential annual event draws 4,000 health care leaders from around the world in person and 6,000 via satellite.

In many ways, Dr. Berwick's keynote lectures set the tone for quality improvement efforts across the US. With an effective blend of common sense, real-life stories, persuasive metaphors, and out-of-the-box thinking, Dr. Berwick's presentations make for fascinating reading for anyone interested in improving America's $1.7 trillion health care system.

For example, in his 1999 keynote, Dr. Berwick recounts the 1949 Montana wildfire that killed thirteen young men and applies lessons learned from the catastrophe to today's health care system.

Rick Wagoner, chairman and CEO of General Motors, is calling on both political parties to work together to solve the nation’s crisis of health care costs. US manufacturers, especially in the heavily unionized auto industry, are at a severe competitive disadvantage to their European and Asian counterparts. Foreign manufacturers benefit from taxpayer-financed health insurance, fewer retirees, and a younger workforce.

General Motors will spend $4.8 billion this year on health care for its one million retirees, employees, and their dependents. While unions are pushing for government-run, taxpayer-financed health care, Wagoner appears to favor a middle path that includes transparency of provider performance, a greater role for consumers, and incremental, yet major reforms to existing health programs.

In Consumer-Driven Health Care, Regina E. Herzlinger, a leading health care thought leader and a professor at the Harvard Business School, provides a thought-provoking look inside a new, powerful force transforming America's dysfunctional health care industry. Consumer-Driven Health Care builds on her popular 1997 book Market-Driven Health Care: Who Wins, Who Loses in the Transformation of America's Largest Service Industry.

In the first part of her new 900-page book, Dr. Herzlinger makes a convincing case about how and why health care is broken and why market-based solutions - which empower consumers - are best. She restates the case she made in Market-Driven Health Care for putting consumers directly in charge of their own decisions (picking insurance plans, making medical decisions).

Through transparency of information, a realignment of incentives, and new tools to support decision-making, the consumer-driven model gives individuals a clear stake in their own health care. While not unique to other parts of the US economy, the approach is a radical departure for the $1.7 trillion health care market. As Dr. Herzlinger makes clear in her energetic analysis, the absence of these proven market-based tools goes a long to explain how health care became our most inefficient, outdated, and error-prone industry.

The second part – 80 percent of the book - is a collection of 73 think pieces written by 92 other experts. With short introductions by Dr. Herzlinger, these articles serve as a useful initial knowledge base for a growing field with an uncertain future.

Consumer-Driven Health Care has its limitations. For example, Dr. Herzlinger's case for the consumer-driven model fails to address the Medicare and Medicaid systems. It also leaves a variety of practical transition and execution issues unaddressed, although these are beyond the purpose of this volume. Because articles were written several years ago as part of a conference and most of the writers lack purchaser-side experience, the book also does not deal with the growing list of market-based reforms underway by large employers and innovative health plans.

In addition, since the field is still in its infancy, Dr. Herzlinger is a business researcher, and the contributors are largely wide-eyed entrepreneurs, the book will likely frustrate health policy wonks and others stuck in the technical minutia and ideological fights that characterize most health care discussions. But then, that’s just as well. Too often analysts forget that health care is a business and operates as a market, albeit a flawed one insulated from tools proven to drive quality and efficiency.

Dr. Herzlinger also has her detractors. It reminds me of the old joke that there are two kinds of people in the world – people who like Wayne Newton and people who don’t. Well, it seems that health care wonkdom is divided by those who like Reggie Herzlinger’s ideas and those who don’t. However, given the massive problems in American health care, her contributions remain as useful as they are provocative.

For a primer on consumer-driven health care, I recommend Let's Put Consumers in Charge of Health Care, a concise article by Dr. Herzlinger in Harvard Business Review (July 2002 issue).

If the doctors cure
then the sun sees it.
If the doctors kill
then the earth hides it.
The doctors should fear arrogance
more than cardiac arrest.

The June 2004 issue of the Harvard Business Review contains an outstanding article on Redefining Competition in Health Care by Michael E. Porter, Ph.D. of the Harvard Business School and Elizabeth Olmsted Teisberg, Ph.D. of the University of Virginia's Darden School of Business.

Their carefully researched, well-argued, actionable recommendations include:

- Standardized information about individual diseases and treatments should be collected and disseminated widely so patients can make informed choices.

- Purchasers, providers, and health plans should establish transparent billing and pricing to reduce cost shifting, confusion, pricing discrimination, and a host of other inefficiencies.

- Providers should be experts in specific conditions and treatments rather than try to be all things to all patients.

Canada's Socialized health care system may result in cheaper drugs but far more dead patients.

The first major study of patient safety in Canadian hospitals has found an extremely high number of preventable medical errors.

Consumer-driven health care - new models and technologies to empower consumers to make informed choices - is growing in popularity. At it's core, consumer-driven health care is all about transparency of costs and quality of care, and giving consumers the tools and information they need.

To learn more, check out the best books on consumer-driven health care, including Regina E. Herzlinger's excellent new book. Read it first.

Preventable medical mistakes and inappropriate, outdated medical care is the third leading cause of death in America, according to the Institute of Medicine and other experts.