Fireside Chat, Panel, Conference Presentation
How Improved Health and Longer Lives Drive Global Prosperity
Milken InstituteThomas Frieden, Jonathan Gluck, Carole Roan Gresenz, Michael Harsh, Peter Margolis, Ceci Connolly
- The session anticipates a lively format with dedicated time for audience interaction and questions to explore potential future links between healthcare innovation, economic growth, and productivity.
- Panelists plan to challenge existing myths regarding the relationship between healthcare innovation, costs, and economic growth, while expecting the Affordable Care Act to drive private-public collaboration on new delivery models.
- Pilot telehealth programs for low-income diabetics in Hawaii are expected to expand to a larger scale if successful, alongside ongoing Medicare and Medicaid Innovation Center efforts to identify methods for bending the healthcare cost curve.
- Future achievements in interoperability and shared data systems between hospitals and ambulatory centers could reduce redundant care and realize cost savings, though exact outcomes remain uncertain.
- Short-term increases in healthcare utilization from regular preventive care are projected to reduce overall costs in the long run, while public payer reimbursement strategies are expected to eventually trickle down to private payers.
- The future outlook for new reimbursement strategies involving both public and private sectors is described as bright, with health insurance availability through exchanges expected to foster entrepreneurialism and positive economic consequences.
- Healthcare data is currently in its infancy compared to sectors like credit cards; initiatives like the Heritage Health Prize aim to build a community of data scientists to better analyze claims, lab, and pharmacy data.
- GE Health Care intends to apply three screens to all future product development: increased access, improved quality, and affordability, with "Me Too" medications expected to be negatively affected by a shift toward comparative effectiveness conversations.
- The collaborative chronic care network aims to transition patients from awareness to ownership over their health, enabling motivated patients to develop new ideas that can be immediately disseminated to thousands of others.
- The CDC plans to continue scaling effective interventions like tobacco control through state and local governments, with the expectation that communities will adopt successful programs and the Smoke-Free Air Act coverage will increase beyond the current two-thirds of Americans.
- Stabilized paper and mobile phone technology are anticipated to enable point-of-care diagnostics in remote locations such as parts of Africa.
- The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation expects to continue piloting ways to address costs for populations with chronic conditions and those requiring end-of-life care, with a data sharing abundance expected to motivate innovation even amidst declining resources.