We are on the wrong road for great health
“Progress means getting nearer to the place you want to be. And if you have taken a wrong turn, then to go forward does not get you any nearer. If you are on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; and in that case the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive man.”
― C.S. Lewis
We, as Americans, are on the wrong road for great health. The current healthcare system is not set up to serve individuals well, it is not consumer-oriented, and it only comes into play when one is already sick or injured.
A lack of spending is surely not the issue. We spend nearly twice as much per capita compared to other developed countries. Yet we somehow have the worst outcomes with respect to mortality rate and disease burden.
Our healthcare system is opaque and reactionary. A patient often doesn’t know how much they will have to pay for services until receiving a bill weeks later. And they might not even encounter a medical professional who really takes the time to understand their situation and recommend a course of action that does not involve taking a pill. Understanding a patient and providing a recommendation should take time and require getting to know the full patient.
Incentives are not aligned. The different stakeholders operating in the healthcare system (e.g., providers and payers) have incentives that are often not aligned with delivering health and well-being to the individual. Instead, providers and payers are often profit-motivated, with their key revenue levers being drugs, procedures, and surgeries. Don’t get me wrong, profit is by no means evil or bad. Profit is really important. But it must be earned within a system that has the individual at the center with all incentives aligned around delivering the best possible outcomes. We will be much better off when the patient having the best outcomes means that all stakeholders win. The shift towards value-based care is a good start, but we have a long way to go for risk-based payment models to become the norm.
The time is now for a revolution
We’re in the midst of a massive transformation in our understanding of health and well-being. According to Rock Health, $29B of capital poured into digital health over the course of 2021. With this immense influx of capital, we’re beginning to move from a system that provides “average person” sick care to one that offers “personalized and individual” real well-being care. We are moving from reactionary care to preventative care.
As we see it, there are two key components leading us on this new road:
First, we as Americans are awakening from our slumber and becoming more aware of our health and well-being.
Individuals are becoming more likely to consider how their environments, their lifestyles, and the food they put into their bodies affect them. And people aren’t just accounting for how it affects their bodies, but also their mind and spirit. People are realizing that being healthy doesn’t just make you physically fit… it also makes you feel good too.
Science, research, and an explosion of data are fueling this awakening by shedding light on the untenable realities of our current system and the poor outcomes they achieve. In the process, causal relationships are becoming more clear. People are starting to understand that drugs and pharmaceuticals can’t solve all our problems and that our environment and mental health play a big role in our overall health.
This newfound appreciation of holistic health doesn’t even take into account the fact that we’ve been living through a global pandemic for the last two-plus years…
Second, we are aflush with major scientific breakthroughs that are making new, innovative health solutions possible.
The cost of an internet of things (IoT) sensor has rapidly decreased. According to a report from Microsoft, the average cost of an IoT sensor dropped from $1.30 in 2004 to less than 40 cents in 2020. This has enabled a “sensor for everything” revolution, which in turn has created data sources and insights that were never before possible at price points that are affordable to average consumers. With affordable technologies, there are now countless new data streams available, allowing providers to monitor patients and individuals to assess their well-being in ways that never existed before.
Further, after decades of progress, the electronic medical records (EMR) infrastructure has been created, and we believe we are closer to fully unlocking much of its value. There have recently been rapid advances in “omics” and DNA sequencing, giving us the ability to now complete a whole genome sequencing (WGS) for less than $1,000. These breakthroughs, coupled with all the other new data sources, data types, and advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning, are creating a cornucopia of new and interesting insights, which will ultimately drive the commercialization of new products and services.
To successfully work towards a better, brighter future, we need a continuous influx of entrepreneurs to seize this opportunity and build amazing, mission-oriented companies. We feel fortunate to get to back these visionary thinkers that are building transformational healthtech solutions.
If you are building in the healthtech space, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Our doors are always open.
Now, it’s time to do an about-turn and get onto a new road ahead.
