Connected Health is powering the improvement of health care systems by creating the tools that make health care better, more efficient and more accessible. The ongoing consolidation of hospitals with hospitals and with medical groups, coupled with changes in payment systems, will create more rational purchasers (e.g. Kaiser, Geisinger) for connected health care platforms offered by companies such as Sotera Wireless, Patient Safe Solutions, Airstrip and others.
Consolidation also has a dark side, however, illustrated by this article about the improper use of pricing power that arose from a hospital merger in Chicagoland, Health Care’s Overlooked Cost Factor, by Eduardo Porter. Connected Health cannot change the principles of economics, but one of its benefits is to create transparency in price and outcomes. By exposing the limitations of our existing institutions this transparency is critical to the transformation of health care which is the true goal of Connected Health.
By Rob McCray
