Things I’m Thinking About In Healthcare Part 1

The proposed Medicare pilot will fundamentally change how doctors are reimbursed for giving chemotherapy and other injectable drugs. Currently, doctors are paid by a simple formula: the average sales price of the drug, plus 6 percent (under the federal budget sequester, that amount has been cut to 4.3 percent). That means doctors see a bigger upsid... See more

The intermediaries, including wholesalers and pharmaceutical benefits managers, or PBMs, are key players in deciding which drugs get used and how much they cost patients. While the rebate amounts are usually kept under wraps for competitive reasons, the case of EpiPen is offering a rare insight into how the system works — and the blame game resulti... See more

Rather than trying to improve them, the most exciting health tech companies will ignore the parts of healthcare that have become obviously anachronistic, actively discarding convention. The seeds of this difference have been sown in a handful of companies started in the last few years. They are painstakingly taking relationships from incumbents, wi... See more