Deborah Kaplan

Clinical trials can offer advanced treatments not yet available to the public.
for Providence
Barbara’s story is only one among many from Providence, which runs clinical trials that can prolong life, and improve quality of life, and not just for cancer. Sometimes people enroll in a clinical trial because there are no other treatment options available or because the treatment has fewer side effects than traditional treatment. Others do so knowing they may not benefit from the trial, but others might in the future.

Amazon is poised to continue its 2022 expansion in more than just e-commerce sales. It’s about to become the largest U.S. carrier for delivery services. Yes, larger than the U.S. Postal Service, UPS and FedEx. That may sound unrelated to healthcare, but it really isn’t. That infrastructure is helping Amazon deliver their own branded PCR COVID-19 tests. It’s...

Scratch beneath the surface of almost any recent trend in healthcare and you’ll find that it is not as new as it might first appear.
But there is really nothing new about consolidation in healthcare. Hospitals have been combining into larger, market-dominating systems for decades. According to a 2020 Medpac report, 90% of hospital markets met Federal Trade Commission definitions for “highly concentrated” in 2017 and there are no indications of the trend reversing since then.
The same is true ...

In November, the Cleveland Clinic named Steve Downey as its chief supply chain and patient support services officer. The position covers the health system's global supply chain and support services, including strategy and operations. Here are 5 questions we asked Downey.

Diners are used to looking at calorie counts and vegan-friendly symbols on menus, but at Just Salad, they have an extra option. Last year, the chain introduced a carbon label that shows the impact that their bowls have on the planet through a number that reflects the estimated carbon emissions from growing and transporting their meals.
People may not completely understand the science behind the number (the company shares its methodology here), but they can see how each salad compares to anoth...

With seven hospitals and multiple ambulatory centers, The Ohio State University Medical Wexner Center takes a standardized and data-focused approach to supply chain management.

When Prof. James Brenton was seeing one of his patients at Addenbrooke’s Hospital recently for ovarian cancer treatment, he needed to review all her studies and treatments. The information was complex and lengthy: blood test results, genomic tests, imaging studies and reports from past therapy. Brenton hadn’t been able to attend the tumor board meeting the day before, where his colleagues — radiation oncologists, medical oncologists, radiologists, pathologists and surgeon...

An autoimmune condition, dermatomyositis is known for causing skin changes and muscle weakness. It’s an inflammatory myopathy. Many first realize something is wrong from a telltale rash in the face, which is sometimes itchy or painful.
While the number of people with dermatomyositis globally is unknown, around 10 in 1,000,000 people are diagnosed with it annually. It’s most typical ...

By definition, healthcare accessibility refers to the way social and economic conditions (aka “social determinants of health” or “SDoH”) impact a patient’s ability to obtain health services. While healthcare disparities are often viewed through the race and ethnicity lenses, they include many other social factors that lead to preventable differences in disease burdens experienced by socially disadvantaged populations.
COVID-19 and the Reality of Healthcare Disparity
While these disparities ha...

The agency has been in the spotlight because of the pandemic, questions about its independence and the approval of Aduhelm. The stakes are high and the politics, fraught.
Ten months into the Biden administration and no one has been nominated to be the permanent FDA commissioner, let alone confirmed. The void reflects the high stakes involved in the position and the bramble of political tensions that have engulfed the federal regulatory agency. But those are some of the very same reasons the a...

With seven acute care hospitals, the Texas health system is using innovative ideas to trim its $1.4 billion supply chain budget, while increasing efficiency.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Use data to understand product costs for similar procedures; the doctors can then try to optimize their usage.
Standardize products and renegotiate contracts for increased savings.
Compare the cost to buy equipment like beds, versus renting.
Work with local partners to manufacture critical products, to decrease reliance on ...

Tim Hinrichs and Teemu Koponen recognized that cloud computing was going to change how software authorization was done. The authorization problem--how approval was given for access and rights--was complex and only going to get more complicated. Hinrichs and Koponen wanted to solve this widespread and foundational problem, with the help of experts across industries that use cloud-native applications.
After building the core technology, Hinrichs and Koponen made an unusual choice. They decided ...

Marjorie Adams always wanted to be a teacher but realized that meant dealing with parents. While working at a CPA firm instead, it clicked. She could teach businesses how to work better with QuickBooks, still educating, but in a different type of classroom. Adams founded Fourlane 12 years ago, and ironically, she’s still dealing with parents: the majority of her 80+ employees are women, most of them moms.
Fourlane helps small to midsize businesses convert from their existing accounting softwa...

As the COVID-19 pandemic hit, some people realized they could work from the beach in Costa Rica rather than their expensive San Francisco apartment. That’s partly why Elements Global Services grew 43 percent during the pandemic. “With remote work, companies wanted to make sure they were retaining their talent,” says Rick Hammell, Elements’ founder and CEO. “Clients like that we can bring them onboard so quickly.”
But COVID isn’t the only reason the human resources technology and services comp...