1. Professional Choices: Positioning the
Virtual Community To Fit the Health
Care Environment
Dawn Marie Yankeelov, ASPectx
dawny@aspectx.com
6/16/03
2. What We Will Cover
• Landscape Snapshot
• 5 Examples and 1 Standard
• Satisfying the Growing Pains of Healthcare
Delivery online
• Upcoming Trends
3. Healthcare Sector’s Landscape
• Healthcare players were latecomers to
business use of the Internet
• Healthcare data flows represent challenges
to manage
--little or no process-level integration
(logic resides in isolated systems)
• Healthcare systems are generally multi-
layered and function independently
4. Healthcare Sector’s Landscape
• The age of the Electronic Medical Record?
– Users tend to connect to their systems directly with
little or no automatic reporting
– No data-level integration so inconsistencies across
healthcare facilities, networks, regions and government
agencies
• Influence of Self-Service: Shift of power from
providers of services to customers who use them
5. The Age of Good Health
• 1997—Recognized Patient Information and
Support online—United States activity
• 1999—Provider-Sponsored, Virtual
Healthcare Communities recognized for
loyalty factor
• 2000—European Markets expand into
consumer-focused healthcare communities
6. Crossing the Quality Chasm
• March 2001 Report from US Federal Institute of
Medicine:
• “The nation’s health care delivery system falls
short in its ability to translate knowledge into
practice and to apply new technology
appropriately.”
• A July 1999 report found that 90 percent of the 30
billion healthcare transactions per year take place
by phone, fax or regular mail.
7. The Age of Good Health
• 2000-2003 E-business for Healthcare
entities
– Payment portals tying docs and insurance
– Patient data collection
– Pharma marketing mushrooms online
– Corporate Portals for compliance on record
portability and compliance
8. VC Value Proposition
• Socially-accepted
• Technically stable
• Economically reasonable
• Disseminates timely
information
• Fosters anytime interaction
9. Healthcare VCs Categories
*Pharmaceuticals *Social Support Extranets
*Physician Portals *Disease Awareness
*Compliance Portals
*Plug ‘n Play VC Builds with Emarketing
*Payment Communities for Insurance
10. 1. Social Support and
Intervention
• Smokeclinic.com--$49.90 fee
– Cofounded by Daniel Seidman of the tobacco-cessation
clinic at Columbia University
– Detailed questionnaire on smoking and drinking habits
– 10 Day Weblog to determine smoke triggers
– Intuitive interface—smoke on the clock
– Daily “quit” schedule/42% of last year’s users actually
quit
• QuitNet.com—Quitter Support Online free
13. Healthyplace.com
• In Top 50 of health sites by Traffic
• 475,000 visitors per month/began Sept. 1999
• Viewers stop at 7-10 pages
• Average time: 25 minutes; 3 times a week
• 80 percent of visitors go straight into a chat
• Targeted by disorder newsletters
• 70 percent are female visitors
• Online radio programming
• 861 Links on the web
19. The Investment
• Page views per user up 30 percent in the last three months
• Number of total users down in 2003 for PatientCommunity.com
• Began June 2000/13 Links on web
21. HONCode: Principles Adherence
Other Principles:
•Attribution—Clear
references to source data
•Justifiability—
commercial products
mentioned will be
supported by balanced
evidence
•Transparency of
Authorship—webmaster
will provide other sources
of support and email access
•Transparency of
Sponsorship—Sponsors
will be known
•Honesty in Advertising
and Editorial policy
24. 4. Employee Portals
• Example: May, 2003 Premier Sourcing
Partners of Premiere Inc. of Charlotte, NC
partners with Park City Solutions to service
1,500 member hospitals for physician,
employee, and patient portals
• It.premierinc.com
• Parkcitysolutions.com
25. Trends To Follow to Every Office
• Eight in 10 employers plan to make greater use of
the internet to administer benefits and distribute
health care information
– Provide employees information on plan choices—92%
– Annual enrollment—87%
– Help employees navigate delivery system—83%
– Health promotion and wellness—81%
– Educate employees about self-care—81%
26. The Final Factor in US: HIPAA
• In the US, The Health Insurance Portability
and Accountability Act (HIPAA) mandates
data formats, transaction standards, and
privacy requirements
• Total US market for community-based
administrative and clinical transactions will
hit $4 billion by 2010 up from $713 million
in 2000 –predicted by Merrill Lynch senior analyst David
Risinger
27. 5. Increasing Partnerships for
Compliance
•April 2002 — Humana, Inc. (NYSE: HUM) and ZirMed.com Inc.
introduced ZirMed’s Internet browser-based claims filing application in
a co-branded portion of Humana’s website.
Optionally, a provider office can subscribe to the ZirMed services to
handle submission and routing of all payer claims electronically, easing
the administrative burdens facing healthcare providers with a single
solution.
28. Treating Healthcare Pain
• Plug ‘n Play Tools for Pharmaceuticals
– Softwatch’s SRS Enterprise Edition for
communities tied to pharma emarketing
– Siebel’s ePharma
– Together they give web management platform
and Call Center connectivity
29. Upcoming Healthcare
Community Trends
• More self-care surveying and patient interaction via
communities for prevention and early diagnosis
• More on-line video capabilities to review patient care
• More online insurance processing for all parties
• More online patient support
• Integration of patient records and accessibility for all
doctors treating one patient
• Single portal sign-ons for physician practices to handle all
transactions and patient entry
