Publications

Article

Assessing the Food and Drug Administration's Risk-Based Framework for Software Precertification with Top Health Apps in the United States: Quality Improvement Study

By: Noy Alon, Ariel Dora Stern and John Torous

BACKGROUND: As the development of mobile health apps continues to accelerate, the need to implement a framework that can standardize categorizing these apps to allow for efficient, yet robust regulation grows. However, regulators and researchers are faced with numerous... View Details

Keywords: Mobile Health; Smartphone; Food And Drug Administration; Risk-based Framework; Health Care and Treatment; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Applications and Software; Framework

Article

The Covid-19 Pandemic Should Not Delay Actions to Prevent Anticompetitive Consolidation in U.S. Health Care Markets

By: Leemore S. Dafny

This article describes potential regulatory and legislative reforms to assist antitrust enforcement agencies in halting anticompetitive acquisitions and practices, and preserving and promoting competition in health care markets. View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Markets; Competition; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms

2021
Working Paper

Detecting Anomalous Patterns of Care Using Health Insurance Claims

By: Sriram Somanchi, Edward McFowland III and Daniel B. Neill

September 2022
Article

The Impact of Financial Assistance Programs on Health Care Utilization: Evidence from Kaiser Permanente

By: Alyce S. Adams, Raymond Kluender, Neale Mahoney, Jinglin Wang, Francis Wong and Wesley Yin

Most hospitals have financial assistance programs for low-income patients. We use administrative data from Kaiser Permanente to study the effects of financial assistance on health care utilization. Using a regression discontinuity design based on an income threshold... View Details

Keywords: Healthcare; Utilization; Financial Assistance; Health Care and Treatment; Social Issues; Poverty; Health Industry

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January 2021
Article

COVID-19 Hasn't Been a Tipping Point for Value-Based Care, but It Should Be

By: Thomas W. Feeley

Four out of five health care provider organizations are suffering ongoing losses as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the recent NEJM Catalyst Insights Council survey on value-based payment and care. Yet Council members, who are still largely entrenched... View Details

Keywords: Value-based Health Care; Health Pandemics; Health Care and Treatment; Cost

2013
Working Paper

International Health Economics

By: Mark Egan and Tomas J. Philipson

Perhaps because health care is a local service sector, health economists have paid little attention to international linkages between domestic health care economies. However, the growth in domestic health care sectors is often attributed to medical innovations whose... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Innovation and Invention; Global Range; Economics

June 2015 (Revised November 2016)
Case

HealthCare.gov: The Crash and the Fix (A)

By: Leonard A. Schlesinger and Paras D. Bhayani

A review of the process utilized by the Obama administration to create the Health Care.gov exchange and the problems that resulted from the implementation effort. There is a B case that provides the follow on strategy and processes utilized to get the site up and... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change; Implementing Strategy; Implementation; Government Innovation; Health Care Industry; Health Care Reform; Health Care and Treatment; Government Administration; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Health Industry; Health Industry; United States

22 Aug 2022
Research & Ideas

Can Amazon Remake Health Care?

Investors and market watchers noted Amazon’s less-than-stellar forays into health care, while privacy advocates raised concerns about Amazon’s access to patient medical data. Still others have voiced hopes... View Details

Keywords: by Christina Pazzanese, Harvard Gazette; Health

August 2003 (Revised September 2008)
Background Note

Note on Financing of the U.S. Health Care Sector

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and Jeff Grahling

This course describes the public and private sources of financing of the U.S. health-care sector,and identifies the characteristics of insurance policies, their costs, the structure of the insurance industry, and the role of consultants and brokers. The insurance... View Details

Keywords: Economic Sectors; Financing and Loans; Insurance; Industry Structures; Health Industry; Health Industry; United States

2025
Working Paper

Antibiotic Treatments for Ulcers--Eradicating H-Pylori Infections: Case Histories of Transformational Advances

By: Amar Bhidé, Srikant M. Datar and Katherine Stebbins

This case history describes how a chance discovery of bacteria that infect stomach linings completely changed how physicians treat ulcers. Specifically, we chronicle how: 1) two Australian physicians brought the bacterial infection to the world’s attention and... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Technological Innovation; Innovation Strategy; Technology Adoption; Collaborative Innovation and Invention; Innovation and Invention; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms

SSRN

17 Feb 2016
Blog Post

Through The Eyes of The Patient: A Recap of The 13th Annual Health Care Conference

Over 650 people participated in the 13th annual Harvard Business School Health Care Club Conference, which took place on campus on Saturday, January 30th, 2016. The conference brought together students of... View Details

Keywords: Health Care

Web

Student Spotlight: 2023 HCC Co-Presidents Reflect on Their Time at HBS and the Current Health Care Systems - Blog: Health Supplement

Blog Blog Health Care and Life Science at HBS Filter Results Arrow Down Arrow Up Read posts from Author Alumni Author Blavatnik Fellow Author Blavatnik Fellowship Team Author... View Details

August 2018 (Revised August 2019)
Case

Oscar Health Insurance: What Lies Ahead for a Unicorn Insurance Entrant?

By: Leemore Dafny and Victoria Marone

Keywords: Oscar Insurance; Fintech; US Health Care; Affordable Care Act (ACA); Health Insurance Marketplaces; Insurer Competition; Provider Consolidation; Market Entry; Health Care and Treatment; Entrepreneurship; Market Entry and Exit; Negotiation; Growth Management; Health Industry; Health Industry; New York (state, US); New Jersey

August 2001 (Revised February 2020)
Case

Consumer-Driven Health Care: Medtronic's Health Insurance Options

By: Regina E. Herzlinger, John Hurwitch and Seth Bokser

Describes the variety of health insurance plans that this medical device company offers, including a high-deductible, consumer-driven health plan with a health reimbursement account that also enables health care providers to quote their own prices. Asks students to... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Insurance; Decision Choices and Conditions; Compensation and Benefits; Demand and Consumers

July 2013 (Revised July 2015)
Background Note

Innovating in Health Care—Framework

By: Regina E. Herzlinger

Contains the framework for the second-year Innovating in Health Care course. Delineates the role of six exogenous forces on new ventures: structure, financing, regulations, consumers, accountability, technology, and public policy and presents the essential elements of... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Management; Health Industry

Article

Physician-Induced Demand for Medical Care

By: Jerry R. Green

This paper addresses the theoretical models designed to ascertain the existence of a variable level of physicians' activity in shifting the demand of their patients. Two basic approaches are followed: equilibrium models of the demand for health care, and disequilibrium... View Details

Keywords: Physicians; Economic Equilibrium; Monopolistic Competition; Economic Competition; Medical Care