Publications

11 Mar 2015
News

Paying more for comparable outcomes in prostate treatment

August 17, 2016
Article

How a Cancer Center Rapidly Developed Patient-Centered Outcome Measures

By: Kevin P. Shah, Tracy E. Spinks and Thomas W. Feeley

In 2014, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center created a streamlined process for developing measure sets for patient-centered outcomes, including provider-generated and patient-reported outcomes, at an accelerated pace. These comprehensive sets are... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Measurement and Metrics; Quality; Service Delivery; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; Texas

January–February 2022
Article

Mobilizing the U.S. Military’s TRICARE Program for Value-Based Care: A Report From the Defense Health Board

By: Robert S. Kaplan, Paul R. Schaettle, Vivian S. Lee, Michael D. Parkinson, Gregory H. Gorman and Michael-Anne Browne

The U.S. Military Health System spends about $50 billion annually through its TRICARE health plans to provide care to 9.6 million active duty service members, retirees, and their families. TRICARE, historically, has used the predominant U.S. fee-for-service payment... View Details

Keywords: Military Health System; Value-based Healthcare; Health Care and Treatment; United States

October 2013
Article

The Strategy That Will Fix Health Care

By: Michael E. Porter and Thomas H. Lee

In health care, the days of business as usual are over. Around the world, every health care system is struggling with rising costs and uneven quality, despite the hard work of well-intentioned, well-trained clinicians. Health care leaders and policy makers have tried... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Strategy; Value; Customer Focus and Relationships; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry

December 2016
Article

Health Care Needs Real Competition

By: Leemore S. Dafny and Thomas H. Lee

The U.S. health care system is inefficient, unreliable, and crushingly expensive. There is no shortage of proposed solutions, but central to the best of them is the idea that health care needs more competition. In other sectors, competition improves quality and... View Details

Keywords: Competition; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; United States

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Research Summary

Overview

We are studying the practical application of Michael Porter's value-based strategy to reform health care by examining best practices of integrated practice units, outcome measurement, cost measurement, value-based payment, episode based payment, regionalization of... View Details

March 2023 (Revised March 2025)
Case

Close Concerns: Diabetes Research and Advocacy

By: Regina Herzlinger and Brian L. Walker

Diagnosed with diabetes at the age of 18, Kelly Close understood the importance of balancing consistency and iteration. This principle had also informed her professional work, which started with a rapid promotion from financial analyst at Goldman Sachs to an analyst... View Details

Keywords: Diabetes; Health; Health Care; Health Care And Treatment; Health Care Outcomes; Health Care Industry; Knowledge Dissemination; Outcome or Result; Equality and Inequality; Business Model; Entrepreneurship

Article

National Trends in the Safety Performance of Electronic Health Record Systems From 2009 to 2018

By: David Classen, A Jay Holmgren, Zoe Co, Lisa Newmark, Diane Seger, Melissa Danforth and David Bates

Importance Despite the broad adoption of electronic health record (EHR) systems across the continuum of care, safety problems persist. Objective To measure the safety performance of operational EHRs in hospitals across the country during a 10-year period. Design,... View Details

Keywords: Electronic Health Record Systems; Health Care and Treatment; Information Technology; Performance; Safety; Measurement and Metrics; United States

May 2009
Case

Global Health Partner: Obesity Care

By: Michael E. Porter, Zayed Muhammed Yasin and Jennifer F Baron

Global Health Partner (GHP) was founded in 2006 as a privately owned health care provider in Sweden serving both public and private paying patients. In contrast to most providers in the country, GHP organized around specific service lines where it saw the potential to... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Medical Specialties; Service Delivery; Organizational Structure; Outcome or Result; Quality; Competitive Advantage; Integration; Health Industry; Sweden

Article

Better Accounting Transforms Health Care Delivery

By: Robert S. Kaplan and Mary L. Witkowski

The paper describes the theory and preliminary results for an action research program that explores the implications from better measurements of health care outcomes and costs. After summarizing Porter's outcome taxonomy (Porter 2010), we illustrate how to use process... View Details

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Research; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry

March 2012 (Revised April 2013)
Case

Schön Klinik: Eating Disorder Care

By: Michael E. Porter, Emma Stanton, Jessica A. Hohman and Caleb Stowell

The Schön Klinik is a private, for-profit German hospital group trying to establish itself as a premium health care provider in a competitive German market. The case details Schön Klinik's founding, its early focus on measurement and improvement, and the design and... View Details

Keywords: Health Care Quality; Outcomes; Quality Improvement; Strategy And Performance Measurement; Integration; Measurement and Metrics; Competition; Health Disorders; Health Care and Treatment; Outcome or Result; Performance Evaluation; Business Processes; Health Industry; Germany

13 Jul 2009
Research & Ideas

Diagnosing the Public Health Care Alternative

Competition among health plans should be based on value for subscribers, where value is the health outcomes achieved per dollar spent. Today, View Details

Keywords: by Staff; Health

Article

Defining the Value Framework for Prostate Brachytherapy Using Patient-Centered Outcome Metrics and Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing

By: N.G. Thaker, T.J. Pugh, U. Mahmood, S. Choi, T.E. Spinks, N.E. Martin, T.T. Sio, R.J. Kudchadker, R. S. Kaplan, D.A. Kuban, D.A. Swanson, P.F. Orio, M.J. Zelefsky, B.W. Cox, L. Potters, T.A. Buchholz, T.W. Feeley and S.J. Frank

PURPOSE: Value, defined as outcomes over costs, has been proposed as a measure to evaluate prostate cancer (PCa) treatments. We analyzed standardized outcomes and time-driven activity-based costing (TDABC) for prostate brachytherapy (PBT) to define a value... View Details

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July 2021 (Revised July 2022)
Case

Brigham & Women's Hospital: Using Patient Reported Outcomes to Improve Breast Cancer Care

By: Robert S. Kaplan, Navraj S. Nagra and Syed S. Shehab

Dr. Andrea Pusic, breast cancer reconstruction surgeon, wants to extend outcomes measurement beyond traditional surgical metrics of infections, complications, and survival rates. The case describes her development of a new mobile phone app, which collects patients’... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Outcome or Result; Cost Management; Activity Based Costing and Management; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Health Testing and Trials; Surveys; Health Industry; Boston

January 2020
Article

Using Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing to Demonstrate Value in Perioperative Care: Recommendations and Review from the Society for Perioperative Assessment and Quality Improvement

By: O. Allin, R. D. Urman, A. F. Edwards, J. D. Blitz, K. J. Pfeifer, T. W. Feeley and A. M. Bader

A shift in health care payment models from volume toward value-based incentives will require deliberate input into systems development from both perioperative clinicians and administrators to ensure appropriate recognition of the value of all services... View Details

Keywords: Value-based Health Care; Outcomes; Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing; Health Care and Treatment; Cost Management; Value; Activity Based Costing and Management