Publications

September 2016
Case

Health Leads: Reaching for Impact (Abridged)

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Sarah Appleby

A nonprofit in the healthcare arena explores strategies to achieve system-level impact. Founded in 1996 with a volunteer-staffed help desk at Boston Medical Center connecting low-income patients with basic resources like heating assistance, job training, and childcare... View Details

Keywords: Scaling Social Enterprise; Scaling Social Impact; Health Care Delivery; Health Care Outcomes; Health Care Reform; Nonprofit; Nonprofit Scaling; Social Enterprise; Health Care and Treatment; Nonprofit Organizations; Growth and Development Strategy; Health Industry; United States

March 2018
Case

University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center: Managing Capacity in Neurology

By: Joel Goh, Robert S. Huckman and Nikhil Sahni

In December 2014, Dr. Anthony Furlan, chair of the Department of Neurology at University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center (UH), faced a mandate from the hospital’s executive leadership team. Specifically, all UH departments were directed to take steps within six... View Details

Keywords: Health Care; Hospitals; Capacity Planning; Scheduling; Health Care and Treatment; Service Operations; Performance Capacity; Health Industry; North America; United States; Ohio; Cleveland

September 2016
Case

Health Leads: Reaching for Impact (A)

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Sarah Appleby

Explores strategies to achieve system-level impact for a nonprofit focused on addressing patients' basic social needs through healthcare institutions. Founded in 1996 with a volunteer-staffed help desk at Boston Medical Center connecting low-income patients with basic... View Details

Keywords: Scaling Social Impact; Nonprofit; Healthcare; Health Care Outcomes; Health Care Reform; Health Care Delivery; Scaling Social Enterprise; Social Enterprise; Health; Nonprofit Organizations; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; United States

May 2025 (Revised May 2025)
Case

Humana Commits to Value-Based Care

By: V.G. Narayanan, Henry Eyring and David Lane

In late 2023, CEO Bruce Broussard reviewed health insurer Humana’s transformation into a value-based care ecosystem. Under its CenterWell brand, the several millions of members in Humana Medicare Advantage plans now had access to Humana-provided primary care, home... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Business Units; Financing and Loans; Innovation Strategy; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Operations; Mergers and Acquisitions; Insurance; Health Care and Treatment; Partners and Partnerships; Health Industry; Insurance Industry; United States

May 2012 (Revised August 2014)
Case

McKesson

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and Natalie Kindred

McKesson, a large, diversified drug distribution and health care IT company, is considering development of new business offerings to help private practice physicians remain independent. The company, with $122 billion in 2010 revenues, just made its first foray into... View Details

Keywords: Health Care Industry; Health Care Policy; Organizational Transformations; Health Services; Health Care and Treatment; Business Model; Service Operations; Change Management; Corporate Strategy; Information Technology; Policy; Pharmaceutical Industry; Health Industry; United States

September 2016
Supplement

Health Leads: Reaching for Impact (B)

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Sarah Appleby

The (B) case documents the development of a strategy to achieve system-level impact in a rapidly changing healthcare landscape for a nonprofit focused on addressing patients' basic social needs through healthcare institutions. Founded in 1996 with a volunteer-staffed... View Details

Keywords: Scaling Social Impact; Scaling Social Enterprise; Health Care Delivery; Health Care Outcomes; Nonprofit Scaling; Nonprofit; Social Enterprise; Social Entrepreneurship; Health Care and Treatment; Nonprofit Organizations; Growth and Development Strategy; Health Industry; United States

Article

Are Cost Advantages from a Modern Indian Hospital Transferable to the United States?

By: R. S. Kaplan, F. Erhun, V.G. Narayanan, B. Mistry and K. Brayton, et al

We use time-driven activity-based costing to estimate the cost of personnel and space for an elective coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery at two U.S. hospitals, Intermountain and Baylor Heart, and Narayana Health (NH), in India. All three hospitals use modern... View Details

Keywords: Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing; Health Care and Treatment; Cost; Organizational Structure; Performance Efficiency; India; United States

Read Now

August 2010 (Revised March 2012)
Case

The UCLA Medical Center: Kidney Transplantation

By: Michael E. Porter, Jennifer F Baron, Jacob Mathew Chacko and Robin Jian Tang

In 2010, organ transplantation remained among the few sets of medical conditions in the U.S. for which bundled payments were a dominant reimbursement model, and for which patient health outcomes were universally measured and reported. In 1986, UCLA Medical Center was... View Details

Keywords: Insurance; Health Care and Treatment; Health Disorders; Measurement and Metrics; Outcome or Result; Competitive Strategy; Integration; Health Industry; California

10 Oct 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, October 10, 2017

watch a series of real, crime-related videos (while the control group watches non-crime-related videos). Not previously victimized participants exposed to the treatment video show significant changes in... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

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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February 1999 (Revised March 2000)
Case

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center: Coordinating Patient Care

External cost pressures are motivating the adoption of case management (CM) at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), but several of the organization's key professional groups are working against it. President and CEO David Dolins must decide whether CM is... View Details

Keywords: Organizational Change and Adaptation; Service Operations; Organizational Culture; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; Boston

31 Mar 2009
First Look

First Look: March 31, 2009

http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu/b01/en/common/item_detail.jhtml?id=309090 Lan Airlines in 2008: Connecting the World to Latin America Harvard Business School Case 709-410 Lan Airlines operates three distinct models: low-cost for domestic... View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

August 2024
Case

Pioneering Pain Management: CWC Alliance Combats the Opioid Epidemic

By: Susanna Gallani, Karen L. Sedatole and Sarah Mehta

Set in March 2024, this case is about CWC Alliance (CWC), a nonprofit working to prevent opioid addiction in the U.S. Founder Cammie Wolf Rice launched CWC in 2018 after her son, Christopher Wolf, died of a heroin overdose. Wolf’s dependence on opioids stemmed from a... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Innovation and Invention; Jobs and Positions; Nonprofit Organizations; Expansion; Growth and Development Strategy; Service Delivery; Mission and Purpose; Health Industry; United States; Georgia (state, US); Atlanta

03 Oct 2023
Research Event

Build the Life You Want: Arthur Brooks and Oprah Winfrey Share Happiness Tips

center of it all. And whether that faith is in organized religion or whether it is in whatever you call a higher power or nature or the divine or what whatever it is, just knowing that you are not the View Details

Keywords: by HBS Staff

30 May 2024
Research & Ideas

Racial Bias Might Be Infecting Patient Portals. Can AI Help?

one Black, who message the same primary care practice could receive responses from entirely different members of their care teams. Though focused on one institution, the Boston Medical Center study... View Details

Keywords: by Ben Rand; Health

May 2009 (Revised October 2009)
Case

Newton-Wellesley Hospital

By: Richard M.J. Bohmer and Natalie Kindred

How will Newton-Wellesley Hospital (NWH) preserve its private practice tradition while remaining effective and competitive in a healthcare industry demanding increasing integration between physicians and hospitals? This is the decision facing Newton-Wellesley Hospital... View Details

Keywords: Business Model; Profit; Health Care and Treatment; Growth and Development Strategy; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Structure; Competitive Strategy; Integration; Health Industry; Massachusetts