Publications

Register to Read

January 2, 2020
Article

Medicare for All or Public Option: Can Either Heal Health Care?

By: Regina E. Herzlinger and James Wallace

The United States has serious health care problems: More than 27 million uninsured people, costs that are growing faster than income, and a staggering $37 trillion of unfunded liabilities in the Medicare program. Perhaps most alarming: The US ranks lowest among... View Details

Keywords: Healthcare; Public Option; Medicare; Health Care and Treatment; Insurance; Cost Management; Problems and Challenges; United States

Read Now

December 2011 (Revised December 2011)
Case

Cancer Treatment Centers of America: Scaling the Mother Standard of Care

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Matthew Bird

The CEO of a private and growing national network of specialty care hospitals focusing on advanced-stage and complex cancer treatments reflected on the firm's past phase of growth before meeting with the company's Chairman and founder to discuss how to further scale... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Business Growth and Maturation; Medical Specialties; Service Delivery; Innovation and Invention; Health Industry

September 2013
Article

Converging to the Lowest Common Denominator in Physical Health

By: Leslie K. John and Michael I. Norton

Objective: This research examines how access to information on peer health behaviors affects one's own health behavior. Methods: We report the results of a randomized field experiment in a large corporation in which we introduced walkstations (treadmills... View Details

Keywords: Information; Behavior; Decision Choices and Conditions; Health; Health Industry

Read Now

31 Jan 2007
News

'Four Cornerstones' Will Transform Health

10 Aug 2022
News

Can Amazon Remake Health Care?

April 1978 (Revised May 1993)
Teaching Note

Child Care Task Force, Teaching Note

By: Regina E. Herzlinger

Keywords: Welfare; Health Industry

2017
Article

Organizational Support for Learning and Contribution to Improvement by Frontline Staff

By: Olivia Jung, Andrea Blasco and Karim R. Lakhani

Keywords: Tournaments; Innovation; Health Care Delivery

January 2001
Case

Merck Global Health Initiatives (A)

By: James E. Austin, Diana Barrett and James Weber

The case series focuses on Merck's drug donation program and then raises new issues facing management about what to do about HIV/AIDS in Africa given the company's development of a new therapy. Describes collaboration among many parties including the Gates Foundation,... View Details

Keywords: Programs; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Health Disorders; Health Care and Treatment; Private Sector; Public Sector; Alliances; Problems and Challenges; Pharmaceutical Industry; Botswana

10 Mar 2015
News

UCLA Researchers for the first Time Measure the Cost of Care for a Common Prostate Condition

September 2014
Supplement

Pfizer and AstraZeneca: Marketing an Acquisition (B)

By: John A. Quelch and James Weber

This (B) case provides a brief description of the outcome of the (A) case. View Details

Keywords: Health Care Policy; Pharmaceutical Sales; Mergers And Acquisitions; Marketing; Pharmaceutical Industry; United Kingdom; United States

08 Apr 2011
News

Management Matters In Health Care, Too

The road to higher-quality, lower-cost health care leads straight to better management. That was the central message a panel of experts convened by the HBS Health View Details

Keywords: Roger Thompson; Ambulatory Health Care Services; Ambulatory Health Care Services

September 2007
Case

Reading Rehabilitation Hospital: Implementing Patient-Focused Care (B)

By: Roy D. Shapiro

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry

June 2014 (Revised February 2017)
Case

Kathy Giusti and the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation

By: Richard G. Hamermesh, Joshua D. Margolis and Matthew G. Preble

What do you do when your rising professional career is cut short by an unexpected cancer diagnosis? Kathy Giusti shifted careers, built a new organization that transformed how cancer research is done, and now faces the challenge of sustaining the organization and its... View Details

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

May 2021
Article

Making Doctors Effective Managers and Leaders: A Matter of Health and Well-Being

By: Lisa Rotenstein, Robert S. Huckman and Christine K. Cassel

The COVID-19 crisis has forced physicians to make daily decisions that require knowledge and skills they did not acquire as part of their biomedical training. Physicians are being called upon to be both managers—able to set processes and structures—and leaders—capable... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Management; Leadership; Health Pandemics; Health Industry

March 2015
Case

The I-PASS Patient Handoff Program

By: Robert S. Huckman and Michael Norris

In 2015, the I-PASS Patient Handoff Program Team, led by six pediatricians around the U.S., had to determine the best way to disseminate their program that had been proven to reduce communication errors in patient handoffs in hospital settings. Should they turn it into... View Details

Keywords: Health Care; Hospitals; Operations Improvement; Entrepreneurship; Health Care and Treatment; Health Industry; United States