The Northern Chicago HBA Chapter initiated the HBA’s program year with an educational event entitled: Digital Health: A Driving Force for New Solutions and Engagement Across the Health Continuum, sponsored by Baxter International with 151 participants. Panel speakers included: Ann Carter, VP, Global Purchasing and Supplier Management, Baxter Healthcare; Michael Senical, Associate Director, Strategy and Innovation, Corporate Strategy and Planning, Astellas; Katie Lestan, Divisional Vice President, Health Systems at Walgreens; and Daniel J. Gandor, Director, U.S. Customer Experience, Oncology & Virology, AbbVie.
The panel addressed what digital health is (and isn’t), how it is being utilized across the healthcare landscape today, and how this will affect the way we work in the future. Digital health holds the promise for radically changing the way we engage with patients, payers, and providers and ultimately deliver healthcare. Key takeaways included:
- Digital health crosses the span of all aspects of healthcare and supply chain of any healthcare organization and experience. It is something that all the organizations are challenged to incorporate.
- Digital health challenges organizations to keep evolving.
- An organization that is doing things well brings in leaders from the tech industry—one example is the Providence Health System as they brought in Aaron Martin from Amazon to ensure that their system was innovative.
- The patient and HCP customer journeys are important, and the companies that will be successful will have this built into their DNA.
- Each of us is involved in digital health whether personally or through our organizations.
