Can Web 2.0
reform healthcare?
Prof. Vance Wilson
Arizona State University
An electronic copy of this presentation is available online at
http://vancewilson.com
Web 2.0: What is it anyway?

Web 2.0 term was coined five years ago to describe a new
wave of HIGHLY SUCCESSFUL web applications which
apply web technologies in novel ways; these include:
 social networking: 200 million active Facebook users
 wikis: Wikipedia had 67 million unique visitors in 9/2009
 podcasts: PodcastAlley.com lists 4.7 million episodes
 video sharing: YouTube streams over 1.2 billion per day
 blogs: over 900,000 blogs are posted every day
 microblogs: over 5.5 billion tweets have now been sent
 mashups: Trulia, NewsMap, Twittervision
Can Web 2.0 Reform Healthcare?
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What does Web 2.0 offer business?

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Promotes business objectives
 Generates buzz
Distributes information
 Replaces or augments printed materials
Increases capabilities
 Podcasts, online videos, and mashups inexpensively
extend business reach
Supports collaboration
 Social networking and blogs make it easy to interact
Motivates participation
 Inherently more interesting than bulletin boards, etc.
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Why focus on healthcare?

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Healthcare is a HUGE
industry, accounting for
16-18% of U.S. GDP in
2009 and projected to
grow at 7.3% per year
through 2013
IT investments are
growing FASTER than
overall healthcare, so
funds exist to support
Web 2.0 expenditures
Can Web 2.0 Reform Healthcare?
Healthcare IT
Investment
Projection
$35
billion
$16.4
billion
2005
2011
BCC Research
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Why focus on healthcare?


Healthcare is in the NEWS
Broad agreement exists
that healthcare needs to be
REFORMED* in order to
provide greater access,
restrain cost growth, and
improve quality
 Yet NONE of the conventional solutions being offered to
reform healthcare gives much consideration to the role
that Web 2.0 applications might play
* A Google search on “health care crisis” produces 45 million results
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Who is building Web 2.0 apps
in the healthcare domain,
and what do they plan
to accomplish?
Personal health records

Goal: to let everyone securely store and manage medical
information for themselves and their families online

Can Web 2.0 Reform Healthcare?
If you prefer a different flavor, Google
is also developing a PHR product
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Health Q&A platform

Coming in 2010: Builds on success of WebMD and Dr.
Oz show by supplying expert answers and blog-style
commentary to participants’ health questions

“Leveraging the power of social networking . . .
contributors ‘share care’ through personal experience
and expert knowledge”

Supported by Discovery
Communications, Harpo
Productions, and Sony
Pictures Television
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Medical knowledge wiki
Translation: Get a note from your doctor

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Free medical knowledge base . . .
 Can be read by anyone, but primarily targeted to support
medical professionals
 Can be edited by any registered medical practitioner in the
UK, Canada, Ireland, Australia, or New Zealand
All content (over 6500 topic pages) and administration (~450
editors) is provided by volunteers

Sermo, an online community of ~115,000 U.S.
medical doctors, provides similar opportunities
for professional interaction in non-wiki format
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Experience matching

“Like a Facebook for those who suffer from multiple
sclerosis, Lou Gehrig's disease and other ailments . . .
allows patients to share stories, treatments, drug side
effects and more”
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Online communication

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Communication between patients and clinical staff
Enhanced online services, including prescription refills,
lab test results, appointment scheduling, and payment
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Epidemic mapping

Utilizes an automatic text processing system to aggregate
data by disease and display by location through a mashup
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Cost transparency

Online marketplaces for medical testing and broad-ranging
services; provides an important step toward increasing
consumer power in healthcare markets
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We know that
 Web 2.0 apps are popular overall
 Healthcare is in crisis & needs reform
 Numerous Web 2.0 apps are now
being targeted toward healthcare
So . . . how much reform can simple
software actually generate, given
several key barriers that exist?
Can Web 2.0 Reform Healthcare?
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Barrier: The healthcare industry is slow to
accept change, especially involving IT

Historically, healthcare has lagged general business in IT
investment by approximately a decade
 Current increased investments are targeted largely
toward electronic medical records and other “back-shop”
IT, not toward Web 2.0 apps

HOWEVER, application development is being funded
largely by organizations outside healthcare (Microsoft,
Google, Sony Television, and independent start-ups)

This effectively bypasses the role of healthcare industry
in accepting or rejecting initial Web 2.0 capabilities
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Barrier: Healthcare is about medical
procedures, not keeping patients happy
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Historically, medical practice has focused on cures rather
than prevention
Patients have been viewed as compliant subjects of
treatments rather than partners in the process
HOWEVER, many modern health conditions, such as
Type 2 diabetes, are addressed better by prevention
tactics which can be supported by Web 2.0 apps
Increasingly, patients are informed consumers and want
to actively participate in decisions about their healthcare
The BANKING industry presented similar barriers in the
early 1990s; banks that stayed offline are now defunct
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Barrier: Patients are happy with the
current healthcare system

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80% of Americans are satisfied with the quality of health
care they receive (Gallup Poll, 9/2009)
HOWEVER, patients are not happy about the current
availability of online access to their healthcare providers
(WSJ/Harris Poll, 9/2006)
 Three-quarters want online access to see lab results,

communicate with physicians, schedule appointments
and receive documents
Over half of patients surveyed say online access
would influence their choice of doctors
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Barrier: Patients have little individual
power to change the healthcare system

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Due to the way healthcare payments are structured in
the U.S., patients have had relatively little consumer
market power compared to other major purchases, such
as appliances, automobiles, and houses
HOWEVER, the U.S. insurance industry is moving
toward consumer-directed health plans which require
patients to pay directly for routine care
Web 2.0 applications increase consumer power by
 Providing ratings of physicians, clinics, and hospitals
 Increasing transparency of services and charges
 Automating the process of acquiring a new provider
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Returning to the original question:
Can Web 2.0 reform healthcare?
Discussion
Can Web 2.0 Reform Healthcare?
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Can Web 2.0 reform healthcare?
An electronic copy of this
presentation is available
online at
http://vancewilson.com
Can Web 2.0 Reform Healthcare?
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