Making the Triple Aim a Common Vision
The core ideas of what the IHI calls the Triple Aim were articulated by Robert Ebert, Dean of Harvard Medical School in 1965. Our understanding of the Triple Aim was accelerated by two important books, To Err is Human (1999) and Crossing the Quality Chasm (2001),...
Lean Supports Healthcare Service and Leadership
It is paradoxical that despite all of the opportunities for professional satisfaction in healthcare, Â one of the issues of greatest concern that challenges the Triple Aim is the emotional health and happiness of healthcare professionals. Healthcare is populated by...
In Defense of Lean
Rarely do you see a clinician, researcher, teacher, philosopher, ethicist and writer all bundled up in one person inside one white coat. Jerome Groopman has been such a person. Dr. Groopman and his wife Dr. Pamela Hartzband, an endocrinologist, are one of healthcare’s...
Where Healthcare Should Focus in 2016
I have been looking forward to 2016 and asking myself where healthcare should focus in the year ahead. In this connection, Don Berwick’s speech at the 27th Annual IHI Forum had a profound effect on me. You can watch it on YouTube. I appreciated his insightful and...
The ACA, Five Years In
A recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine offers us food for thought as we contemplate the Affordable Care Act (ACA) at five years and look forward to its next challenges in 2016. If you have not read it, the article is entitled “Health Care Reform’s...
Optimism or Hope?
During the week after I had given a very positive review of the 27th IHI Forum in my weekly “Healthcare Musings” I received an email comment from one of the regular readers who wrote to me saying that he admired my optimism, but he just did not feel it. The comment...
The Digital Doctor, 2016
One of the many lists forecasting what will happen in the New Year predicted that in 2016 many patients will begin  consulting a Digital Doctor by using a health app for the first time. The article also predicted a big rise in the use of video visits and video...
Magic Johnson: A Triple Aim Hall-of-Famer
One of the highlights for me at the recent 27th IHI Forum in Orlando was the opportunity to see Magic Johnson and to hear him speak. Magic Johnson is one huge man. More impressive than his size-15 feet or his massive shoulders is the breadth and the warmth of his...
Healthcare and Behavioral Economics
When you live in a small town that is at least a half hour away from “big box stores” and other commercial outlets you begin to develop some shopping efficiencies. Recently, before driving the one hundred miles south to Boston for me to attend a meeting, my wife and I...Case Study – Elizabeth Mcarthy
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