On Wisconsin Healthcare: Exact Sciences Shows What Disruptive Innovation Can Look Like in Healthcare
By Curt Kubiak, President and CEO
How will healthcare delivery be different in 5 to 10 years?
While none of us has a crystal ball, if you explore the idea of disruptive innovation, you’ll find some clues as to what is possible.
Clayton Christensen’s “Disruptive Innovation” theory explains how industries change when something that was once expensive and inaccessible becomes simple, affordable, and widely available. The idea is straightforward: new solutions start out as less expensive or more accessible options and scale overtime, eventually reshaping entire industries. Non-users become users and demand multiplies.
We’ve seen this phenomenon play out before. Netflix allowed us to stream movies instead of renting DVDs, Amazon brought even mundane purchases online for delivery, and Uber made getting a ride as simple as opening an app on your phone.
Each of these ideas opened the door for more people to use a service by making it more accessible and affordable. Consider how healthcare delivery could change in the same way.
Here’s a local example: Exact Sciences.
Exact Sciences transformed cancer screening with its non-invasive colon cancer test, Cologuard®. By allowing patients to screen for cancer at home rather than going in for a procedure, the company dramatically expanded access to early detection and preventive care.
From 2018 to 2021, Exact Sciences’ product helped drive about 77% of the increase in colon cancer screenings in the U.S. More than 19 million people have used the test so far.
Exact Sciences is working on the next step in early cancer detection. Its new test, CancerguardTM, is a blood test designed to help find several types of cancer early. CEO Kevin Conroy says the “golden era” of finding cancer earlier, when it is easier to treat is here.
If you look at the barriers to healthcare, you’ll find the areas ripe for disruption.
Right now, we have nearly 38% of insured Americans skipping care due to cost. Other circumstances also get in the way of easy access for individuals:
- They can't get an appointment when they need one
- They can’t pay the deductible or coinsurance
- They don’t understand their insurance plan or have prior authorization delays
- They’re concerned about surprise bills and unknown costs
When care is expensive and hard to get, people simply don’t seek or receive the care they need.
The biggest potential changes in healthcare delivery could help solve these problems, making getting care faster, simpler, and more affordable.
At the end of the day, we all want the same thing: a healthcare system that works better. Accessibility and affordability affect both patients and providers.
Patients want consistent access to affordable healthcare, and providers want consistent access to patients and proper compensation.
The question for those currently operating in the healthcare system is: Will you help lead the change, or wait to be disrupted?
Sometimes the biggest risk is doing nothing. We all have a choice to be part of building a better healthcare system or watch it happen without us.
Wisconsin has providers, employers, and ideas to build a significantly better model.
However, it will take significant collaboration.
We all need to think differently about what patients really want and what will bring more of them into the system more easily. Start with consumer experience and work backwards toward enabling processes and technology.
The question is no longer whether disruptive innovation can happen in healthcare.
The real question is what will the next disruptive idea be to make healthcare more affordable and accessible — and who will work together to make it happen?
Do you have other examples of disruptive innovation you’d like to share? Reach out at OnWisconsinHealthcare@the-alliance.org.
Curt Kubiak is the President and CEO of The Alliance, a non-for-profit cooperative that helps employers save money on their healthcare spend. After an early career in the manufacturing sector, Kubiak has spent nearly two decades as an executive in the healthcare industry in Wisconsin.
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