Health Care Design Conference - 2013 Boston

I want us all to design healthcare systems that act as an extension of care, rather than a barrier. Treat human beings as the complex souls that we are— rather than a package to be moved through a system as efficiently as possible.

God's Hotel by Victoria Sweet.

Most approaches in reducing healthcare costs focus on efficiency: of the office visit, the hospital stay, the experience. The result (and even the goal) is a care team that spends less time with a patient, rushing through observations and interactions in a fractured way. Humans have their own natural pace and they are more complex than a FedEx package or a table in a database. Like the "slow food" movement? We need to start what Dr. Sweet calls a "slow medicine" movement. Technology in healthcare should be unobtrusive and should support the relationship and interaction between people- because that's the space where care happens. Technology should be used to create more space and time for human interaction, rather than a replacement for it.

A dear friend of mine was recently diagnosed with a brain tumor (glioblastoma) 2.5 weeks after the birth of his second child. I am immensely grateful for fantastic care he's received so far. I'm also grateful for the software apps designed to create and moderate online support communities, fundraise, and help coordinate care and support for patients. The importance of providing really good information on a diagnosis, to quickly and efficiently communicate out to a network of friends and family is so powerful. With web-based support tools we've been able to leverage the love and helplessness we all felt so quickly into action to support. Their journey has just begun, but I'm feeling so grateful that the tools were here from the start to channel their network into action and instantaneous support.

I went to HxD last year with just a few months under our belt at Iora Health. I was inspired by the speakers, and promised to come back and share stories---and also bring an Iora physician with me because I felt like there weren't enough providers at the conference last year.

Innovation is messy. You can hear us talk about our lessons learned- from both our achievements and our cringe-inducing failures-- all without getting your hair mussed. You'll laugh, you'll cry. You'll be entertained. You'll hear people talk fast.