Inauguration Day

We’re streaming CNN.com at our offices!   Back to regular blogging...

Forget Bernie Madoff, is Social Security the #1 Ponzi Scheme?

In the wake of the Madoff disaster, I have read some minor op-eds citing Social Security as the biggest Ponzi scheme ever. Really?  Honestly, I would think that this kind of talk might not warrant coverage from CNBC, whose article “The Real ‘Mother’ of All Ponzi Schemes” likens our national safety net for seniors and the...

My Healthcare Options Penalizes Hospitals and Confuses Consumers

Recently, the Massachusetts Health Care Quality and Cost Council unveiled its new website, My Healthcare Options.  While intended to directly support consumers and physicians as a decision-making tool, the site unnecessarily penalizes otherwise good hospitals through inconsistent ratings, by presenting those ratings without context, through...

My Healthcare Options

The long, long, long awaited — and perhaps feared — Massachusetts quality and cost site just launched yesterday, entitled MyHealthcareOptions. Despite a funky stretched out picture on the homepage and a cartoony rating stars that evoke a Mario Brothers outing more than Michelen fine linen, I’ve been having fun poking around the...

MedTouch Clients Awarded More Awards: Award-Winning Sites Continue Their Award-Winning-ness

Three more awards for MedTouch clients St. Dominic Hospital in Jackson, Mississippi; Wolfson Children’s Hospital of Jacksonville, Florida’s Baptist Health; and the Rehabilitation Hospital of the Cape and Islands. CAMBRIDGE, Mass.– MedTouch, a leading provider of interactive, web-based solutions for health care organizations, announced...

Why Smart, Ticked Off Computer Guys Are Looking to Destroy Your Hospital

Having gone through my venture capital financing hazing in the late nineties, one of the features I’ve noticed about businesses that get funded are those which have a “disruptive” model to them.   VCs enjoy the idea that their investments will not only create value for their own businesses but, in the words of a (very...

Engage With Grace: The One Slide Project (Blog Rally)

As my father passed away in a nursing home on Christmas Eve a few years ago, I’m donating our blog today as part of the Engage With Grace Blog Rally. Although we had some of these conversations with my father, I wish we’d had them all.  I would have much preferred to be with him when he passed.  Instead, we were all far away,...

WWDD — What Will Tom Daschle Do?

The former Senator Tom Daschle has been picked for the HHS top spot, and there’s been some excellent speculation — I mean, coverage about what Daschle might do once in office.   I think we often miss the forest for the trees when we talk in these grand policy terms.  Sure, the healthcare system is broken.  I think you’d be...

Winding down our travel season…

Despite travelling extensively, it was a real pleasure to speak at CHPRMS last week.  We had a great session on the changing nature of trust and how social media networks are resetting consumer expectations.  It was a fun time and a great crowd of about 100 people who remained engaged (and awake!) for an hour after lunch. Sometimes...

How to Create a More Just, Two Tiered Healthcare System on the Cheap

You know I love a  solid economic assessment of healthcare: Either Americans in the higher income strata must step up to the cashier’s window to help subsidize, with higher income taxes, the health care of the most hard-working members of the lower income classes, or the United States will have to evolve toward a noticeable two-tiered or...