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How Amazon Could Change Healthcare for Providers & Patients
Amazon’s recent decision to team up with Berkshire Hathaway and JP Morgan Chase to jointly reduce the healthcare spending of more than one million employees and their families sparked a ferocious debate. Proponents have referred to the move as “disruptive,” meaning that Amazon has the ability to transform healthcare as we know it today. Skeptics, on the other hand, point to Amazon’s lack of expertise in healthcare and predict that the company will be unable to materially impact a sector that is historically resistant to change.
The question becomes, if Amazon does succeed in changing healthcare, what does that change involve?
Robert S. Huckman, a professor of business administration at Harvard Business School and faculty chair of HBS Health Care Initiative, contends that Amazon’s biggest impact would be improving how care is delivered to patients. With Amazon Prime, the company has demonstrated its ability to make routine transactions seamless and reliable. Could it do the same to healthcare, by addressing administrative hassle and scheduling changes in one place?
Huckman also sees opportunity for Amazon to make healthcare more accessible through its Whole Foods retail footprint, by offering services found at retail clinics similar to CVS’s MinuteClinic or Walgreens. And Amazon’s same-day delivery in certain markets could make the delivery of prescriptions along with groceries a real possibility. Finally, Amazon’s ability to capture data and analyze it is another way the company could transform healthcare, according to Huckman.
“The company’s path forward in this sector is marked by many uncertainties,” Huckman notes. “To the extent that success in transforming health care requires a deeper institutional knowledge of health, medicine, and insurance, Amazon may face an uphill battle. If, however, the key to success lies in greater attention to operational execution, data analysis, and customer service, Amazon may find a significant opportunity.”
For questions, comments or concerns, please contact Jennifer Duell Popovec
