Health Affairs Series

InHealth sponsors a series of periodic interviews that are featured in Health Affairs’ Web Exclusives. Health Affairs is a leading health policy journal published by Project Hope in Bethesda, Md. The following interviews are with leaders of the biomedical and medical technology sectors and focus on individuals who are either innovators in their own right or are in a position to foster novel research.

• John Brown
• Clayton Christensen
• E. James Potchen and Bill Clarke
• Dane Miller
• David Baltimore
• Alfred Mann
• Elias Zerhouni

John Brown. May 1, 2007. Consumerism is not coming to the orthopedic implant business -- it has already arrived. So says John Brown, chairman of the board for Stryker Corporation and current chairman of InHealth. “Because of the knowledge gained through the Internet, sophisticated patients and their families know who are the manufacturers, who are the leading surgeons, and they insist on getting the best surgeon and best product,” Brown tells Rob Burns, a professor of health care systems and management at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Brown also argues that the media have exaggerated safety and conflict-of-interest concerns about the medical device industry. Health Affairs John Brown Article

Clayton Christensen. March 13, 2007. Clayton Christensen is one of America's most influential business thinkers and writers. A professor at Harvard Business School, Christensen is perhaps best known for his writings on disruptive innovation in such books as The Innovator's Dilemma and The Innovator's Solution. In this interview with the California HealthCare Foundation's Mark Smith, he argues that the answer for more affordable health care will come not from an injection of more funding but, rather, from innovations that aim to make more and more areas of care cheaper, simpler, and more in the hands of patients. Health Affairs Christensen Article

E. James Potchen and Bill Clarke. February 13, 2007. John Iglehart, Health Affairs founding editor, interviews a representative of academe (E. James Potchen) and one from industry (Bill Clarke) discuss the ways in which their interests intersect for the good of U.S. patients. The focus here is on imaging, which shows great promise in transforming medical treatment from invasive practices involving hospital stays to imaging procedures that can be performed easily and safely on outpatients. Subjects include the state of the industry, coming innovations, and the contributions payers (including Medicare) can make as they struggle with rising costs and difficult-to-quantify payoffs. Health Affairs Potchen and Clarke Article

Dane Miller. May 18, 2006. Rob Burns talks with Dane Miller, former CEO of Biomet, about challenges posed by new technology in the orthopedic devices area. One key challenge is the rising cost and use of orthopedic devices at a time when providers are facing decreased profitability and reimbursement for orthopedic services. Another challenge is the long-term time horizon needed to gauge product success that contrasts with payers’ and providers’ short-term horizon. A third challenge is heightened governmental scrutiny of device makers’ relationships with orthopedic surgeons. This interview was conducted before Miller left Biomet in March 2006. Health Affairs Miller Article

David Baltimore. May 16, 2006. As a man with equal interests in science and science policy, David Baltimore has been at the forefront of many of the important debates that have shaped science since the 1970s. Very much engaged in the initial discussions about the use of recombinant DNA technology, Baltimore had a front-row seat as the biotechnology industry developed. He was also a major player in the decision that resulted in funding of the Human Genome Project by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Baltimore discusses biotechnology, science education, and the need for a strong dialogue among scientists and scholars in the health policy community. Health Affairs Baltimore Article

Alfred Mann. March 14, 2006. In this wide-ranging interview, Alfred Mann describes the activities of medical technology enterprises with which he is engaged. Several are companies that he formed. One is the nonprofit Alfred E. Mann Foundation for Biomedical Engineering that is establishing research-oriented institutes on university campuses and supporting their work in developing marketable innovations. Mann discusses the need to consider the cost implications of technology, in the context of U.S. health system reform, and describes several important innovations that have emerged from his companies over the years. Health Affairs Mann Article

Elias Zerhouni. March 9, 2006. National Institutes of Health (NIH) director Elias Zerhouni is pushing hard for innovation and the risk taking required to make major leaps in medicine. Fully attuned to cutting-edge work that crosses disciplines, he cites nanotechnology, clinical databases designed to answer research questions, systems biology, and an openness to radical ideas among his top priorities. The NIH director’s job, he says, "is to have a vision." This requires leveraging NIH funding so that money is spent more wisely and has a cumulative effect on population health. Knowledge can be extracted from science, and health system transformation is made possible. Health Affairs Zerhouni Article