Stamen Popov, the Novartis Oncology Business Unit Head for Bulgaria & Macedonia was a keynote speaker at Webit.Festival 2017. His keynote covered the topics about the “from cost to value ” conversion in healthcare and treatment.
Healthcare spending is increasing faster than than the current economic climate’s capabilities
Many countries are concerned that higher spending doesn’t lead to proportionally better outcomes. Healthcare systems waste a significant amount of resources that limits the fiscal space and hinders performance. The largest percent of wasted resources goes to over-hospitalization, over-examinations and over-prescription of pills. Waste is also created by inefficient or flawed rules, overly bureaucratic procedures and poor execution or lack of best practices, e.g. effective preventive care or patient safety, low volume for specific treatments per hospital, etc.
Mr Popov made a point that the most expensive pill appears to be the one which hasn’t delivered any positive effects to the patient. The pricing in the industry has to start evolving with accordance to the fast paced changes in technology and the development of new ways of treatment. Companies should to be paid for a result delivered, not for a specific pill. A shift needs to be made in pricing, away from what has been a transactional approach to a value-based approach. That should mean focusing on the outcomes and really communicating the value of the medicines and pricing them accordingly. Care routed in outdated habits, ignoring scientific findings and motivated by something other than optimal care shouldn’t be the care of today.
Focusing on value-based care, reducing waste and directing investments to the point where greater value can be produced is critical for sustainability.
Universal health care aspirations will be hard to materialize if we don’t shift to value-based care and change policies to support this shift. This change requires collaboration with every member of the healthcare ecosystem and better public-private partnership. Healthcare systems should stimulate more effective treatment results with the help of all parties involved in the process – patients, medics, researchers, healthcare providers and pharma companies.
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