Experts Share Their Visions for Health Care Industry’s Future

Local health care leaders shared their visions for the future of the industry during a recent panel discussion presented by the Naveen Jindal School of Management at UT Dallas.

The panel discussion “Healthcare Realignment: The Brave New World” explored solutions for managing and leading health care in Dallas-Fort Worth. According to the Dallas Regional Chamber, health care accounts for about 15 percent of the area’s economy.

Panelist Dr. Jeffrey Canose, chief operating officer and senior executive vice president of Texas Health Resources, said that health care systems can be more sustainable by offering more value to its patients and helping them adopt a healthy lifestyle.

“We need to diversify what we offer to the community,” Canose said. “If we are truly about health and well-being, we cannot do that with a 4.62-day snapshot in the life of individual patients who happen to have an acute illness, an exacerbation of a chronic disease or a trauma experience.”

The discussion drew an audience of about 200 people, including students in the Jindal School’s bachelor’s in healthcare management and master’s in healthcare management programs, doctors, administrators, and other professionals.

Dr. Britt Berrett PhD’09, director of the bachelor’s in healthcare management program, moderated the panel. The Dallas-Fort Worth Hospital Council co-hosted the event with the Jindal School in the Davidson Auditorium. DFWHC president and CEO Steve Love gave the opening remarks.

Dr. Paul Hain, North Texas market president for BlueCross BlueShield of Texas, detailed the relationship between health care and the insurance industry. Hain said insurance transformed from a risk aggregator to an industry that helps negotiate favorable contracts for businesses and bears the risk for their employees’ health care.

“We are trying our hardest to protect businesses from the hardship of paying for health care so they can continue to thrive, hire more people and drive our economy,” Hain said. “That’s the reason BlueCross exists.”

Hain said BlueCross helps consumers make better choices for costly medical services such as MRIs — which can range from $500 to $3,000 — by providing transparency tools to help them compare their options.

Hain also said BlueCross helps independent physicians collectives, such as the Genesis Physicians Group, combine resources to keep costs lower than are possible when practices are bought by hospital systems.

Dr. Jim Walton, president and CEO of Genesis Physicians Group, described the role independent physicians will play in the future of health care and how to reconcile market justice with social justice.

“Does the market create justice for people?” Walton asked. “And how do they pay for this expensive, expensive care?”

He said fellow physicians concerned about these problems see the market forces that are driving rapid consolidation of health care businesses as not only a threat to small-business entrepreneurship but as a hindrance to their mission of social justice. He elaborated on the conflict by describing possible motivations of large health care entities.

“It may be more that their mission is to have profitability for the next technology, or the next acquisition, or for the next merger,” Walton said. “There’s some real tension, and we have to have this conversation.”

Walton said collectives of independent physicians are a response to the rapid consolidation of large health care systems. This alternative business strategy gives independent physicians access to capital, which buys them the time and resources to redesign how they provide health care, he said.