Lifestyle

With the stock market high and profits generous, some Long-term Care Insurance (LTCI) vendors are suggesting that investors take money out of the market and buy the insurance they offer. Though it is true that this might be a good idea for specific groups, for others it is not what they think nor will it be worthwhile.

Sell the Bullets

By

Wars create fortunes. Be the guy who sells the bullets, not the soldier fighting the war.

It's hardly a secret that investing in pre-IPO shares can generate big increases in equity value for stakeholders once a company goes public. However, such opportunities have historically been restricted to a select few. Now, new technology platforms are democratizing pre-IPO investing.

Suppose sick-care had a freemium business model like LinkedIn? Basic services would be free, but patients would pay for premium services.

Something called the Physician's Misery Index is out and the results aren't pretty. Overall, the nationwide PMI is now 3.7 out of 5-meaning that for America's doctors "the scales are tipping from satisfaction to misery."

Health care and biomedical innovation will drag until we move from a reimbursement-driven model to an innovation-driven model. Organizations need to have internal strategies to prepare for the shift.

A California startup offers on-demand house calls for less than $100. More doctors are opting for temporary jobs, and do physician harm patients when they over-simplify? Those stories and more in this week's PMD Critical List.

Many biomedical and health products and services are on the market and their success is driven by best guesses. The only way to know if these assumptions are valid is through commercial and scientific experimentation.

American workers got injured on the job at a rate of 3.3 injuries per 100 full-time workers in 2013, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A look at federal regulations shows how the government compensates workers for different injuries.

Losing Touch

By

We need to be careful that the laying on of hands is not replaced by the tapping of thumbs. If it is, we will have to grapple with the consequences.

The numerical re-framing of our lives has yielded vast increases in knowledge and improved living conditions, but it is a mixed bag of results.

President Obama has publicly stated that he is against excessive and hidden fees for retirement accounts. This is important because if fiduciary rules for retirement plans are not altered, a segment of America will have little in their old age returned to them from these accounts.

The global health care and biomedical research and development landscape is changing quickly. All of these changes present biomedical and health care entrepreneurs opportunities to create new products, services, models, and platforms.

It seems like it's the "all things Warren Buffett" time of year. The celebrated titan of capitalism is revered for his financial smarts, but less well known is the role physicians played in his early success.

The first $1 trillion company might be in sick-care or preventive medicine. However, it won't happen until we change the rules of the game allowing barriers to come down, new ecosystems to evolve and new business models erupt that nourish international innovation adoption and penetration.