501derful.org
From HealthIT:
Healthia Inc.
launched Tuesday an online comparison shopping portal for healthcare products
and services. Businesses and consumers in the United
States will be able to use the Web site www.healthia.com to
research and select health insurance plans, health savings accounts (HSAs), and
doctors from across the country, said Chini Krishnan, CEO and co-founder of
Healthia, a startup in Santa Clara, Calif.
Interesting idea. Of course, it’s only as good as the quality of the information in it. But get this: in the section on "doctors" (I looked up oncologists within 15 miles of my zip) there’s a customer review form! You get to rate your doc and comment on him/her. It’s like rating a book or camera. There’s evidently a consumer rating form for each health "product". Well that’s the net for you: participation.
I have been wondering, where is NCQA and URAC? They have been collecting this data and rating providers and health plans for years on basis of results and inconjunction with AHA and ADA. A lot of pieces of the answer already exist, but health care parties do not play well together.
Jennifer, how accessible is that information and does the “patient/consmer” have input? This new movement is part of what I call branding inside-out: brand based on what consumers say about their experience, not by what paid marketers say about them. For lack of anyother way to have a voice, patients might just use this sort of thing–for good or ill.