My conversation today is with Will Shrank, MD. Dr. Shrank led the evaluation group at CMMI (Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation). He has spent time in the private sector, first at CVS Health and UPMC (University of Pittsburgh Medical Center) as chief medical officer of the health plan in Pittsburgh, and then as the chief medical officer for Humana. Now he is a venture partner at Andreessen Horowitz and doing some consulting for CMMI.

We start out this conversation talking about waste in healthcare. In fact, Dr. Shrank was on a team who did a study (link in show notes) about waste in the US healthcare system. (The article is, unfortunately, paywalled.) In that study, it says estimates suggest we have upwards of a trillion dollars of waste a year.

This waste can be categorized into administrative and clinical failures. Dr. Shrank emphasizes the need for aligning incentives with higher quality care, paying for patient outcomes, and highlights the potential rising power of PCPs. The discussion covers the progress made towards value-based care, the challenges faced by the current fee-for-service model, and the future landscape of primary care and healthcare delivery.

In sum, we have a waste problem in this country. Aligning incentives might be one way to curb that waste.

=== LINKS === 🔗 Show Notes with all mentioned links: https://cc-lnk.com/Encore413

🔗 Healthcare Industry Acronyms and Terms https://relentlesshealthvalue.com/healthcare-acronymns

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