Consolidation in health care has been increasing for some time and is now quite extensive in the Greater Seattle market. Some of this comes from mergers and acquisitions, but an important part also comes from larger organizations gaining market share from smaller competitors. As a result, the greater Seattle health care market is now dominated by three large organizations University of Washington (UW) Medicine, Providence St. Joseph Health, and Kaiser Permanente formerly Group Health Cooperative.
These three organizations who are fighting over market shares in Seattle have all faced budget shortfalls in recent years which have lead to waves of layoffs, high leadership turnover, clinic closures, and in the case of Group Health, an acquisition by Kaiser Permanente which essentially dissolves the iconic cooperative, founded nearly 70 years ago with the mission of providing integrated health care and health coverage to Northwest residents. There are many reasons these organizations are caught in red oceans which I will …show more content…
They are doing so by increasingly adopting technological innovation that have similar outcomes to more traditional approaches but are significantly more expensive. Hospitals, seeking surgical volume, find it difficult to resist surgeons' preferences for robotic surgery for instance, even without favorable direct reimbursement, and surgeons feel compelled to keep up with market demands so as not to lose patients. Undeniably, the use of robotic assistance in surgery has expanded exponentially since it was first introduced more than decade ago. Robotic assisted surgeries shares the same risks of open and laparoscopic surgery. On top of that, there are additional risks that are unique to the robotic system. Not only is there potential for human error in operating the robotic technology, but an added risk of mechanical failure is also
These three organizations who are fighting over market shares in Seattle have all faced budget shortfalls in recent years which have lead to waves of layoffs, high leadership turnover, clinic closures, and in the case of Group Health, an acquisition by Kaiser Permanente which essentially dissolves the iconic cooperative, founded nearly 70 years ago with the mission of providing integrated health care and health coverage to Northwest residents. There are many reasons these organizations are caught in red oceans which I will …show more content…
They are doing so by increasingly adopting technological innovation that have similar outcomes to more traditional approaches but are significantly more expensive. Hospitals, seeking surgical volume, find it difficult to resist surgeons' preferences for robotic surgery for instance, even without favorable direct reimbursement, and surgeons feel compelled to keep up with market demands so as not to lose patients. Undeniably, the use of robotic assistance in surgery has expanded exponentially since it was first introduced more than decade ago. Robotic assisted surgeries shares the same risks of open and laparoscopic surgery. On top of that, there are additional risks that are unique to the robotic system. Not only is there potential for human error in operating the robotic technology, but an added risk of mechanical failure is also