Health Care's Kodak Moment

by Kim Bellard, July 26, 2017

For those of us of a certain age, a "Kodak moment" connotes a special event that should be captured by a photo.  For younger generations, the term probably doesn't mean anything, because they don't know what Kodak is.  That's why, for some, "Kodak moment" has come to suggest a turning point when big companies and even entire industries can become obsolete. 

Health care could soon be at such a point.

Anthony Jenkins, a former CEO of Barclay's, recently warned that banks could face a Kodak moment soon.  He said they're already seeing a "Uber-moment," where smartphones and contractless cards are transforming the industry.  "The Kodak moment is completely different," Mr. Jenkins explained.  "That’s where customers realize there’s a totally better and different way of doing what they want to do, and the incumbent becomes obsolete."

In a separate speech, Mr. Jenkins elaborated that, due to new technologies, "we can imagine total transformation of the banking system."  He predicted banks have 5 to 15 years to face these challenges, or become irrelevant to their customers.

The "good" news, he added, is that: "Banks can avoid that, but they have to act now, and what they really need to do is think about innovation, but also transformation, doing something radically different."

For "bank" or "banking system" feel free to substitute "doctor/hospital" or "health care system"

Incumbents all-too-often grow protective and/or fail to take advantage of new opportunities.  The irony of disruption, Mr. Jenkins noted, is that it is "actually a great growth opportunity," and that "incumbents are best positioned to seize disruptive opportunities."  

Health care has a number of legacy problems that make it ripe for disruption.  Innovators look at these problems and see opportunities.

The opportunities -- or, threats, depending on one's point-of-view -- on health care's horizon are numerous.  They include:

• Digital health makes real-time information and communication feasible, such as with wearables and telehealth.
• Big Data will help us finally understand what is happening with patients and predict with better accuracy how we can manage our health.
• Robots will take over health care tasks/jobs that humans either don't want to do or lack the required precision to do.
• Artificial intelligence (AI) will be able to make sense of all that Big Data and all the various research studies, and can serve to either augment or, at least in some cases, replace physicians.
• 3D printing will allow us to replace an ever-increasing number of body parts, even systems, and do so with unprecedented speed and affordable cost.
• Nanotechnology will allow us to monitor and maintain us down to a cellular level.

Meanwhile, traditional health care companies -- from providers to middlemen to manufacturers to insurers -- are waiting with some trepidation to see what 21st century behemoths like Amazon or Apple are going to do in their space.  

Disruption might come from innovators within the health care industry, but it might also come from unexpected sources -- and in unexpected ways.  Kodak didn't take digital photography seriously enough, and it certainly wasn't expecting smartphones as the new camera.  

Health should have a number of the old-fashioned Kodak moments -- the birth of a child, a miraculous recovery, achievement of a health goal, and so on.  Whether health care organizations or even the entire health care system suffer the other kind of Kodak moment depends on how (and when) they respond to the disruptive opportunities now available to them.