What's wrong with healthcare today?
Much of the national healthcare debate focuses on macro issues such as tax policy, "administrative simplification" and electronic medical records.

But we think the problem is much simpler:
      The process of healthcare is broken at the patient level.

For patients, seeking and receiving healthcare ranges from confusing, to frustrating...to infuriating.  For instance:

• 50% of patients leaving a physician appointment are confused about what they've been told, and what they are supposed to do.¹

• Patients have an average of 23 seconds to talk before their doctor cuts them off.²

• Only 17% of Americans know what a primary care physician is.

• About 40% of patients attempt to self-navigate the system, and more than 60% of these wind up at the wrong specialist, resulting in unnecessary cost and delayed diagnosis and treatment.³

Quantum Health was founded by professionals with expertise in consumer behavior, who conducted more than 3,000 interviews with recent users of healthcare.  We identified specific gaps in the process − where patients get "lost in the system," seek or receive duplicate procedures, and spend unnecessary days in the hospital.  Our conclusion:

18-20% of healthcare events never needed to occur,
and can be avoided through better coordination
of the process of healthcare

Physicians are not the problem.  They often provide superior medical diagnosis and direction.  But as many physicians have told us, they have an average of 7-10 minutes to spend with each patient, and don't have the resources or expertise to guide the patient between office visits or other provider touchpoints. 

Physicians are routinely shocked when we show them what their patients really did − or didn't do − after leaving their office or receiving their medical direction in the hospital.

And frankly, it's usually not the patient's fault, either.  They're doing the best they can to follow complex instructions given by multiple providers whose diagnostics, lab results, diagnoses and directions are not inter-connected.

The problem is lack of coordination in a complex system.

By understanding the sources of this patient confusion and mis-direction, we have developed  "coordinated healthcare programs" that are focused on coordinating information and activities between patients, families, physicians, and their office staffs.  Patients receive better guidance and information, and health plans using this approach have seen significant savings by reducing unnecessary duplication and delays.