Posted by Tristan Sedgwick on Fri, Jan 22, 2010
What is the everyday consumer's perception of sustainability in the medical and health categories? Will there be an expectation for environmentally responsible health products alongside the rise of "green" consumer products?
We posed these questions to commuters passing by Farm's World Usability Day exhibit at South Station in Boston. What words come to mind when they think about sustainable medical products?
The word cloud above shows the variety of responses and reoccurring themes. Recyclability, reusability, safety, and disposal were the primary concepts expressed by the respondents.
The commuters we spoke with represented a range of perspectives - from those unfamiliar with sustainability as a "green" concept to those who were founding members of Boston's many "green" organizations.
The exercise prompted a few participants to think about the environmental impact of consumer health products for the first time. Some felt that the concept of a sustainable medical product was contradictory - that the challenges of safety and efficacy were too great to also be concerned about environmental impact. Others spoke about their ongoing concern about the unsustainable environmental impact of single-use medical products being disposed of on a mass scale.
Considered as a whole, this snapshot survey reflects consumer sensitivity to reducing waste (concerns about disposal and preference for re-use and recyclability). A concern for safety was expressed as well, not only for the product's immediate clinical use, but also for the product's long-term impact on human health and the environment.
This observation is supported by the growth of organizations focused on this issue, such as Practice Greenhealth and Health Care Without Harm. Industry is also responding, with medical device companies such as Baxter and Medtronic listed at the top of Newsweek's 2009 Green Rankings, taking steps toward sustainable choices in their product development processes.
Do you expect to see medical and healthcare products influenced by sustainability practices in the future?
Where do you see opportunities for sustainability in the medical and consumer health categories?
Posted by Marc Dubreuil on Wed, Jan 06, 2010
For those of us who make our living in the world of medical product development, the future seems very uncertain based on current economic and political trends.
The struggling economy is forcing venture capitalists (VCs) to find and fund products and opportunities that are less risky and farther down the development and commercialization path. VCs are moving away from early-stage medical devices to later stage and energy investments, where returns may be lower but the exit is visible and predictable.
The FDA is undergoing a culture shift and is trying to get a better handle on the appropriate level of clinical data to support safety and efficacy. Recent news suggests that the 510k process will remain largely unchanged; but anyone who's been waiting on 510k decisions knows that it has become a much more arduous process over the last 18 months.
And what effect will the pending Health Care reform have on the ability of the medical device industry to innovate and introduce new products? In a well researched, documented, and written book by T.R. Reid, titled The Healing of America, the subject takes a page from the experiences in Japan. Japan uses a single national fee schedule that sets fixed prices for all procedures. For example, an MRI in the US costs $1,000 to $1,400. The fixed price for an MRI in Japan is $105. So the Japanese service providers turned to the MRI manufacturers and demanded lower cost equipment. The manufacturers responded with machines with more advanced features that cost about one-tenth the cost of US units. Most of the product innovation in Japan comes from small hospitals associated with large medical schools while medical companies are focused on cost out.
As we start to move more plan participants to public options, will Medicare and Medicaid face the same regulated price limitations? Will the development of new life-saving Health Care technologies be strangled by the system? Will our new product development be driven by cost and not effectiveness? Time will tell.