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Joe Hage
🔥 Find me at MedicalDevicesGroup.net 🔥
May 2019
We cool to talk about money now?
2 min reading time

Back in the day I was told, “You can’t talk about money as it relates to medical devices.”

Leaning in, they whispered the follow up.

“Don’t insult the doctor’s integrity. It’s not about the money,” they winked. “They are in this business to help people. Talk about that.”

They told me these were fair game for discussion:
• Features and benefits
• Improving patient outcomes
• Connectivity to EMRs, meaningful use (this was years ago)
• Save time, see more patients
• … add your safe topic here.

READY FOR PRIME TIME?

Eighteen months ago, a client willing to “go there.” I was their medical device marketing consultant. We wrote:

We know. It’s uncouth to bring economics into a proper conversation about improving patient outcomes. But unless your hospital is convinced [our product] is clinically superior AND economically feasible, it ain’t gonna happen.

Well, [product] is economically feasible. And here is the solid economic case for bringing [it] to your institution.

We hyperlinked to a responsive cost calculator with comparisons to in-program hospitals and estimated cost savings.

Here’s what it looked like.

(Let me know if you want me to build a similar one for you.)

WE MUST TALK ECONOMICS NOW, RIGHT?

I believe economics must be part of the conversation when sales takes the helm. But marketing copy? Right there on your website?

Are you cool with that? Does your company do it?

Why or why not? Please, leave a comment below.


Related content, see:

  1. Workshop: The Way to Get Your Device Reimbursed in Today’s Payer Environment [$ premium content]

  2. Webinar: How to Get Past the Value Analysis Committee

  3. Webinar: Predictable and Repeatable Medical Device Sales


In Case You Missed It…

Last week’s message included information about 52 job openings (mostly in Seattle) for a fast-growing immunology company.

Interested? Just email me with your LinkedIn URL and contact information. I’ll introduce you over email.

I also invited you to consider three suggested ways the Medical Devices Group can bring more value to our community. Your feedback welcome!


Thank you for being part of our Medical Devices Group community!

Make it a great week.

Joe Hage signature

Joe Hage
Founding Principal, Medical Devices Advisory Group


P.S. Please  this article with your network. They’ll appreciate it!

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Posted by Joe Hage
Asked on May 28, 2019 5:24 am
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Meet your next client here. Join our medical devices group community.

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Joe Hage

from Eric Boss
The challenge is, in most cases the doctor isn't the one with the checkbook. The C suite only wants to talk $ and ROI.

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Joe Hage

from Sami RIZK
thank you Joe for your continuous efforts in keeping us informed of all new medical devices and the technology involved.
best regards, Sami

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Joe Hage

from Stephen Glassic
The money conversation in regard to medical devices and medical care in general should only be in the context of reducing costs to patients and improving outcome for patients while only taking a reasonable profit. There are too many profit takers who don't really bring any true value to the table. They should be identified and eliminated. There are also too many corporate executives who just enter a corporation to create huge personal gains for themselves with the aim of jumping ship when the inevitable storm comes. They often do it by creating a false impression that they are making big improvements and big gains on wall street but in the process leave a lot of baggage behind when they take the golden parachute. These people should only be rewarded based on the long term value they provide in lowering patient costs vs patient health improvement while maintaining a reasonable and efficient corporate growth. Not perceived short term gains that will not stand the test of time.

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Joe Hage

from Annie Cohen, PMI-ACP, CPT
@Kokoo

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from Jeannie Di Pietro
Medical device is not like it was 20 years ago with a few companies out there. Now there are 600 in the USA. Price and profit are definitely a big factor. You better know your competitors and show your features and benefits. And tell them how you will service their account with support. Hopefully you will have a great reputation and following.

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Joe Hage

from Jeffery W.
Love to hear about immunology job opportunities

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from Martin Goodman
Thanks for posting Joe. Cost is important but I think many companies don't look at this seriously enough in early stages. Why not openly state cost benefits...if done well as part of a value based healthcare model I only see it as a positive.

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Joe Hage

from Igor Khait
It is not just upfront costs. What about technical support, consumables and throughput? For cartridge based instruments amount of cartridges needed and their price (plus their storage - refrigerated or not) it is consumables which determine price/benefit ratio.

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Joe Hage

from Mark Cieplinski
All healthcare providers are pursuing the Triple Aim and one component is to reduce the per capita cost of healthcare (1). Improving outcomes (2) and achieving greater patient satisfaction (3) are also important, but you cannot ignore the ramifications of "cost". You need to present the Venn Diagram of how your organization is prepared to partner with the customer to address all three components or find yourself losing to the competitor that will.

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Joe Hage

from Kiki Schmalzl, MBA-MIS,RN
Quad aims now to include staff satisfaction if I recall correctly.

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from Tavo Kolling
Each of us wants to earn a good salery and so does my boss. If my boss is satisfied, I know that the business runs well.
This is my personal opinion about the price level... it saves my job.
If I, in addition can work for the benefit of the health, I'm happy to fullfil the job I do...

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from Sorin Nicula
It's all about patient care, but.....At the end of the day you gotta draw the line $see where you at and pay your bill$$$$

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from Michael Yow
It's not just about money it's the features and benefits that can make the hospital more efficient and gives them a quicker view of the patients status.

It's about proper documentation and the recall of past information that can help them understand and diagnose the symptoms of the patient.

Technology isn't free, I agree that cost can be an up front issue but the savings shown over time are what needs to be recognized to see where the money was spent and why it's a good purchase...

I'm currently unemployed so this is not a company line, it is how the healthcare system should view the value of their purchases... High prices don't always equal higher quantity, and lower prices don't always equal poor quality... you have to do your homework and talk to your counterparts in the industry...

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Joe Hage

from Jonas Persson
If it would be true that they are in it for a higher purpose they should be extremely cautious about the spend - the less cost incurred the greater the numbers that can benefit from these new or updated medications. Been there did it done it in Pharma and I had to puke every morning as the sounding board always was the “higher purpose”. We weren’t even allowed to mention the word saving... any company needs to be in control of their spend and ALWAYS - that is however true😊

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from Kevin Bailey
As practices have been acquired and product choice being limited, surgeons understand the business aspect of device choice has moved much higher via value analysis. No matter how good the device ia for patients

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from J. Logan Glahn
I agree. Unfortunately in the medical device implant world we have hospital officials making science based decisions as to what implants will and will not be allowed within that particular facility without having and science based training. Value analysis has nothing to do with the patient anymore and is simply based around cash flow control.

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from Jihad A. Fakhreddine
This is absolutely spot on. We need to talk about features, efficacy, security and cost benefits for the patients, institutions and Drs. Everything must be discussed.

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Joe Hage

from George Nieuwoudt
Business is defined as a occupation and trade to make a profit... Maybe we should talk both.

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Joe Hage

from J. Logan Glahn
I agree ... and if this crowd thinks surgeons and other doctors closely involved in the medical device and implant realm aren’t savvy businessmen and businesswomen also taking advantage of the many different revenue streams created by the medical devices and medical implants you’re in for a rude awakening.

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Joe Hage

from Dr. Suresh Saravdekar
It's TRUE
They expend so much money to get their degree and to pick up to their career to their expectations ..

So it's now a give and take business
No more a pure service on one side and pure profit on other side ..
as it was previously..
We need to accept this reality..and workout a plan which will be win win for both..

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Joe Hage

from Karen Boyd, ASQ CQA
It's critical to discuss cost, as this will affect ability to market and reimbursement for buyers.

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Joe Hage

from Joseph Miller
Wink Wink

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from Dan Cortez
Completely ok to talk about RVU’s but often get a bit standoffish if we talk about their professional fee $$.

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Joe Hage

I had to google "relative value units." 🙂

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Joe Hage

from Patrick Kammer
Two key areas that must be discussed - cost & competitive products. Knowing how to do so appropriately is vital.

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Joe Hage

from Chris Nevarez
Under 35? Many are struggling with their student debt and are all over this topic.

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from J. Logan Glahn
As a medical device sales representative and distributor for nearly a decade the overall decision as to what implants will be used in surgery should fall in the lap of the surgeons. Right? For the patients sake first and foremost. It still does to some small degree. But overall value analysis teams with little to no operating room experience, no implant efficiency knowledge or training and no device longevity training are making a strongly science based decision. With little to no science training or background. They want cheap and poorly fabricated implants on the shelves because they can drive price points down. Drive cost down and save the hospital money overall. The unfortunate circumstance is when you use poorly made implants that tend to fail you end up revising the case and will in turn end up costing the hospital more money in the long run via hourly wages for staff and costs to keep the patient in the ICU after a revision surgery along with surgeon and anesthesia costs. Tech costs. Generally doubling the cost due to doing the case multiple times. Just my humble take in things.

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