Health IT, Hospitals, Policy

Healthcare needs more humor: Bush’s five funniest lines from Datapalooza IV keynote

The last 30 seconds of this trailer is a perfect example of Jonathan Bush’s Datapalooza […]


The last 30 seconds of this trailer is a perfect example of Jonathan Bush’s Datapalooza talk.

Secretary Sebelius released a bunch of data, but didn’t have much else to say.
Atul Gawande gave a slow-build speech that tied everything together beautifully at the end.

Then Jonathan Bush took the stage right before lunch. Healthcare needs more snarky guys in plaid jackets. The room lit up and everyone started laughing. Not polite chuckles, but big “Wow, I can’t believe he said that!” laughs.

Bush had the energy of Todd Park with the zing of Jon Stewart. I didn’t know that the two founders of athenahealth were such a perfectly matched set. They should take the stage together for next year’s keynote.

Bush had sharp comments for everyone: the government, hospitals, doctors. These were his five best lines.

On the release of national estimates for 30 types of hospital outpatient procedures from CMS:
“Thanks Secretary, thanks for releasing 30 of the 30 million things you need to release.”

On the conflict of interest he sees with hospitals running ACOs
“You don’t lose your profit urge when you have non profit attached to your name — Cleveland.”

On the failure of athenahealth
“I thought that we would generate savings and we would be rich and feel good and date midwives. We cut the C-section rate from 24% to 10% and cut NICU days by 38% and we lost our shirts.”

On territorial doctors
“It turns out that only doctors can provide support to laboring women while watching the Celtics.”

On the current cool factor of big data
“It’s so cool to be part of something that might be sexy some day.”

He closed his speech with three pleas:

  1. Release CMS data to any entity that can use it to manage risk
  2. Expand the ACO model – any entity that can manage risk well should be able to
  3. Legalize an open market for health information exchange

My last athenahealth comment is about how many people the company sent to Datapalooza IV compared to how many the American Medical Association sent: 43 vs. 1. Thanks to Nadine Levick, MD, of the EMSSafety Foundation, for sharing that observation.

Veronica Combs

Veronica is an independent journalist and communications strategist. For more than 10 years, she has covered health and healthcare with a focus on innovation and patient engagement. Most recently she managed strategic partnerships and communications for AIR Louisville, a digital health project focused on asthma. The team recruited 7 employer partners, enrolled 1,100 participants and collected more than 250,000 data points about rescue inhaler use. Veronica has worked for startups for almost 20 years doing everything from launching blogs, newsletters and patient communities to recruiting speakers, moderating panel conversations and developing new products. You can reach her on Twitter @vmcombs.

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