“What have you learned?”

I was asked this very good question last evening about my sabbatical. It was well timed because if I were asked it even a few days ago, I would have responded that I haven’t been doing this long enough. According to my Mac Dashboard Widget, I’ve now been on sabbatical for 159 days, and interestingly, I had begun to form an answer, which began to crystallize.

So, here are my top 3:

  • There are a lot more ideas and interesting and smart people with them in health care than even I believed.
  • Energy around the safety net: every patient deserves to have the benefits of great health care supported by technology, including patient access to their care teams and online health information. The data shows that they want it, and they can access it. We need to provide it to them.
  • Supporting diversity and reducing disparities among minority populations always energizes me.

Oh, and at the Health 2.0 Unconference yesterday, I was asked to introduce myself in 3 words. I chose “change the profession.”

Ted Eytan, MD