San Francisco Business Times Highlights Kaiser Permanente’s Strategies for Reshaping Company

The San Francisco Business Times on Monday profiled Kaiser Permanente's Chair and CEO George Halvorson and the "two key strategies" he believes will lead to "continued financial success," as "market pressures" force "the sprawling HMO, hospital and medical-group giant to review its traditional focus on one-size-fits all health plans." Halvorson's strategy includes the successful implementation of "a $3 billion electronic medical record system by late 2006," the Business Times reports. He said, "Five years from now if you look at all the (electronic) system support the doctors will have, and you look back at what it was like to practice in an environment without any of that information, people will look back on it as a kind of medical Dark Ages." Halvorson's other priority is developing new products, including several high-deductible health plans and health savings accounts "to attract younger, healthier enrollees," the Business Times reports. Halvorson said, "We've moved into benefits packages that have additional cost sharing, and to do that we had to put in place the insurance systems and billing systems necessary to support those products" (Rauber, San Francisco Business Times, 1/24).