The Harvard Business Review’s Health Care Innovations Insight Center has listed ten innovations it thinks could eventually improve healthcare (“Health Care of the Future,” Gardiner Morse, March 8, 2010).

Checklists. A checklist at Johns Hopkins Hospital required doctors to confirm, among other things, that they had washed their hands before inserting a central line. The 10-day line-infection rate went from 11% to zero. But getting people to use checklists can be a struggle.

Behavioral Economics. Nudge patients to comply with doctors’ orders, and nudge doctors to improve care.

Patient Portals. Patients could log onto their own secure portal to access and share their medical records, check lab results, renew prescriptions, deal with insurers, and communicate with doctors and nurses.

Payment Innovations. “Any hope of affordable, quality care lies partly in payment reform.”

Evidence-Based Decision Making. Electronic medical records should help doctors make better decisions based on the best evidence.

Accountable Care Organizations. The health reform bill includes plans for a pilot ACO whose job is to keep people healthy and out of the hospital and reward doctors and hospitals when they do.

Virtual Visits. Televisiting, a la Ellen Page talking to her doctor, who is in Denmark, in the Cisco ad.

Regenerative Medicine. “Stem cells…can potentially cure an array of devastating, once intractable conditions.”

Surgical Robots. The jury is still out on whether patients do better when a robot is involved.

Genetic Medicine. Once the technical challenges are overcome, doctors will be able to replace defective genes with working ones and tailor drug treatment to your specific genetic profile.

To read more about improving healthcare, click on these articles:

• How Would You Reform Healthcare?
• A Healthcare Role Model
• Baldrige Saves Lives
• Disruptive Innovation and Healthcare
• 3 Ingredients to Improving Healthcare

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