Innovation, general, innovation , academic - Four Centers of Medical Innovation

I’ve been invited to give a keynote address “The Rise of Innovation-Driven Health Care” at the University of Pittsburgh on November 9 at The Innovator’s Conference.
. The invitation got me to thinking: What does it take to launch an innovation revolution in medicine?

Basically three things:

1) Experienced entrepreneurs with ideas that make a difference, and a management team to take the idea to market.

2) Sources of venture capital to change ideas into reality.


3) Supportive urban supportive environments, homes of commercially successful enterprises, well-known medical institutions, and academic centers as sources of talent.

Four Centers for Innovation

Here are four medical innovation centers.


• Consider the entrepreneurial spin-offs from Healthcare Corporation of Amrica (HCA)in Nashville. Nashville now has over 300 for-profit innovative health care- related enterprises.

• Think of Boston’s Medical Industrial Complex with its nexus of academic medical centers and health fare firms sprouting around Route 128.

• Look at Minnesota’s Medical Alley stretching form from Rochester to the Twin Cities with the Mayo Clinic, Medtronic, St. Jude Medical Inc, United Healthcare Group, MinuteClinic, and 800 registered medical device manufacturers.

• View the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center which has pioneered organ transplant surgery, robotic surgery in the field of orthopedics, patient engagement before surgery by “prescribing” online interactive Internet programs telling patients exactly what to expect, and now an Innovation Center to bring new ideas, new technologies, new processes, and new ways of thinking to the attention of a wider world.