Every day, Advisory Board researchers comb through the latest health care news, study policy proposals, and convene with industry experts and executives to identify thought-provoking, unconventional solutions to health care's greatest challenges. Our new quarterly digest, Executive Insights, is the culmination of their efforts.

Read the research, insights, and opinion pieces below—or members can download a PDF of the magazine—to see our takes on the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, the latest analysis of the Biden administration's health policy, new developments in digital health, and more.

Not a member? Download your copy of Executive Insights here.

It has been a year. Where to begin?

Welcome to the inaugural issue of Advisory Board’sExecutive Insights—in what I hope will become a quarterlyjournal for executives across the health care industry. Herein wehave collected all of our research, insights, and opinion piecesaimed specifically at health care leaders and published onlineacross the first quarter of 2021.

For most of the past 12 months, our industry has founditself reacting, adapting, and hoping that life will return towhat we remember at some point just around the corner. But ithasn’t turned out that way. It’s trite to say that the pandemic hasirrevocably altered nearly everything we accepted as normal—butI don’t think that has it quite right. The pandemic—and indeedmuch of the past several years—has very painfully revealed thatmany of the assumptions we held as true and unchanging simplyweren’t. Here are just a few from our industry: Telework results inpoor productivity and engagement. Digital health will never takehold as a viable alternative to in-person visits. Physicians will neverpractice differently without different financial incentives beingthrown at them. Patients may want to be treated with home-basedcare, but few will ever provide it. All, as it turns out, untrue.

In this issue—and in those to come—we want to show you not how to goback to normal (whatever that was), but rather what’s coming. We’veexamined how behavioral health will have to permanently change toadapt to a society largely kept isolated from one another for a year. We’relooking at the future of digital health and how Big Tech plans to disruptit and private health plans intend to pay for it. And we model out futurevolume recovery for providers—under a variety of vaccination scenarios.

I should point out that everything you read here has already beenpublished online. Some time ago, Advisory Board altered its publishingschedule such that ideas are now published as soon as they are written,and not long after they’ve been formulated and vetted. Executives nolonger have to wait for a member event or the newest book to hear ourtake on any of the major topics facing the industry.

But sometimes it’s handy to have it all in one place. We, of course,welcome any and all feedback—effusive endorsement, savagecriticism, we value it all. If you have any questions, comments, or ideasfor future topics, please feel free to contact me. I hope to see youall again very, very soon—either in person at an upcoming AdvisoryBoard event, or in my (mostly) weekly webcast, Stay Up to Date. And ifyou haven’t subscribed to our podcast, Radio Advisory, hosted by mylongtime colleague, Rachel Woods, please do so. It’s been growing byleaps and bounds. If you’re not registered and you’d like to be, we’vehelpfully included instructions how on page 88.

So those are the main things. How are you all?