Self-care is taking up a dominant position alongside healthcare as health innovation further infiltrates all industries. In this reality, tuning care will become increasingly vital.
Welcome to “A Healthusiasm World”, a newsletter by Christophe Jauquet on making customers healthy & happy.
Understand how the boundaries between healthcare, wellness, and consumer industries are blurring.
Discover the latest health behaviours, innovations and trends.
Learn what's next for customer experience, purpose-driven marketing, and digital health.
Every business is a health business, simply because everybody wants to be healthy & happy.
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Car Tuning
Car tuning is the modification of a car to optimise its appearance or overall performance in line with the user's personal needs. To be honest, I’m not too familiar with car tuning. Many people aren’t unless, perhaps when you’ve watched all nine movies of Fast & Furious, I guess. However, I’ve understood it is a delicate exercise to match your personal skills and ambitions within a standard configured but solidly designed car. Many terrible wrecks happened due to poor expertise, wrong information or calculations. Car tuning requires vision, resources and coordination between different disciplines to optimise appearance or performance successfully. So does Tuning Care…
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Care Tuning
We continue to see the rise of the transformational economy. It grows from a human aspiration to become better, healthier or even happier and makes people look for products, services or experiences that transform them. Many companies that previously had little to no affinity with health & self-care are now embarking on a journey that puts health at the core of their customer strategy. And as the boundaries continue to blur between the healthcare, wellness and consumer industries, other companies are bound to go down that same path. After all, it's what consumers are increasingly looking for. Technological, psychological and economic evolutions primarily drove this Healthusiasm trend in society. But in the past years, an additional (r)evolution made the healthusiasm movement more important: The Pandemic.
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In control of your health
The pandemic was characterised by specific situations that sparked the desire to be more in control of our health: Health systems were inaccessible to regular, non-covid patients for significant periods, making people suddenly more reliant on themselves; a shortage of health workers was putting pressure on the viability of specific healthcare segments, making many not wanting to end up there (ever); the empathy for governmental covid-measures was quickly wearing out, making people live according to their personal health priorities; the limitations of 'sick care' became apparent, making people focused on preserving health; boosting immunity became an obsession for many, making it one of the most popular health ambitions ever seen.
Of course, the need for a sound-functioning healthcare system was emphasised by this urgency. It was an argument to claim the importance, attention and investments it had lost over time. But in the meantime, another vital evolution happened on the other side of the spectrum. The world was accustomed to being empowered in common industries like banking, travel and retail. In the light of the pandemic reality, people now also look to take their health into their own hands. By intensifying self-care, we aspired to avoid the parts of healthcare that seem broken or provide a horrible experience. It wasn’t surprising when Ipsos (2020) found that 78% of people want more control of their health & care. It also disclosed that 65% of Europeans are more likely to make everyday decisions based on their health since the pandemic. People are more than ever focused on self-care.
Health happens outside of healthcare
But, self-care, and the closely related wellness business, is more than fitness, spas and nutrition. While healthcare was shaken up, self-care took an even more solid stance in areas that could impact our physical and mental health. It was also starting to claim its place alongside healthcare. After all, 99% of caring about our health happens outside of healthcare. To put it in the words of the World Health Organisation: an average person spends less than an hour a year with a healthcare worker versus over 8.700 hours a year in self-care (8700 hours = all day, every day). In this statement by the WHO, self-care stands for all the actions we undertake every moment of every day to be healthy & happy, regardless of whether we are sick or not. Therefore, self-care is not just the prevention of diseases but part of the entire continuum of health management. It can be considered the soft side of medicine and is gaining importance in and out of the healthcare system.
The Yin & Yang of health management
Health management as a combination of health & self-care is ubiquitous across industries. Consumer industries become active facilitators in the management of one's health. Wellness initiatives integrate more medical practices into their approach. Healthcare organisations have started combining modern medicine with more wholesome, holistic methods. In the next 2-5 years, self-care will solidify its position alongside healthcare. These two opposing, non-communicating forces will turn up to be the Yin and Yang of health management. The different 'cares' will be tuned to one another. Initiatives will rise from both sides to unlock access, empower people, make smarter decisions, design a better experience, and achieve better outcomes. Early initiatives already showcase how this will facilitate more collaboration and tuning between health & self-care.
Merging medicine and wellness
There is perhaps not a better visual representation of this convergence between health & self-care than the Sangha Retreat in Suzhou, China. This property is built with a central corridor that literally links a wellness area with a clinic for conventional medicine. During their stay, visitors can freely tune the care to their needs. Valencian-based wellness clinic, SHA Wellness, brings a 360° integrative approach to health that combines holistic and medical practices. In the wake of the pandemic, they've launched a programme to address the long-term effects of covid-19 using wellness therapies and clinical treatments. In London then again, Lanserhof at The Arts Club is the first medical Gym in the world. This state-of-the-art medical and health facility combines preventative medicine, rehabilitative care, nutrition, fitness and holistic wellbeing. Care is provided and tuned together by health coaches and medical and orthopaedic experts to be the most comprehensive health care one can receive.
Health and wellness coaches
While medical practices are adopted in consumer and wellness industries, health coaches also take a more critical role in the medical world. The Mayo Clinic in Minnesota has launched a Wellness Coach Training Program to train health coaches, wellness coordinators, physicians, yoga instructors, dieticians, and exercise specialists on the soft side of medicine. Today, these Health & Wellness coaches often work in tandem with the Mayo Clinic's doctors and nutritionists to build a more impactful connection with the patient. In the UK, the National Health Service (NHS) established a new vision of the future in which Health & Wellness coaches are central. This 'Personalised Care' initiative is an all-age, whole-population approach that supports the entire population in be(com)ing as healthy & happy as possible, regardless of whether they are sick or not. Health & Wellness coaches are critical in this vision to build knowledge, skills, confidence and responsibility to manage one's own health.
Lifestyle Medicine
Lifestyle Medicine is another practice of tuning health & self-care. Its popularity is driven by the conviction that lifestyle interventions can treat (and possibly reverse) chronic conditions. In the coming years, a growing wave of healthcare professionals will be certified to apply evidence-based, whole-person, prescriptive lifestyle changes. Lifestyle medicine tunes healthcare with self-care-related actions such as healthy eating, physical activity, restorative sleep, stress management, avoiding risky substances and maintaining positive social connections.
The Healthusiasm Take
We live in a world where people are used to taking matters into their own hands in most parts of their lives. Also, in managing our health & happiness, this empowerment will soon become the norm: We will understand better the lifestyle decisions that impact our health; From prevention to diagnosis, people will increasingly be supported by tools and solutions they can use themselves; The participation of the patient will also radically increase their involvement in treatment and disease management; earlier discharges from hospitals will put new and more elaborated responsibility with the patient. Because of these evolutions, self-care will steadily become a critical aspect in each phase of health management.
We were already evolving towards this future. In the past decade, people increasingly cared about their health & wellbeing. They became more involved in self-care. The pandemic has only elevated this Healthusiasm trend. As a result, self-care will continue to grow in our lives, complementing healthcare with more accessible, understandable and convenient solutions. We will see more consumer initiatives focused on self-care. In the medical setting, wellness methods will be integrated into therapeutic approaches, and medical practices will be applied in wellness settings. If done right, health & self-care will turn into the Yin & Yang of health management, creating a dynamic interplay between (sometimes opposing) forces that are nevertheless interconnected. As a result, health & self-care will be tuned for better experiences and outcomes.
That is precisely the challenge for a healthcare industry that has always been closed and protected from external interference. Tuning care will now demand dedication and openness by the healthcare system to be successful. But it's worth it because Tuning Care will be essential for every person who wants to be as healthy & happy as possible, regardless of whether someone is sick or not.
Enjoy the reading.
Got any thoughts that you want to bounce off me?
Feel free to reach out.
-Christophe-
Global keynote speaker on the future of health business.