Technically feasible Snapshots of engineering, operations, and healthcare data in the real world.

A year of learning about the healthcare industry

Since deciding to work in health tech, I’ve wanted to deepen my understanding of the American healthcare system, especially revenue cycle management, interoperability, and care delivery. Here are some of the resources I’ve been using.

Three books that continue to inspire me:

  • Elisabeth Rosenthal’s “An American Sickness”: Many “best practices” in billing are strategies to maximize revenue in a broken market. Always ask who benefits from complexity.
  • Michael Marmot’s “The Health Gap”: Health follows social gradients. Technology is useless if it only helps people who already have the most resources.
  • Marty Makary’s “Unaccountable”: Outcome transparency is rare and necessary. Data transparency is the only real accountability.

More books that shaped my thinking:

  • “Understanding Value-Based Healthcare” by Moriates, Arora, and Shah: Clear on cost measurement and the shift from volume to value.
  • “The Innovator’s Prescription” by Christensen: Business model patterns; helps spot where disruption will fail.

People and voices I follow on LinkedIn for signal:

  • Farzad Mostashari (Aledade): Practical VBC and primary care insights.
  • Lisa Suennen (Venture Valkyrie): Sharp takes on health tech business models.
  • Nikhil Krishnan (Out-of-Pocket): Plain-language and often hilarious breakdowns of payer and provider mechanics.
  • Chrissy Farr (health tech investor): Market moves and incentives.
  • Aneesh Chopra: Interop, policy, and TEFCA progress.

Podcasts and shows I have found worth my time:

  • Relentless Health Value: Straight talk on pharmacy, benefits, and payment incentives.
  • AHealthcareZ (YouTube): Deep dives on payer/provider mechanics and benefits with plain explanations. A lot of content, but extremely useful as a library to look up a specific acronym or concept explained.
  • Tradeoffs: Policy tradeoffs, clear explanations.
  • An Arm and a Leg: Patient billing realities.

Newsletters and blogs that keep me honest:

  • Out-of-Pocket: Humor plus clear operator-level analysis.
  • The Incidental Economist: Evidence-based health policy.
  • Health Affairs: Deep dives on policy and payment reform.
  • KFF: Coverage, premiums, and affordability data.

Courses and primary sources:

  • CMS data portals: Care Compare, PUFs, MA rate announcements; they force you to confront how messy the data is.
  • CMS Final Rules and Fact Sheets: IPPS, OPPS, Physician Fee Schedule; painful to read, but they set the economics.
  • Udemy – Healthcare EDI X12 837 and 835 Beginners Training: Practical walk-through of claim and remittance formats with sample files: https://www.udemy.com/course/healthcare-edi-x12-837-835-beginners-training/
  • Coursera/UPenn – Healthcare Analytics Essentials: Intro to claims-driven analysis and measurement: https://www.coursera.org/learn/healthcare-analytics