About Value-Based Healthcare
The healthcare industry faces challenges such as diseases that are difficult to treat even with current medical care, regional differences in access to medical care, and healthcare costs. Value-Based Healthcare is an approach that aims to solve these issues by focusing on optimizing healthcare costs and maximizing healthcare outcomes for patients.
Three Basic Concepts
- Enhance quality of
healthcare treatments
- Provide solutions using advanced therapies for diseases that are difficult to cure with conventional approaches.
- Improve access
to healthcare
- Provide affordable treatment, diagnosis, and testing to anyone, anytime, anywhere.
- Improve cost
effectiveness
- Develop highly-effective drugs and treatments tailored to individual patient needs and symptoms at the point of care.
Challenges in the Healthcare Industry
| Challenges |
Details |
 Quality of Healthcare |
Pharmaceutical companies and research institutes are progressing in the development of advanced medicine such as cell and gene therapies. Cell therapy includes regenerative medicine, which uses iPS cells to culture and produce tissues such as human organs and transplant them into patients. Gene therapy involves taking stem cells from a patient with a genetic abnormality and inserting normal genes from a healthy person into those cells. The modified cells can make the necessary proteins from normal genes, so these cells are proliferated and returned to the patient, and treatment is performed using the normal genes. The challenge is to accelerate the development of advanced medicine that can effectively treat and ameliorate diseases that were previously not adequately treated. |
 Disparities in Healthcare Access |
The treatments, medications, and healthcare that are available in developed countries can be inaccessible in developing countries. Even in developed countries, there are disparities in healthcare access, such as differences in the healthcare available in urban and rural areas. For this reason, it is imperative to popularize telemedicine using digital technology, develop products that enable more convenient testing and diagnosis and develop less expensive drugs. |
 Increase in Healthcare Costs |
According to OECD Health Statistics, healthcare costs across OECD countries were an average of just 5% of the GDP in 1970. However, in 2021, healthcare costs exceeded 10% of the GDP in Japan and 17% in the United States. The causes include aging populations, structural alterations in diseases, and the introduction of new technologies. Furthermore, rising healthcare costs are a common challenge in many countries, including developed countries. |
Contributions by PHC Group
| Challenges |
Details |
 Enhance Quality of Healthcare Treatments |
Maximizing healthcare outcomes requires the development of advanced therapies against diseases for which conventional medical treatments and therapies may not provide satisfactory results. Typical examples are cell therapy and gene therapy. PHC Group provides equipment and solutions necessary for sites developing such advanced therapies. These solutions include ultra-low temperature freezers, which are indispensable for producing and storing COVID-19 vaccines, and CO2 incubators for cell culture. We hold the second largest market share* for these products globally. In cell culture, we support the research and development of cell medicine pharmaceuticals with equipment* that allows real-time cell metabolic analysis. |
 Improve Access to Healthcare |
PHC Group manufactures compact biochemical analyzers and sells cardiac biomarker-measuring devices. We will continue to focus on developing and manufacturing POCT devices and contribute to creating an environment where anyone can receive testing and diagnosis anytime, anywhere, and at affordable cost. In terms of digital transformation to improve access to healthcare, we provide a variety of solutions, including healthcare IT products and services. |
 Improve Cost Effectiveness |
Historically, it has been common to pay for a given treatment or medication. However, the approach to pay for the outcomes obtained from treatment is becoming more widespread. To implement this new approach, it is crucial to have deep knowledge about the effects of treatments and drugs, and to develop even more effective drugs and treatments. Since our business engages directly with healthcare data, PHC Group will analyze and leverage data to provide optimal healthcare that allows patients to choose treatments and drugs tailored to individual needs and symptoms, while providing valuable data for advancing drug development. Through these efforts, we will seek to contribute to improving cost effectiveness. |
- *Global Assessment of Life Science Equipment Market and The Impact of COVID-19 (Frost & Sullivan, published November 1, 2021)
Contributing to Value-Based Healthcare through our unique strengths
We believe that PHC Group can contribute to Value-Based Healthcare in the following roles, and are confident that our group's strengths can truly be demonstrated.
PHC Group has established strong relationships with pharmaceutical companies, universities, and research institutes that research and develop drugs and treatments; with hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies that are the forefront of diagnosis and treatment; and with various healthcare professionals from upstream to downstream and patients.
Furthermore, our group's products and services are in leading positions and have earned deep trust in various healthcare fields. This position allows us to create products and services required for the future of healthcare by reflecting on dialogue and discussion with our valued users.
Our manufacturing capabilities with high precision and high quality enable us to realize precision and quality in our products and services. Since healthcare is directly related to people’s health and lives, needless to say, precision and quality are extremely critical,
and the manufacturing excellence we have cultivated over the years provides great support for our development and production.
PHC Group will fully leverage our unique strengths to contribute to Value-Based Healthcare.
Koichiro SatoPHC Holdings Corporation
Senior Executive Vice President, Representative Director,
Chief Operating Officer (COO)