CEO's greetings

Dear reader,

Healthcare is at a turning point. The old ways of operating are no longer sufficient, and it is clear that the focus of healthcare must shift from treating diseases to preventing them. However, standalone solutions like rolling out health and wellness applications, for example, are not enough to save an entire healthcare system. For prevention to truly work, we need structural and systemic change throughout healthcare and society.

The state of healthcare today is deeply concerning. People are living longer – but are sicker than ever – societies are struggling with ever-increasing healthcare costs, and the burden on healthcare professionals is continuing to grow. It is not hard to find reasons to support systemic change. The real question is how we make that change happen.

The operating logic of our current healthcare system has largely been built around treating diseases. Our system’s financial incentives and structures also support disease treatment, as funding is directed to wherever the highest number of sick people is. And the more sick people there are, the greater the need for care – and the more resources, funding, and service providers are required. However, treating diseases does not reduce the overall number of sick people. On the contrary, that number only continues to grow year after year. 

The vast majority of healthcare resources is currently spent on treating chronic diseases. Yet because chronic conditions are permanent by nature, treating those already affected may take decades while the total number of sick people continues to grow. That’s why preventing chronic diseases is key to solving the healthcare crisis. 

To integrate prevention throughout the entire healthcare system, a new operating logic must be created – one that sets in motion a feedback loop that reduces disease risk. As these risks decrease, fewer people become ill, which helps to reverse the trend of rising disease burden.

This new operating logic is built by first detecting the risks of those at highest risk within a healthy population. Next, the onset of disease is prevented by targeting medical interventions and health-promoting actions – provided by healthcare professionals – toward these individuals. After that, the effectiveness of the interventions and actions is measured by reassessing disease risk. Based on the results, funding is then directed specifically to operating models that reduce risk.

An operating logic which facilitates timely disease risk detection, prevents disease onset, measures population-level changes in disease risks, and funds preventative operating models, enables a risk-reducing feedback loop that creates a foundation for a functioning preventative healthcare system. 

The ability to detect disease risks is at the core of prevention. Without it, there can be no preventative healthcare. Disease risks are already being detected in healthcare today, but under the current operating model, this is manual and slow. For this reason, the current methods are not adequate for detecting risks at the population level.

Similarly, risk-reducing tools and procedures are well established – but this is of no use if we can’t first identify people at risk of getting sick. Only by detecting population-level disease risks early, can we direct healthcare services, risk-reducing measures, and their funding to those at the highest risk and effectively prevent diseases.

Even if we could find the resources to detect risks with the current tools and target high-risk individuals with appropriate interventions, the tools are still not adequate for monitoring risk development. This is because healthcare’s current risk detection methods are partially based on subjective data (such as blood pressure measurement, BMI, and family history). The method used to detect risks must be objective and repeatable. Only then can we build a preventative healthcare logic that enables a risk-reducing feedback loop. 

Nightingale Health is in an excellent position to support the development of a preventative healthcare system. To the best of my knowledge, it’s the only company in the world that can offer a comprehensive solution as a foundation for this new operating logic and preventative healthcare system. Its disease risk detection requires only one blood sample, which means disease risk assessment at the population level doesn’t burden healthcare’s already limited resources.

With its proprietary technology, Nightingale Health analyzes blood samples and gives healthcare providers a complete risk report. From a single blood sample, common chronic disease risks can be identified all at once and at low cost. A clear results report makes it easy for healthcare professionals to communicate disease risks and recommend actions to patients. As only one blood sample and no subjective clinical data is required, results are both objective and easily repeated. That means we can monitor the effectiveness of different interventions with follow-up testing at both individual and population level, and start to direct funding toward the best risk-reducing operating models and interventions. A positive feedback loop begins – under the new operating logic of preventative healthcare, everyone is a winner.

In Finland, Nightingale Health’s technology has already replaced many traditional risk tests in private healthcare, and the same is taking place in public healthcare as well. I believe that we have already initiated a revolution in healthcare toward a better future for everyone.

Teemu Suna
CEO and Founder, Nightingale Health Plc