Sachin H. Jain: In Healthcare, what’s often hailed as new is, in fact, old
Sachin H. Jain, President and CEO of SCAN Group, shared a post on LinkedIn:
“In healthcare, what’s often hailed as new is, in fact, old.
More often than not, we’re simply renaming long-standing ideas with fresh terminology.
Take social determinants of health, for example.
Many in the industry believe we’ve only recently begun to consider social factors in healthcare. Not true.
Back in the 1980s, organizations like SCAN participated in the pioneering Social HMO demonstration project, which integrated social services to improve health outcomes. The benefits? Homemaker services, personal care, adult day care, respite care, and medical transportation. Sound familiar?
Another example: value-based care.
It’s often pitched as a revolutionary approach to healthcare payment. Again—not new.
For decades, organizations have operated under full-risk and global capitation models. Think Kaiser Permanente, Atrius Health, Healthcare Partners, CareMore, and Heritage. These groups assumed full financial risk for patient populations long before the term “value-based care” entered the lexicon. The principles haven’t changed—only the branding has.
And what about ethnic-focused health plans?
Some view them as a recent innovation. But they’re not.
Plans like Chinese Community Health Plan, Central Health Plan, and Brand New Day have long catered to specific ethnic communities, designing benefits tailored to their unique needs. These models didn’t just appear—they were built over time with intentionality and cultural insight.
The takeaway? History matters.
We should study it. Learn from it. Build on it.
Understanding the past helps us avoid repeating its mistakes—and helps us build a better, more effective system.
Yet in today’s healthcare innovation economy, history is often erased in favor of a shinier narrative. Claims of being “first,” “best,” or “most innovative” drown out the real story. But progress doesn’t come from pretending we’re starting from scratch—it comes from standing on the shoulders of those who came before us.
Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it.
It’s one reason healthcare can feel like it’s stuck in a loop: too often, what’s marketed as innovation is just a reboot of old ideas.
Respecting history isn’t nostalgic. It’s strategic. What truly matters is execution—and a relentless drive to improve on what came before.
But that improvement begins with knowing and respecting all that came before us.”
The post outlines how several prominent healthcare approaches—such as social determinants of health, value-based care, and ethnic-focused health plans—have roots in longstanding models. It emphasizes the importance of historical context in driving meaningful innovation.
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