Walgreens’ Role in the Consumerization of Healthcare

Tracy Brown, the president of Walgreens retail and chief customer officer, discussed radical shifts and resilient leadership required to transform health and well-being for all. She cited alarming statistics about the rise of chronic diseases and neglected care due to affordability, accessibility, and convenience issues, despite the high level of technology and medical knowledge available. She addressed the role of trust and emotional connection in healthcare and suggested seeing, hearing, and understanding people as the base of trust. In order to transform the US health system, she proposed a new "fourth Network" based on community-driven care along with the existing networks such as hospitals and doctors' offices. Tracy suggested leveraging existing data to understand the patients better, utilizing existing infrastructure for increasing accessibility, and getting embedded in the community. Then she advocated for partnerships to solve health issues collectively. Lastly, she mentioned the upcoming launch of Walgreens' virtual healthcare, which aims to make the company the most convenient health and wellness destination.