Beginning with high-deductible health plans and cost sharing models, which started springing up around a decade ago, and continuing to the creation of health insurance exchanges — written into the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — consumerism has been on a steady rise in the healthcare industry.
When David Ebel joined the financial executive staff of Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic in the late 1980s, he had zero experience in healthcare but plenty of experience in the corporate finance world at accounting firm Arthur Andersen and then Dayton Hudson Corp., which is now known as discount retail giant Target.