http://www.nickdawson.net/healthcare/retail-vs-healthcare-its-not-exactly-the-same/

What can retail do that healthcare can not? What can healthcare do that retail can not?

Check this short blog post out. It forces us to consider boundaries...and how we design for permeability.

I think retail has room to play in spaces previously occupied by healthcare providers with consumers taking a proactive attitude in their relationships with their health providers. Add in social and sharing and things get interesting, really fast. Extend this out to mobile and contextual applications (say a retailer who sells fitness equipment, diet and exercise apps, and can synch with customer approved third parties?) Suddenly, retailers could be the next enablers. (imagine the angels, advocates, and allies mix with people looking for easier ways to take charge of their own healthcare?)

This blog post closes with this provoking little sentence (directed to its healthcare audience): "Rather than taking the retail approach to interacting with the digitally connected, try taking the nursing approach. Let’s ask ourselves what a nurse can do that a shopkeeper cannot (are there still shopkeepers? well, you get the idea)."

Hmmm. Interesting exercise. Are there still 'shopkeepers'? ...or 'retailers'?