With the race for the presidency entering full swing, health industry executives will spend much of 2008 discussing, being questioned about, and analyzing how the federal government could affect the current system. Meanwhile, consumers are taking more responsibility for decisions about their health insurance, drugs, and providers, and more government regulations are requiring public disclosure of quality, safety, and costs. The coming year will be a pivotal one for the health industry, with new market competitors, financial pressures, and regulatory requirements.

PricewaterhouseCoopers' Health Research Institute (HRI) has identified areas of concern for health executives and policy makers in 2008. To provide research-based insight, PwC commissioned a survey of 1,000 consumers and reviewed recent publications from industry and the government. To get the broadest possible input from PwC's network of business advisors, HRI employed an innovative tool called the PwC Thought-Wiki, which is based on similar technology that powers Wikipedia®, an online encyclopedia. This tool incorporated a new level of collaborative authoring and knowledge sharing into HRI's content development, resulting in the following Health Research Institute picks for the top health industry issues in 2008.