Empowered Patient Podcast

Chelsey Lindner, a pharmacist and Manager of Clinical Services at Shields Health Solutions, provides insights about the growing prevalence of oral and subcutaneous injection oncology medications, which is shifting the delivery of care from the clinic to at-home. This innovation in cancer care introduces complexities around accessing and affording these specialty drugs and requires the skills of a specialty pharmacy to support the patients and providers. In an integrated care model, there is also a growing need for attention to medication adherence and monitoring for side effects by these pharmacists.

Chelsey explains, "Shields is considered a specialty pharmacy integrator. We partner with health systems across the country to help them operate best-in-class specialty pharmacy programs. We are focused on improving patient outcomes through specialized pharmacy services and supporting the optimized use of specialty medications through navigation of access, care coordination, and comprehensive medication management. So those are three of the big services Shields offers as a company."

"I would say that the number one component that these oral oncology medications offer is a level of patient convenience and maintenance of their quality of life. Because what was a cancer diagnosis 20 years ago meant they were going to have to come to the health center or be admitted to the hospital to receive their treatment. Whereas now, when a patient might be faced with a certain cancer diagnosis, they will be managing it like a chronic condition. They can stay at home, they can stay with their families. They can do all of those things that they want to do that help support that quality of life as they're going through active cancer treatment. And so with that certainly comes, I think, a level of popularity. And I think the pharmaceutical companies certainly would be incentivized to continue the research in this area and the development of these agents."

#ShieldsHealthSolutions #IntegratedCareModel #SpecialtyPharmacy #CancerTreatment #MedicationAdherence

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Chelsey Lindner, a pharmacist and Manager of Clinical Services at Shields Health Solutions, provides insights about the growing prevalence of oral and subcutaneous injection oncology medications, which is shifting the delivery of care from the clinic to at-home. This innovation in cancer care introduces complexities around accessing and affording these specialty drugs and requires the skills of a specialty pharmacy to support the patients and providers. In an integrated care model, there is also a growing need for attention to medication adherence and monitoring for side effects by these pharmacists.

Chelsey explains, "Shields is considered a specialty pharmacy integrator. We partner with health systems across the country to help them operate best-in-class specialty pharmacy programs. We are focused on improving patient outcomes through specialized pharmacy services and supporting the optimized use of specialty medications through navigation of access, care coordination, and comprehensive medication management. So those are three of the big services Shields offers as a company."

"I would say that the number one component that these oral oncology medications offer is a level of patient convenience and maintenance of their quality of life. Because what was a cancer diagnosis 20 years ago meant they were going to have to come to the health center or be admitted to the hospital to receive their treatment. Whereas now, when a patient might be faced with a certain cancer diagnosis, they will be managing it like a chronic condition. They can stay at home, they can stay with their families. They can do all of those things that they want to do that help support that quality of life as they're going through active cancer treatment. And so with that certainly comes, I think, a level of popularity. And I think the pharmaceutical companies certainly would be incentivized to continue the research in this area and the development of these agents."

#ShieldsHealthSolutions #IntegratedCareModel #SpecialtyPharmacy #CancerTreatment #MedicationAdherence

shieldshealthsolutions.com

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Tamsin Chislett, CEO of Hyfe, highlights the importance of understanding coughs for healthcare providers, the lack of information about coughs, and Hyfe's advancements in building a database and developing biomarkers based on different kinds of coughs. Hyfe's AI technology, which can integrate with other devices and platforms for remote patient monitoring, enables passive, continuous tracking of cough patterns that can be used in research and clinical trials. Opportunities for digital therapeutics include chronic cough, COPD, lung cancer, respiratory infections, and cardiovascular diseases.

Tamsin elaborates, "Hyfe is the global leader in AI power. The problem we're trying to solve is that you have this really common symptom cough, which has been experienced by every human alive and is experienced daily by many people, yet to discuss it, measure it, monitor it, or even manage it, we're entirely reliant on subjective data. Everyone's had the experience of going into a primary care doctor, and saying I've got a really bad cough. The doctor says How bad is it, and is it getting worse? We don't even have the proper language to describe it."

"We want to get to the point where, in those situations, the doctor can start to get objective data about the patient's cough patterns and use that instead. The way we see it is that there was a time when to measure fever, we put a hand on a patient's forehead. We hope that within a few years, thanks to Hyfe's technology, we should not be in the same position with cough. So we're always looking to have objective data."

"I think the interesting thing about cough is that because it's never been measurable, it hasn't been studied anywhere near as much as it probably should have. And even in the first five years of Hyfe's life, we've seen an explosion in cough-related science now that it's possible to monitor coughs with a smartphone, a smart watch, or anything with a microphone running Hyfe's technology. We've seen exciting science across a whole range, many of which are intuitive when you start thinking about cough, acute cough is a big one and respiratory infections, but there's also chronic cough."

"There's also COPD, there's IPF, there's lung cancer, there are so many respiratory and even cardiology diseases where cough is a cardinal symptom, a really clear sign of exacerbation of disease or worsening. However, to date, it has not been able to be measured, and cough monitoring with Hyfe allows you to monitor cough over time, see patterns, and use those patterns to optimize patient care in the future."

#HyfeAI #ChronicCough #HyfeDTx #DigitalHealth #AIinHealthcare #DigitalTherapeutics #MedAI #CoughMonitoring #RemotePatientMonitoring #HealthInnovation #RespiratoryAwareness #CoughAwareness #CoughScience #PatientCentricCare

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Tamsin Chislett, CEO of Hyfe, highlights the importance of understanding coughs for healthcare providers, the lack of information about coughs, and Hyfe's advancements in building a database and developing biomarkers based on different kinds of coughs. Hyfe's AI technology, which can integrate with other devices and platforms for remote patient monitoring, enables passive, continuous tracking of cough patterns that can be used in research and clinical trials. Opportunities for digital therapeutics include chronic cough, COPD, lung cancer, respiratory infections, and cardiovascular diseases.

Tamsin elaborates, "Hyfe is the global leader in AI power. The problem we're trying to solve is that you have this really common symptom cough, which has been experienced by every human alive and is experienced daily by many people, yet to discuss it, measure it, monitor it, or even manage it, we're entirely reliant on subjective data. Everyone's had the experience of going into a primary care doctor, and saying I've got a really bad cough. The doctor says How bad is it, and is it getting worse? We don't even have the proper language to describe it."

"We want to get to the point where, in those situations, the doctor can start to get objective data about the patient's cough patterns and use that instead. The way we see it is that there was a time when to measure fever, we put a hand on a patient's forehead. We hope that within a few years, thanks to Hyfe's technology, we should not be in the same position with cough. So we're always looking to have objective data."

"I think the interesting thing about cough is that because it's never been measurable, it hasn't been studied anywhere near as much as it probably should have. And even in the first five years of Hyfe's life, we've seen an explosion in cough-related science now that it's possible to monitor coughs with a smartphone, a smart watch, or anything with a microphone running Hyfe's technology. We've seen exciting science across a whole range, many of which are intuitive when you start thinking about cough, acute cough is a big one and respiratory infections, but there's also chronic cough."

"There's also COPD, there's IPF, there's lung cancer, there are so many respiratory and even cardiology diseases where cough is a cardinal symptom, a really clear sign of exacerbation of disease or worsening. However, to date, it has not been able to be measured, and cough monitoring with Hyfe allows you to monitor cough over time, see patterns, and use those patterns to optimize patient care in the future."

#HyfeAI #ChronicCough #HyfeDTx #DigitalHealth #AIinHealthcare #DigitalTherapeutics #MedAI #CoughMonitoring #RemotePatientMonitoring #HealthInnovation #RespiratoryAwareness #CoughAwareness #CoughScience #PatientCentricCare

hyfe.com

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Dr. Orit Wimpfheimer, Chief Medical Officer at Nanox, a medical imaging AI company using technology to detect early signs of diseases through opportunistic screening of CT scans. The AI platform identifies signs of diseases such as osteoporosis and cardiovascular disease that may have been overlooked by the radiologist. The tools are designed to be integrated into the radiologist's workflow to provide quantified measurements to guide clinical care decisions leading to improved patient outcomes.

Orit explains, "The number of CT scans over the last 20 years has risen astronomically. People are getting CT scans for many reasons, and there's a lot of data on the images that doesn't get translated into patient care. And what our AI tools do is to scan all those CT scans in the background unobtrusively, so they look for signs of chronic conditions and highlight those to the radiologists while they're reading the scans. This ensures that chronic diseases are commented on in the reports, initiating a clinical pathway to help treat those diseases at the early stages of their disease processes. Ultimately, we're trying to find diseases much earlier to treat them much better and therefore increase the quality of life and the length of life by treating these diseases before they become very symptomatic."

"So our tools are actually measurement tools. When the radiologist looks at the images, they have their checklist in their mind, myself included. I'm a radiologist. Things we're always looking for on the scan, and then we pay attention based on the patient's clinical history or rule out pneumonia, rule out cancer, whatever it is. Sometimes these chronic diseases might be lurking in the background, but they don't get attention from the radiologist. And even if the radiologist is super careful and tries to find everything on the exam, we don't have time to start measuring things. And when you comment on something without giving a quantified measurement, it's very hard for the clinician down the line to know what to do with this patient. It's too vague. When we give quantified information, the doctor, after the radiologist, can take that quantified information and then know where to send the patient next and what to do next with the patient. And that's critical because we don't want to drop patients along the way, the clinical care pathway, because then it's ineffective."

#NanoxVision #AIinHealthcare #HealthcareAI #MedAI #RadiologyAI #HealthcareInnovation #Medical Imaging #Radiology #EarlyDetection #PreventiveCare #PatientCare

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Geoff Nau, Senior Manager of Product Management for Paragon at Altera Digital Health, highlights how digital health solutions can address the challenges of nurse burnout and retention. AI and machine learning can help automate documentation tasks and streamline workflows to allow nurses better access to patient information. Improving nurse retention requires attention to factors like time-off policies and leveraging technology to give nurses more time to focus on patient care.

Geoff elaborates, "I have been a nurse since 2004. I practiced at the bedside for approximately 15 years. I did pediatric and adult ER as well as NICU. So I started my nursing career on paper and transitioned to electronic. And so in that time, a couple of factors, in the beginning, there was not enough information, and click-intensive. And looking at my travels and going to hospitals and sites today, that challenge is still there as far as access to data relevant to that patient visit, whether it's trending labs, care plans, etc. My experience with most EHRs out there, most of all, is that it's just click-intensive. A one-size-fits-all is tough to do nowadays."

"There is still a considerable amount of paper out there. When you start getting into these specialized areas like behavioral health, IOP or intensive outpatient, a lot of that, especially if there's anything like a treatment plan, things that may have multiple people needing to touch it, I still see a lot of that on paper. My goal from a solutions perspective is to get as much of that electronic as possible, especially given where we're at with challenges with nursing and staffing. Today, your patient loads go from four to five to one nurse."

"I'm a nurse. I also have a doctorate in organizational psychology. And this was a big study of my focus during my dissertation, where I looked at why people stay on the job as opposed to why they leave. When I first got into nursing, nurses would leave for a dollar. They would go up the street to another facility. But now, having support systems in place allows nurses to take time off, as you said. I know that here, where I live in North Carolina, a couple of institutions are taking a look at their PTO policies. They're looking at their holiday policies and trying to be more flexible. They're working with PRN staffing. In my research, I also found a community component to job embeddedness, if you will, in nursing."

#AlteraDigitalHealth #DigitalHealth #Nurses #Nursing #NurseBurnout #NurseRetention #MedAI

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Geoff Nau, Senior Manager of Product Management for Paragon at Altera Digital Health, highlights how digital health solutions can address the challenges of nurse burnout and retention. AI and machine learning can help automate documentation tasks and streamline workflows to allow nurses better access to patient information. Improving nurse retention requires attention to factors like time-off policies and leveraging technology to give nurses more time to focus on patient care.

Geoff elaborates, "I have been a nurse since 2004. I practiced at the bedside for approximately 15 years. I did pediatric and adult ER as well as NICU. So I started my nursing career on paper and transitioned to electronic. And so in that time, a couple of factors, in the beginning, there was not enough information, and click-intensive. And looking at my travels and going to hospitals and sites today, that challenge is still there as far as access to data relevant to that patient visit, whether it's trending labs, care plans, etc. My experience with most EHRs out there, most of all, is that it's just click-intensive. A one-size-fits-all is tough to do nowadays."

"There is still a considerable amount of paper out there. When you start getting into these specialized areas like behavioral health, IOP or intensive outpatient, a lot of that, especially if there's anything like a treatment plan, things that may have multiple people needing to touch it, I still see a lot of that on paper. My goal from a solutions perspective is to get as much of that electronic as possible, especially given where we're at with challenges with nursing and staffing. Today, your patient loads go from four to five to one nurse."

"I'm a nurse. I also have a doctorate in organizational psychology. And this was a big study of my focus during my dissertation, where I looked at why people stay on the job as opposed to why they leave. When I first got into nursing, nurses would leave for a dollar. They would go up the street to another facility. But now, having support systems in place allows nurses to take time off, as you said. I know that here, where I live in North Carolina, a couple of institutions are taking a look at their PTO policies. They're looking at their holiday policies and trying to be more flexible. They're working with PRN staffing. In my research, I also found a community component to job embeddedness, if you will, in nursing."

#AlteraDigitalHealth #DigitalHealth #Nurses #Nursing #NurseBurnout #NurseRetention #MedAI

alterahealth.com

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Dr. Paul Moore, Chief Scientific Officer at Zymeworks, focuses on developing targeted therapies, particularly multispecific antibodies and antibody-drug conjugates for hard-to-treat cancers such as gynecological, thoracic, and digestive tract cancers. This approach can target multiple areas on tumor cells and immune cells, potentially overcoming tumor heterogeneity and allowing for immune system modulation. The platform allows for a plug-and-play approach, enabling the development of therapies for oncology and autoimmune diseases.

Paul explains, "So, multispecific antibodies are antibodies. Antibodies traditionally have a single target that they bind, so they're monoclonal and hit a specific target. A lot of excitement is generated for bispecific antibodies, which are engineered to bind two targets. Then with multispecifics, you are trying to broaden even further the number of targets or binding sites you've incorporated into your drug so that you can simultaneously interact with more than one target. The reason that can be important is that allows and facilitates new biology that is not possible for just a monoclonal antibody or a single antibody-targeting drug conjugate."

"Multispecifics open up the opportunity to take two targets that are on different cells, different cell populations. So, you can have a target on a tumor cell you're trying to target. Then you can have a target on an immune cell like a T cell, which you can co-engage. You can bridge a T cell to a binding domain that's on a multispecific with your second specificity, which can bind to the cell. And what that allows you to do is bring the T cell into the environment of the tumor cell, and through that engagement, the T cell can kill the tumor cell. So that is the foundation of a lot of excitement in bispecifics."

#Zymeworks #Antibodies #MultispecificAntibodies #ADC #AntibodyDrugConjugate #Tumors #Cancer #ImmuneSystem

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Dr. Paul Moore, Chief Scientific Officer at Zymeworks, focuses on developing targeted therapies, particularly multispecific antibodies and antibody-drug conjugates for hard-to-treat cancers such as gynecological, thoracic, and digestive tract cancers. This approach can target multiple areas on tumor cells and immune cells, potentially overcoming tumor heterogeneity and allowing for immune system modulation. The platform allows for a plug-and-play approach, enabling the development of therapies for oncology and autoimmune diseases.

Paul explains, "So, multispecific antibodies are antibodies. Antibodies traditionally have a single target that they bind, so they're monoclonal and hit a specific target. A lot of excitement is generated for bispecific antibodies, which are engineered to bind two targets. Then with multispecifics, you are trying to broaden even further the number of targets or binding sites you've incorporated into your drug so that you can simultaneously interact with more than one target. The reason that can be important is that allows and facilitates new biology that is not possible for just a monoclonal antibody or a single antibody-targeting drug conjugate."

"Multispecifics open up the opportunity to take two targets that are on different cells, different cell populations. So, you can have a target on a tumor cell you're trying to target. Then you can have a target on an immune cell like a T cell, which you can co-engage. You can bridge a T cell to a binding domain that's on a multispecific with your second specificity, which can bind to the cell. And what that allows you to do is bring the T cell into the environment of the tumor cell, and through that engagement, the T cell can kill the tumor cell. So that is the foundation of a lot of excitement in bispecifics."

#Zymeworks #Antibodies #MultispecificAntibodies #ADC #AntibodyDrugConjugate #Tumors #Cancer #ImmuneSystem

zymeworks.com

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Dr. Sonja Tarrago, head of Physician Strategy and Engagement at DexCare, has created a care orchestration platform to help health systems improve patient access to care, direct patients to the proper care, and optimize provider capacity. DexCare solutions have enabled health systems to treat more patients with existing resources, increase new patient acquisition, and reduce time to care. This platform reduces long wait times, provides real-time online scheduling, and matches patient demand with provider availability.

Sonja explains, "DexCare is a care orchestration platform used by leading health systems to help manage the supply and demand of healthcare. That means that our platform helps health systems get discovered at the point of search. So, where patients are searching for care, we know that's typically Google, and then we navigate patients to the best fit care. So we do that while optimizing provider capacity and resources in real time. So, as we talk about our customers, we think that first of all, we need to acknowledge that healthcare is in crisis right now."

"In addition to making care more discoverable, we're using data to help direct our patients to the right care based on what they're looking for. This makes sure that the patients are getting connected to the right resources within the health systems that we work with, and we're helping to reduce bottlenecks and improve efficiencies within the health system."

"So we need to help patients find care, not find a doctor. In addition to that, I think another gap is that patients have limited access to real-time online scheduling. And by that, I don't mean a form that a patient fills out and waits for someone to get back to them. I mean a real-time slot that patients can book into."

#DexCare #CareOrchestration #DigitalHealth #CareOptimization

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