Interview: Dr Eric Topol (Part 1)

We’re joined by Dr Eric Topol—cardiologist, scientist, author, and global digital health leader. In part one, Eric shares his journey from clinician to digital health pioneer, his vision for “SuperAgers,” and why genomics and personalised medicine could redefine how long—and how well—we live

Chatbots for Patients

We discuss the Wall Street Journal’s bold claim that chatbots could become part of the medical team. From spotting errors to translating lab results and reminding patients about medications, can they really serve as low-risk, always-on companion? Questions remain around accuracy, empathy, and whether they truly add value or just more noise.

The Human Side of Interoperability

Inspired by Amy Gleason’s LA Times op-ed, we look at the personal impact of fragmented health systems. Her daughter’s care journey shows how disconnected records hinder outcomes—and how AI uncovered a hidden opportunity. Should we lean into more personal stories to communicate to a wider audience?

Meta & Who Owns Your Health Data?

A San Francisco jury found Meta guilty of illegally harvesting data from millions of Flo app users—menstrual cycles, ovulation, even pregnancy intentions. The ruling highlights urgent questions: Who really owns health data, and what rights do patients have when tech giants treat it like ad fuel?

Patient Consent in the Age of AI

Consent forms are broken—static, outdated, and unfit for the AI era. We unpack Y. Tony Yang’s American Journal of Bioethics piece arguing for “dynamic consent,” accountability frameworks, and real patient understanding. Without rethinking consent, healthcare risks losing trust as AI tools grow more influential

Black Box for Aged Care

What if aged care had a “black box,” like aviation? Sensors, AI, and monitoring systems could flag risks before crises hit. A Pulse+IT blog argues for shifting from reactive to proactive care, but business models and adoption lag behind. We debate whether the sector can finally move from inquiry to prevention

Resources:

• Louise’s LinkedIn poll on gen AI use for health research Link
• Dr Eric Topol’s book SuperAgers Link
• Y. Tony Yang’s American Journal of Bioethics Article on Patient Consent Link
• Aged Care’s Black Box in Pulse+IT Link
• Amy Gleason’s parental perspective on the need for health data interoperability Link

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Telecare Acquisition by Teladoc: US telehealth giant Teladoc Health acquires Australian virtual care clinic Telecare in a rare successful exit for the local digital health startup scene. The hosts discuss implications for Australia's startup ecosystem and the significance of this $2.57 billion company's investment in local innovation.

Boots At-Home Test Kits:  UK pharmacy chain Boots launches 13 at-home testing kits that integrate with the NHS app, raising questions about clinical utility, health equity, and the transformation of retail healthcare. The discussion explores whether consumer demand justifies bypassing traditional healthcare pathways.

BUPA Genetic Testing Initiative:  Health insurer BUPA rolls out a £300 genomic health toolkit offering medication response testing and disease risk assessment. The hosts debate whether this signals the arrival of personalised medicine or represents another way to monetise the "worried well."

FDA-Approved AI Wearable for Essential Tremor:  The Felix Neuro AI wristband receives FDA approval as the first AI-powered device to treat essential tremor through real-time electrical pulse therapy. The technology demonstrates promising results with potential applications for other neurological conditions.

AI Scribes Market Consolidation and Regulation Epic's entry into the AI scribe market is the biggest signal yet of the commoditisation of AI Scribe technology, while regulatory challenges emerge around patient consent, medical device classification, and clinical responsibility. The hosts explore how market consolidation could concentrate control among big tech players.

ChatGPT-5 in Healthcare OpenAI launches ChatGPT-5 with explicit healthcare applications, featuring training from 250 physicians and patient testimonials. The discussion examines the potential for disrupting information asymmetry between patients and clinicians while addressing concerns about bias and hallucinations.

Resources:

TGA guidance on when scribes are medical devices Link

ACSQHC Pragmatic advice for clinicians on using AI Link

Department of Health, Disability and Ageing Safe and Responsible Artificial Intelligence in Health Care – Legislation and Regulation Review: Final Report Link

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GenAI as Therapist A New York Times op-ed explores how people are using ChatGPT for therapeutic conversations and emotional processing, raising questions about whether AI companions represent innovative digital self-care or a concerning workaround for unmet mental health needs.

USA's "Make HealthTech Great Again" Pledge The White House hosted a summit with 60+ tech companies to sign a HealthTech Ecosystem pledge promoting data interoperability and AI in healthcare, though questions remain about whether this represents genuine reform or just encourages data sharing with private platforms while healthcare infrastructure gets decimated.

Australia Gets Tough on De-Identification Australia's Privacy Commissioner issued new guidance clarifying that supposedly "de-identified" health data used for AI training may still qualify as personal information, potentially ending the era of inadequately anonymised data sharing and pushing the industry toward synthetic data or on-premise learning.

OpenAI's Kenya Study: Clinical Copilot in Action OpenAI's real-world study with Penda Health in Kenya showed their GPT-4o clinical copilot reduced diagnostic errors by 16% and treatment errors by 13% across 40,000 patient visits, demonstrating measurable improvements when AI is properly integrated into clinical workflows.

George and Louise chat with Dr Danny Sands - Pioneer of participatory medicine, discusses the origins of the e-patient movement and participatory medicine, from early email communication with patients and exploring how to maintain human connection while embracing technological advancement

Connect with Danny on LinkedIn

Resources:

NY Times I’m a Therapist. ChatGPT Is Eerily Effective Link

Australian Privacy Commissioner ruling Link

Sands (2025) From Internet to Artificial Intelligence (Al) Bots: Symbiotic Evolutions of Digital Technologies and e-Patients Link

Shout outs to: Liz Salmi, ePatientDave, Danny Sands, Ian Opperman, Gavin Andrews, Dr Amit Thacker Africa Health Business

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George and Louise chat with Dr Danny Sands - Pioneer of participatory medicine discusses the origins of the e-patient movement and participatory medicine, from early email communication with patients and exploring how to maintain human connection while embracing technological advancement

Connect with Danny on LinkedIn

Amazon launches Pathology - Amazon enters the healthcare diagnostics space with at-home blood testing services in India, leveraging their logistics expertise to challenge traditional healthcare providers.

UK Biobank - The world's largest human imaging project completes scanning 100,000 volunteers over 11 years, with AI analysing data that would have taken thousands of years to process manually.

Wearables and Regulation - The US FDA warns Whoop about their unapproved blood pressure insights while both UK and US governments push for widespread wearable adoption, highlighting the blurred lines between wellness devices and medical equipment.

OpenEvidence & Bias in Medical Research - The AI medical platform used by 40% of US doctors raises $210M but faces criticism for perpetuating gender bias, particularly around hormone replacement therapy misinformation.

AI in Everyday Healthcare - South Australian aged care provider ECH dramatically improves care plan accuracy from 35% to 92% using AI, while Monash Health seeks AI clinical coding solutions to improve efficiency and address workforce pressures.

Shout Out: 

Complete the Australian Alliance for Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare Survey and contribute to help shape the national AI agenda

Resources:

Wired (2010) The Blood Test Gets a Makeover Link

George Gouzounis’ AI in Aged Care Newsletter Link

Dr Danny Sands (1998) Clinical E-Mail Guidelines Link

Dr Tom Ferguson’s (2007) whitepaper e-Patients: How they can help us heal health care Link

Journal of Participatory Medicine Link

The Whole Early Catalog Link

Sands (2025) From Internet to Artificial Intelligence (Al) Bots: Symbiotic Evolutions of Digital Technologies and e-Patients Link

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George and Louise break down the hot topics of the day, including:

• AI Scribes now regulated as medical devices in the UK - all pilots must cease until MHRA approval 
• UK Government announces £10 billion digital health investment and AI Early Warning System 
• NHS 10-Year "Fit to the Future" Plan - three major shifts including analogue to digital transformation 
• Cybersecurity failures at WA's PathWest and UK's Synnovis directly impacting patient safety?
• Positive AI developments: FDA approves breast cancer risk prediction tool, Australian chemotherapy dosing AI

How does Australia go about integrating 300,000+ allied health professionals into the national digital health strategy? That topic and more are covered in the chat with our guest Anita Hobson-Powell, the inaugural Chief Allied Health Officer at the Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing.

Connect with Anita on LinkedIn

Resources:

• NHS 10 year health plan for England. Fit to the Future Link
• National Allied Health Digital Uplift. Responses due 20 July Link
• Health Connect Australia Strategy, Architecture and Roadmap to enable health information exchange Link
• ANU Study on the Future of Digital Health EOI Link

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Special episode: Today on Pulse, we’re doing something a little different. We’re joined by one of Australia’s most respected voices in digital health — Dr Amandeep Hansra. Amandeep is a GP, a health tech leader, an investor, and a long-time advocate for innovation in healthcare. She is the founder of Australian Medical Angels investment syndicate and Creative Careers in Medicine – a community for clinicians who support each other as they explore ‘creative’ ways to practice medicine differently.

But earlier this year, the tables turned. In a sudden and deeply personal twist, Amandeep found herself not behind the stethoscope, but on the other side — as a patient, facing a series of debilitating symptoms that landed her in hospital. Within mere weeks she was back living her best life, but answers are still elusive. 

Today, Amandeep is generously joining us to share her journey — not just as a doctor, but as someone navigating the complexities, gaps, and opportunities in our health system firsthand. This is a story about communication, access, digital innovation, and what happens when the doctor becomes the patient.

Connect with Amandeep on LinkedIn 

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On today’s show, George and Louise delve into:

Has China really built the world’s first an AI-Agent Hospital?

Royal Melbourne Hospital in Melbourne has built a machine learning model to predict likely wait times in the emergency department, complete with a public-facing dashboard – how cool is that!

Whoops, the US FDA’s AI, Elsa, has problems coming out of the starting gate

Australian regulator the TGA has approved sleep apnoea tech on smartwatches. Is this the relationship saving tech everyone will want?

Congrats to the Bluegum Health Transformation team in Tassie for their early progress in transforming the state’s health system, enabled by digital and data. 

Is there a fundamental mismatch between the goals of interoperability and monolith EMRs?

OpenAI’s all listening, all seeing, all dancing AI companion. What could be the applications and implications for healthcare?

And Louise chats with Julia Conway at the Independent Health and Aged Care Pricing Authority on pricing virtual care and what’s needed to make virtual a part of everyday healthcare

Connect with Julia on LinkedIn

Resources:

RMH Emergency Wait Times Dashboard Link

Overview of smartwatches & sleep apnoea detection Link

China’s AI Agent Hospital Research Paper Link

Bluegum Health Transformation Homepage Link

Dr Yousseff Aboufandi’s OpenAI LinkedIn post  

IHACPA Virtual Care Project Final Report Link

ePatientDave’s Substack #PatientsUseAI Link

JAMIA paper how patients with brain tumours use LLM Link

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George and Louise dive into a roundup from the Australian Digital Health Festival, key government presentations and reports from the Commonwealth, Victoria and New South Wales

We cover some of the big stories coming out of Silicon Valley – there’s a lot to talk about!

Plus we chat with the Queen herself, Mother of FemTech, Ida Tin on “women’s health as societal infrastructure”

Connect with Ida on LinkedIn | Join the Book Waitlist

Resources:

Halle Tecco on the Growth-Stage Cliff Plaguing Women’s Health Startups Link

John Carreyrou’s book Bad Blood, Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup

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On the show today is part 2 of George and Louise’s talk with Bernard Salt AM, Founder of The Demographics Group. They have a conversation on shifting populations, shifting priorities and what that means for the health sector. 

Australia’s election delivers a result no pundits foresaw.

The FDA is mandating the use of AI for their scientific reviews. What could this mean for stakeholders?

Friend of Pulse Rachael Dunscombe suggests healthcare’s complexity means that for AI governance to be successful we need to adopt principles espoused by cybernetics guru Stafford Beer in the 1950s.

UK Q1 VC funding report stats are in and the results are not what you’d expect.

George & Louise give a run-through of the 6 Megatrends impacting the health sector, according to a new report by NSW Health and CSIRO.

Connect with Bernard on LinkedIn | Instagram | The Demographics Group

Resources:

What is Digital Health? Whitepaper by David Rowlands Link

Health Megatrends Report, NSW Health & CSIRO Link

Call for Disclosure when using AI for patient comms Link

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Listen for your chance to go the Digital Health Festival on us – with thanks to the DHF team. #Muchlove💗

On the show today George and Louise talk with Bernard Salt AM, Founder of The Demographics Group. We have a conversation on shifting populations, shifting priorities and what that means for the health sector. Part 1 drops today and part 2 will be in our next episode.

A virtual first telehealth service has received bipartisan support in the Australian election. Woo-hoo! Is this going to change things or will it turn out to be just a rebrand? What does this mean for consumers and our health sector?

Friend of Pulse Dr Tina Purnat is back with her take on the social media paradox for young people getting their health information from non-health experts.

Global health interoperability rankings are in. How does your country rate?

Connect with Bernard on LinkedIn | Instagram | The Demographics Group

Resources:

Dr Tina Purnat & The Social Media Paradox Link

Health Systems Interoperability Ranking Link

Acquired Pod covers Epic Link

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