The Beat

About Manny Montalvo:

Manny Montalvo is SVP, Head of Digital Health & Innovation at Teva Pharmaceuticals since September 2021. Manny is responsible for overseeing the US Respiratory business, the US commercial innovation work, and the US and GLOBAL DIGIHALER® franchise. Manny’s digital health team at Teva is entirely homegrown and has pioneered a class of digital pharmaceutical devices - a rarity in the pharmaceutical industry. Manny’s charge at Teva is to encourage the use of digital therapeutics as part of the healthcare experience, making it seamless for both the healthcare providers and the patients they serve. With over 20 years of life-science experience, Manny Montalvo has held leadership roles in both Sales and Marketing, working in numerous therapeutic areas in the US and global markets, as well as in R&D and Commercial Operations. 

Prior to assuming his current role, Manny Montalvo served as the Vice President of Global Digital Health Marketing & Commercial Analytics at Teva Pharmaceuticals where he set the strategic direction for Teva’s biologic program and Digital Health Marketing and transformation of Teva’s Global Commercial Analytics. Manny joined Teva in 2013 to lead its R&D Innovation program as Vice President of Global New Therapeutic Entities (NTE) Innovation where he focused on the evaluation of the latest drug delivery technologies and drug development, adding more than 15 new products to Teva’s specialty portfolio. 

Before joining Teva, Manny held leadership positions with P&L responsibilities at Sanofi and Johnson & Johnson. During his tenure at Sanofi and J&J, Manny worked in a variety of commercial roles including consumer marketing, driving growth for a range of portfolios including diabetes, dermatology, cardiovascular and primary care. 

Things You’ll Learn:

• Two out of five medicines in your cabinet are likely from Teva.
• A platform business has a feedback loop with customers.
• To innovate, one has to have a collaborative space supported by management.
• Teva Pharmaceuticals is partnering with Rimidi and HealthSnap, integrating their data as a step closer to fulfilling their mission. 
• The more patients on Teva’s platform, the better the technology gets.
• About 40% of Teva’s digital space workers did not come from the traditional pharma industry. 

Resources:

• Connect with and follow Manny Montalvo on LinkedIn.
• Follow Teva Pharmaceuticals on LinkedIn.
• Visit the Teva Pharmaceuticals Website!
• Discover DIGIHALER here!

Morgan Health is focused on improving the quality, equity, and affordability of employer-sponsored healthcare in the U.S. by investing capital in companies focused on improving healthcare in the commercial marketplace.

As the Head of Healthcare Innovation at Morgan Health, Rivka Friedman is focused on improving the quality, equity, and affordability of employer-sponsored healthcare in the U.S. by accelerating the adoption of new approaches to care delivery.

On this episode, Rivka joins hosts Dr. Jessica Shepherd and Dr. Jordan Shlain to discuss how Morgan Health is working to invest in companies that share their vision of BETTER care.

Listen in as Rivka shares how you build trust in the healthcare system and the three things that need to align to improve healthcare for the future.
 

Topics Covered

• The focus of Morgan health in improving employer-sponsored healthcare
• The key lessons Morgan Health learned from the failed Haven
• Rivka weighs in on the trend of the productization of healthcare
• Rivka shares a few of the companies they are currently working with
• How Morgan Health defines accountable care
• Rivka shares what success looks like for Morgan Health
• The 3 Biggest challenges Morgan Health is facing
• How to build trust in the healthcare system
• Rivka shares what motivates her to keep going to improve healthcare

Connect with Rivka Friedman
Rivka on LinkedIn

Morgan Health

Connect with Dr. Jessica Shepherd, Dr. Guatam Gulati & Dr. Jordan Shlain

HLTH

Dr. Shlain on Twitter

Dr. Shlain on LinkedIn

Dr. Jessica Shepherd MD
Dr. Shepherd on Twitter
Dr. Gulati on Twitter

Dr. Gulati on LinkedIn

Resources 
A Visual Approach to Leverage Points - The Donella Meadows Project

Embold Health

Vera Whole Health

Centivo
LetsGetChecked
   

Introductory Quote
[30:18]
“One key goal for us across all of our teams is figuring out what works and then scaling it. To do that, we have to try a lot of things and fail. So that's part of our job, launching these pilots, and then letting a bunch of them not work, and being honest and open both about our successes and our failures.”

About Theresa Demeter:

Theresa Demeter is an entrepreneurial executive administrator with 30 years of healthcare performance and operational experience. In her role as a Managing Director at Tegria, she brings her passion for conceptualizing and implementing innovative solutions that drive quality and performance improvement to optimize patient outcomes. Theresa developed Tegria’s offering that helps healthcare organizations prioritize and operationalize their health equity strategy and mitigate the harmful effects of implicit bias through macro-simulation.

Prior to joining Tegria, Theresa drove the formation and expansion of InSytu, a national leader in clinical process improvement consulting powered by macro-simulation. She also served as the Director of Women and Infants Outpatient Services at Swedish Health Services in Seattle.

Theresa earned a master’s degree in healthcare administration from the University of Washington and is a certified childbirth and parenting educator and doula.

Things You’ll Learn:

• Technology can depend significantly on having access to a high-quality broadband service, something that some people still don’t have daily.
• Healthcare companies should always devise their health tech solutions thinking of access issues for people in rural settings and income issues for people in urban environments.
• Techquity is the intentional and thoughtful development of healthcare-related technology without excluding anybody.
• On some occasions, people have better health outcomes when they can stay within their community rather than moving away from them.
• Health advocates are people who build trust by bridging health companies with communities.
• Healthcare has to make partnerships to address issues that affect a patient’s health, like their social determinants.

Resources:

• Connect and follow Theresa Demeter on LinkedIn
• Follow Tegria on LinkedIn 
• Discover the Tegria Website
• Listen to Theresa’s previous interview from ViVe here!
• Visit the HLTH Foundation Website!
• Check out Tegria’s pictures of their trip to Alaska here!

A holistic medical approach using hyper-personalized nutrition protocols, mental health, sleep, movement, mindfulness, and relaxation enables patients to see the whole picture of their health, leading to 85% of patients improving or resolving their chronic conditions within the first year.

Parsley Health is on a mission to make life-changing modern holistic medicine accessible to everyone, anywhere.

Dr. Robin Berzin is the Founder and CEO of Parsley Health. Parsley Health is the nation's leading holistic medical practice designed to help people overcome chronic conditions through personalized holistic medicine that puts food, lifestyle, and proactive diagnostic testing on the prescription pad next to medications. She is also the author of State Change: End Anxiety, Beat Burnout, and Ignite a New Baseline of Energy and Flow.

On this episode, Dr. Berzin joins host Dr. Jessica Shepherd to discuss how Parsley Health is marrying functional medicine with conventional primary care to bring root cause resolution medicine to more patients. 

Dr. Berzin shares the background behind her book, State Change, a 30-day program designed to reset the body, mind, and mood for a higher level of focus, a positive mental state, and peak physical health.

Listen in as Dr. Berzin explains how Parsley Health is digging in to treat conditions such as autoimmune diseases by addressing the health of the whole patient in a telehealth setting.

Topics Covered

• Dr. Berzin explains the background of root cause resolution medicine
• How lifestyle changes can modify chronic conditions
• Why prescriptions aren't the (only) answer
• How Parsley Health is marrying functional medicine with conventional primary care
• How Parsley is reducing the cost of care by transitioning into a membership model-based service
• Dr. Berzin explains the connection between mental and physical health as portrayed in her book, State Change
• How a 30-Day plan can help you move more, feel better, and clear the fog
• What Parsley Health is doing to treat the surging female population diagnosed with autoimmune diseases
• How Parsley is using telehealth to deliver total patient hyper-personalized protocols

Connect with Robin Berzin

Robin Berzin

Connect with Dr. Jessica Shepherd, Dr. Guatam Gulati & Dr. Jordan Shlain

HLTH

Dr. Shlain on Twitter

Dr. Shlain on LinkedIn

Dr. Jessica Shepherd MD
Dr. Shepherd on Twitter
Dr. Gulati on Twitter

Dr. Gulati on LinkedIn

Resources 

Parsley Health
State Change: End Anxiety, Beat Burnout, and Ignite a New Baseline of Energy and Flow

Autoimmune Diseases Signs, Causes, and Treatment | How to Get Rid of Immune Diseases
 

Introductory Quote
[26:46]
Where you've been determines where you're going. That first visit with the doctor over video is fully a deep dive, it's an hour long. And we really get to know you as a person. And then we're prescribing from there a highly personalized plan that begins with foods, I always say food isn't like medicine it is medicine. [27:18] And so our prescription plan begins with hyper-personalized nutrition protocols, mental health, sleep, movement, mindfulness, and relaxation.

About Kevin Grabenstatter:

Kevin Grabenstatter is a Managing Director in L.E.K. Consulting’s San Francisco office. Kevin joined L.E.K. in 2006 and focuses on strategy and growth for health systems, physician practices, and other providers, value-based care delivery, and emerging technologies/HCIT. He advises clients on critical strategic issues across the healthcare value chain. 

Kevin formerly held strategy roles at Kaiser Permanente, where he was responsible for the design of strategic initiatives in areas such as care transitions, patient flow, and cost efficiency. His expert commentary has appeared in Managed Healthcare Executive.

Kevin got his Bachelor of Science with Honors from the Pennsylvania State University and a Master’s degree in Business Administration at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business.

About Joe Johnson:

Joe Johnson is a Managing Director and Partner, as well as the head of L.E.K. Consulting’s New York office. Joe co-leads L.E.K.’s Healthcare Services practice and leads the Healthcare IT and tech-enables services sub-practice. He plays an instrumental role in helping senior executives across the industry develop and implement new strategies and provides M&A advisory support to address the changing healthcare landscape.

Joe has more than 20 years of consulting experience managing and directing client engagements and has worked on a substantial number of strategic growth, operations, and commercial due diligence projects across the healthcare services industry. His expertise in the Healthcare Services practice includes payer and provider healthcare IT, digital health, government programs (Medicare, Medicaid), and post-acute care, among others. Joe’s expert commentary has appeared in Harvard Business Review.

Joe first joined L.E.K. in 2000 and returned after receiving his MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. He graduated from Harvard University cum laude with a B.A. in Economics.

Joe got a Bachelor of Arts in Economics at Harvard University and a Master’s degree in Business Administration at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.

Things You’ll Learn:

• Healthcare systems currently face challenges that include inflationary and operational pressures, staffing shortages, and supply chain obstacles.
• Healthcare systems should also be thinking about how they can diversify their revenue streams.
• Patient experience needs to be as seamless and positive as possible.
• Precision medicine is a really interesting area to invest in, as technology, data, and insights can be used in a way where that can provide differentiated care for patients.
• Now that customer retailers have entered the healthcare industry, other health businesses should think of creative ways to give patients and consumers the experience these other industries have brought to them.
• Strategy is as much about what you should be doing as a company organization as well as what not.

Resources:

• Connect with and follow Kevin Grabenstatter on LinkedIn.
• Connect with and follow Joe Johnson on LinkedIn.
• Follow L.E.K. Consulting on LinkedIn.
• Visit the L.E.K. Consulting Website!
• Listen to the episode on Consumer Retailers in the Healthcare Sector of L.E.K.’s Insight Exchange podcast here!
• Reach out to Kevin and Joe at [email protected]

Robin Shah is an oncology subject matter expert, building a career around startups in the cancer care space.

So, he regularly receives phone calls from people whose friends, family members or colleagues have been diagnosed with cancer and don’t know what to do.

And Robin wondered how he could help people in this way at scale.

How could he support cancer patients who didn’t know someone like him? How could he help them navigate the healthcare system and get access to the right resource at the right time?

Today, Robin serves as Founder and CEO of Thyme Care, a value-based oncology management platform that provides personalized, clinically coordinated care to individuals with cancer.

Thyme Care pairs human guidance with software and analytics to engage members with a cancer diagnosis, quickly connecting them to the right care and providing ongoing support through targeted, evidence-based interventions.

On this episode, Robin joins host Dr. Jessica Shepherd to explain how Thyme Care’s tech-enabled team helps cancer patients find the help they need.

Robin discusses his patient-first approach to solving problems in oncology, describing the psychosocial aspect of navigating cancer and why Thyme Care is the first company of its kind to focus on oncology.

Listen in to understand how Thyme Care integrates directly with clinicians in a patient’s region and learn how Robin is improving the patient experience—while reducing the cost of care.
 

Topics Covered

• What’s behind Robin’s passion for building companies in the oncology space
• How Thyme Care helps cancer patients navigate the system and find the help they need
• How Thyme Care gives patients someone to talk to (when physicians can’t)
• Thyme Care’s tech-enabled team that provides the right resource at the right time
• How Thyme Care offers clinical wraparound support today with an eye to eventually deliver care
• How Robin’s team addresses the psychosocial aspect of navigating cancer
• How Robin benefits from having family members who work in the oncology space
• How Thyme Care integrates directly with providers in a patient’s region
• How Thyme Care improves the patient experience while reducing the cost of care
• Why Thyme Care is the first company of its kind to focus on oncology
• The benefit of Robin’s patient-first approach to solving problems in oncology
• How COVID inspired people to be more engaged in their healthcare journey

Connect with Robin Shah

Thyme Care

Connect with Dr. Jessica Shepherd

HLTH

Dr. Shepherd on Twitter

Dr. Shepherd on LinkedIn

Resources

Flatiron Health

OneOncology

‘Robin Shah on How Thyme Care’s Technology Can Make an Important Impact on Overall Wellness’ in Authority Magazine

About Maulik Majmudar:

Dr. Maulik Majmudar is the co-founder and Chief Medical Officer at Biofourmis. Dr. Majmudar served as Medical Officer at Amazon, where he led several healthcare-related initiatives. Before Amazon, Dr. Majmudar was associate director of the Healthcare Transformation Lab at Massachusetts General Hospital and an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School, where he was responsible for the identification, validation, and implementation of digital health solutions to improve care delivery.

Things You’ll Learn:

• Someone’s location should not be a factor that makes a big difference in healthcare outcomes.
• The Biofourmis platform is a disease, site of care, and acuity agnostic
• Remote Patient Management means that the data collected remotely is used for monitoring but also handled, interpreted, and executed.
• In healthcare, the ultimate measures of success are outcomes and unit economics.
• Obesity, high blood pressure, and diabetes are prevalent in socioeconomically deprived neighborhoods and underserved populations with little to no access to care.

Resources:

• Connect with and follow Maulik Majmudar on LinkedIn.
• Follow Biofourmis on LinkedIn.
• Discover the Biofourmis Website.

Healthcare is a $4 trillion industry just waiting to be disrupted. But because people’s lives are at stake, we must disrupt the space responsibly.

And that’s why every digital health company needs clinical experts on their teams and advisory boards.

Ruby Gadelrab is Cofounder and CEO of MDisrupt, a health advisory platform on a mission to organize the world's digital health products by performance through clinically crowdsourced data generation.

Ruby has created a two-sided marketplace that pairs domain experts in healthcare with digital health companies in desperate need of high quality, actionable expertise.

On this episode, Ruby joins hosts Dr. Jordan Schlain and Dr. Jessica Shepherd to explain why there is so little clinical representation in digital health startups and how MDisrupt pairs health tech companies with the right expert at the right time.

Ruby describes how MDisrupt vets clinicians to become part of its health expert network and discusses how clinicians are compensated for their time.
 

Listen in to understand the benefits of a having a medical advisory board and learn how MDisrupt helps health tech innovators accelerate their path to market and drive adoption.
 

Topics Covered

• Ruby’s take on what it means to disrupt healthcare responsibly
• Why it’s crucial for health tech companies to have clinical expertise on their teams
• How MDisrupt provides an on-demand health expert marketplace
• Ruby’s vision for MDisrupt to organize the world’s digital health products by performance
• How MDisrupt vets clinicians to become part of its health expert network
• How clinicians are compensated for being part of MDisrupt
• Why there is so little clinical representation in digital health startups
• Why health tech companies without medical advisory boards struggle with adoption
• How Ruby’s team pairs a health tech company with the right expert at the right time
• The market insight that inspired Ruby to build MDisrupt
• How to assess your current advisory board and align incentives appropriately
• Leveraging digital health to support underserved populations

Connect with Ruby Gadelrab

MDisrupt

Connect with Dr. Jordan Shlain & Dr. Jessica Shepherd

HLTH

Dr. Shlain on Twitter

Dr. Shlain on LinkedIn

Dr. Shepherd on Twitter

Dr. Shepherd on LinkedIn

Resources

Instacart Health

Oura Ring

CGM Devices

Invitae

23 and Me

About Brad Kittredge:

Brad Kittredge, Co-founder, and Chief Executive Officer of Brightside Health has spent over a decade pioneering evidence-based and consumer-driven healthcare solutions, including building the Product teams at 23andMe and Lantern. Inspired by the challenges of a close family member with lifelong depression, Brad’s mission is to ensure that everyone has access to life-changing mental health care with measurably better outcomes. He holds an MPH, MBA, and Psychology degrees from the University of California, Berkeley.

About Mimi Winsberg:

Brightside Health Co-founder and Chief Medical Officer Mimi Winsberg, MD, a Stanford-trained psychiatrist with over 25 years of clinical experience, has profound expertise in the application of digital tools and therapeutics that impact behavioral health. Mimi leads and oversees Brightside’s psychiatry and therapy clinical programs, with a focus on optimizing engagement and outcomes in individuals with mental health conditions across the range of severity. Prior to Brightside, Mimi applied her clinical skills in leadership roles at Ginger and Lyra, as well as serving as the on-site psychiatrist at the Facebook wellness center. Mimi also holds a B.A. in Neuroscience from Harvard College and is on the leadership council of Brainstorm, the Stanford Laboratory for Brain Health Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

Things You’ll Learn:

• Patients with higher-severity mental symptoms are bounced around.
• Brightside digitized the Collaborative Assessment and Management of Suicidality and combined it with standard care to develop their remote patient monitoring platform.
• Brightside is launching Crisis Care, a national program for patients experiencing active suicidal ideation.
• About 50,000 people take their own lives in the US every year, and for every suicide death, over 200 are seriously considering suicide.
• One demonstrates their impact on healthcare through peer review.
• Virtual care has become on par with in-person care, aside from physical exams in the mental health space.
• Payers can see the data that backs the work Brightside has been doing as effective in a measurable way in terms of clinical and financial impact.

Resources:

• Connect with and follow Brad Kittredge on LinkedIn.
• Connect with and follow Mimi Winsberg on LinkedIn.
• Follow Brightside Health on LinkedIn.
• Visit the Brightside Health Website.

The World Health Organization estimates that one billion people have a mental health condition, but 70% of them aren't getting care.

So, what is the best way to address this supply-demand imbalance?
 

How do we help someone with a clinical diagnosis manage their condition? And what can we do to support the mental health needs of people before they develop a serious issue?
 

Russell Glass is CEO of Headspace Health, the world’s most comprehensive and accessible mental health care platform.
 

Russ leads the company in helping create a world where everyone is kind to their mind by way of mindfulness and meditation tools, behavioral health coaching, therapy and psychiatry services.
 

On this episode, Russ joins host Dr. Guatam Gulati to explore the root causes of the mental health crisis in the US and explain the benefit of a virtual-first approach to care.
 

Russ discusses how Headspace helps its members get the right level of care and what his team does to alert the appropriate authorities when a user has suicidal or homicidal intent.
 

Listen in for Russ’ insight on the over-prescription of psychotropic drugs like Lexapro and learn how to prevent serious mental health issues with a simple mindfulness and meditation practice.
 

Topics Covered

• Headspace Health’s mission to transform mental health care
• The supply-demand imbalance that inspired Russ’ work in mental health
• Why Russ takes a broad definition of mental health
• How Headspace offers mindfulness/meditation, behavioral health coaching and therapy services
• When virtual mental health interventions are appropriate and when in-person care works best
• How fast we adopted virtual mental health solutions during COVID
• The root causes of the mental health crisis in the US
• How Headspace helps its members get the right level of care
• How to prevent serious mental health issues with mindfulness and meditation
• How Russ thinks about crime being attributed to the mental health crisis in the US
• What Headspace does to alert the appropriate authorities when a member has suicidal or homicidal intent

Connect with Russell Glass

Headspace Health
 

Connect with Dr. Guatam Gulati

HLTH

Dr. Gulati on Twitter

Dr. Gulati on LinkedIn

Resources

Ginger

Social Determinants of Health

Generalized Anxiety Disorder Mental Health Assessment

Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale

‘Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction vs. Escitalopram for the Treatment of Adults with Anxiety Disorders’ in JAMA Psychiatry