The Big Unlock

In this 100th episode of the podcast, Unity Stoakes discusses about their life-long mission to improve people’s health and well-being worldwide and how the healthcare landscape has witnessed significant changes over the last ten years.

Unity maintains that by combining the powers of moonshot thinking, a transformer mindset, and collaborative communities, healthcare companies can reinvent the future of health. Health systems should lean towards early-stage innovation, experiment, and then really think about developing an innovation stack in the context of care delivery and better outcomes.

Unity advocates leveraging technology to build a cohesive health care segment where doctorpreneurs and clinicians can together transform organizations using the enormous capital and talent at their disposal. He also advises digital health start-ups to have a persistent and resilient mindset to thrive in the industry. Take a listen.

Note: StartUp Health has recently launched the StartUp Health Moonshots Impact Fund. For more details, visit here.

In this podcast, Amit Phadnis, Chief Digital Officer at GE Healthcare reflects on how a geographical transition and a change in domain from IT networking to healthcare has worked out for him and shares his learnings from this shift. GE Healthcare is a leading global medical technology, pharmaceutical, diagnostics, and digital solutions innovator. 

While Phadnis admits that the potent combination of physics, electronics, electromagnetics, and AI will significantly transform care delivery, he discusses how these must be integrated into clinical workflows to change the healthcare delivery model. The majority of digital healthcare technologies provide patient-centric data aggregation, which aids clinicians and speeds up patient diagnosis and treatment. He views healthcare tech also driving beyond the hospital’s four walls to get closer to the patients virtually. The future of healthcare then, does indeed seem to be a robust partnership between the medical practitioners, computing, and analytics. 

Amit also advises digital health startups to focus on the last mile of healthcare that is improved patient outcomes, decreased healthcare costs, and early disease detection. Take a listen.  

In this podcast, Darshak Sanghavi, MD, Global Chief Medical Officer of Babylon Health talks about how digital healthcare providers can deliver on the sales promise they make about bringing affordable and accessible healthcare to everyone. Babylon Health is the global end-to-end digital healthcare provider serving over a dozen countries and millions of people.

Darshak delves into the challenges around including the demographic segment that has never engaged with healthcare before and is underserved. He discusses how digital primary care is on the verge of possibly replacing about 80 to 90% of in-person visits.

Lastly, Dr. Sanghavi outlines what constitutes a longitudinal care experience. It’s not a ‘one-and-done’ approach but an effective engagement where systems are optimized to do the simple things and consumers find it easy to access them digitally. Take a listen.

In this podcast, Amber Fencl, VP of Digital Health and Engagement at Novant Health, discusses how innovations in technology are driving healthcare and enabling its seamless, effective delivery into patients’ homes today. They are transforming the home into the new healthcare hub.

From drones that deliver medical supplies and AI-leveraged platforms that detect strokes to harnessing AI voice bots to answering patient questions on COVID vaccine and setting up the remotely monitored COVID-care at home, digital health tools have come a long way. Novant Health is the first healthcare system in the U.S. to get the FAA clearance to use drones for distributing medical supplies during the COVID-19 pandemic. In combination with invaluable consumer insights and when integrated with a robust EHR system, digital health care can only enhance patient-centric care delivery models.

Lastly, but not the least, start with what the consumers need and want to look for, because if you deliver something they’re not interested in, they will not use it. Take a listen.

In this podcast, Tony Ambrozie, Chief Digital Officer of Baptist Health South Florida, shares his journey and learnings embracing digital in healthcare. Transformation in any sector requires sustained effort, a budget, a cohesive team and most importantly, a well-drafted communication plan.

Digital transformation is not easy – setbacks are inevitable. When digital health tools add to the physician’s workload, the rate of adoption slows down. When organizational processes and mindsets don’t adapt, mistakes are unavoidable.

With his deep background in consumer-oriented industry sectors, Tony brings a heightened appreciation of the gaps in digital patient engagement and how to approach the challenges. Take a listen.

In this episode, Jacob Sattelmair, Co-Founder and CEO of Wellframe discusses how technology solution providers can collaborate with health plans to deliver impeccable quality care to people whenever and wherever they need it. With Telemedicine adoption rates gradually on the rise, it’s imperative to enhance investment in a digital concierge type service that puts the patient first, breaks down silos within the health plans, and facilitates improved collaboration between plans and providers vis a vis support.

Sattelmair maintains that leveraging “high-tech for high-touch support” is the way to go in a COVID-ravaged world. This will not only transform patient experiences and care management but will prompt people to better understand their health while smoothing the navigation around the healthcare system. Take a listen.

In this episode, Dr. Roy Schoenberg, President and CEO of Amwell, discusses the current state of telehealth in the U.S. and how its adoption is impacting the experience for healthcare stakeholders – consumers, providers, and payers. Amwell is a leading telehealth platform in the United States and globally, connecting and enabling providers, insurers, patients, and innovators to deliver greater access to more affordable and higher quality care. 

The COVID-19 pandemic made people realize that healthcare can be effectively delivered through technology. Telehealth technology has turned the corner and now has a life of its own. Dr. Schoenberg discusses the role of big tech and EHR in the rapidly changing landscape and shares advice for digital health startups. Take a listen.   

In this episode, McKinsey partners Oleg Bestsennyy and Jenny Rost discuss the findings of their recently published report – ‘Telehealth: A quarter-trillion-dollar post-Covid-19 Reality?’ The conversation highlights the rapid growth of telehealth since the pandemic and explores several important differences in adoption rates based on types of care, demographic profiles, and other factors.

Telehealth can be a great enabler for delivering innovations that lead to better quality healthcare, member experience, and lower costs. There is a need for continued innovation to sustain and expand telehealth and investment in building seamless consumer experiences, especially in a hybrid care model.

The report provides several interesting charts that inform readers on the emerging landscape of telehealth and virtual care models. Oleg and Jenny also discuss various headwinds that will impact the growth of telehealth technologies in the future. They also share advice for health systems and health plan executives looking to navigate the transition to virtual care models successfully. Take a listen.

In this episode, Matthew Roman discusses how Duke Health is implementing a number of foundational technology platforms for effective patient engagement and care delivery over the next couple of years.

A clinician by background, Matthew describes the collaboration model among a diverse group of technology and operational executives to implement digital health programs at Duke Health. He gives us a hint of the one single question he wrestles with every day as the Chief Digital Strategy Officer. He also explains why they choose to “tread lightly” in offering clinical advice through artificial intelligence.

Matthew describes several challenges digital health startups must be prepared to face, even if they have remarkable and game-changing technology solutions. Among his words of advice? Don’t oversell. He also shares a few learnings from his experience for peer group executives in health systems. Take a listen.

In this episode, Mike Restuccia discusses the state of telehealth in the pre-and post-COVID era and how the overall workload for the technology function has expanded significantly with the onset of virtual care models. He discussed the role of the IT function in the context of the overall mission of Penn Medicine that covers education, research and care delivery.

In this extended interview, Mike discusses a broad range of topics including the role of big tech and EHR companies in the digital transformation journey, his approach to technology vendor relationships, and a governance model for identifying and nurturing innovative startups. He discusses the use of newer data sources such as genomic data in the analytics programs at Penn and the challenges of AI-enabled solutions from the vendor community that overpromise and under-deliver.

Mike also shares how he spends a significant amount of time attracting and nurturing tech talent, and how to support and empower high-performing teams. Take a listen.

Note: Penn Medicine has published several insightful reports on the IT function’s contributions to the overall mission. These provide valuable insights into the functioning of one of the largest and most prestigious medical institutions in the country. Interested readers can download the reports here.