Faces Of Digital Health

Asia is the 2nd largest digital health ecosystem in the world. Investments in the sector totaled 6.3 billion in 2018. 5 Faces of digital health episodes are going to be published in July, offering an overview of the region, and some insights provided by speakers from China, Singapore, South Korea and India.

Developing countries are often seen as ideal test hubs for innovation: there's no existing infrastructure to disrupt, the regulation permits a faster speed of adoption. However, like any market, African countries have their own specifics. How can you scale in Africa? Can you reduce the price of your consumer solution to the affordability of African consumers? Moka Lantum, based in Kenya, is an expert on the African healthcare market. He obtained his Doctor of Medicine training at Faculty of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, University of Yaoundé, Cameroon; a Diploma in Nutrition and International Child Health, from Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden; a Doctorate in Pharmacology, from the University of Rochester, Rochester, New York. He is a graduate of the Masters in Health Care Management at the Harvard School of Public Health. He has rich entrepreneurship history of developing solutions for the African market. 

G4A, formerly known as Grants4Apps is probably the most famous digital health accelerator inside a Pharma conglomerate. For a few years, the program was designed to support a handful of startups by offering them office space, various entrepreneurship skills training and network expansion. As the digital health market evolved, so has the program, with Eugene Barukhovich taking over the global head of G4A digital health development at Bayer in 2016. At the moment, G4A is present in some form or another in 35 countries. 8 accelerators/incubators run around the globe. This discussion explains how a global pharmaceutical corporation with almost 120.000 employees launched a digital health accelerator, what are the specifics of this year's application process, how are business scandals of digital health and biotech startups from the Silicon Valley affecting the ecosystem, Eugene briefly comments the Dutch and German digital health system.   To learn more about this year's G4A program and application, see this link: 

Longevity, eternal youth or even immortality have been an aspiration in religion and culture throughout history. Today, people adopt all sorts of approaches to increase their wellbeing, delay aging and avoid diseases. Efforts are increasingly quantified with sensors, wearables, or even biohacking - interventions to influence body biology. The new hope for advancements in longevity is seen in artificial intelligence, which is becoming increasingly powerful. Alex Zhavoronkov has been researching the use of AI in aging for years. He is the CEO of Insilico Medicine, a Baltimore-based leader in the next-generation artificial intelligence technologies for drug discovery and aging biomarkers discovery. He truly is a well of knowledge - since 2012 he published over 130 peer-reviewed research papers and 2 books including "The Ageless Generation: How Biomedical Advances Will Transform the Global Economy" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013). In this episode, he talks about the complexity of aging as a biological process, types o

Estonia has only 1,3 million people but is famous worldwide for its digital governance. If you want, you can even become an Estonian electronic resident and run your business from Estonia, regardless of your country of residence. Healthcare wise, 95% of healthcare data is in digital form, some of it supported with blockchain technology. What does all this mean - is data structured or is information stored in pdf? How supportive is the system for digital health startups? And how did the country, where only 6.5% of the GDP is spent on healthcare, achieve the level of digitization many countries are only dreaming of? Hannalore Taal - digital health specialist and the Chief e-Health Specialist at the Estonian Ministry of Social Affairs explains.

This short recording offers a snippet of thoughts about healthcare China, Japan, Germany, Dubai, Israel, Japan, and Bolivia.

ClinicalTrials.gov currently lists 302,091 clinical studies in the US. It is impossible for patients and their doctors to be aware of all clinical trials an individual might be eligible for. While one would expect the trials to be run and supported by sophisticated software, the reality is often far from that expectation. Patients often come to doctors inquiring about trials doctors might not even have been aware of. Trials data is managed manually, in old fashion way — clinical trials are written in a word format, transmitted to sites in pdf files, later on along the process, the data are often manually abstracted from clinical trials to homegrown solutions for analysis in each institution. Data is collected in tailor-made 3rd party systems for different pharma companies and then re-converted to another format for FDA submissions.  There is no doubt: there are plenty of opportunities to improve clinical trials with new technologies. Samuel L. Volchenboum, MD, PhD, MS, is an expert in pediatric cancers and bl

Anyone who wishes to learn about blockchain in general or specifically in healthcare can get overwhelmed by the number of results offered by a Google search. Awareness of the difficulty of finding credible, helpful and nuanced information around blockchain, was among the triggers to create the book Blockchain in Healthcare Innovations that Empower Patients, Connect Professionals and Improve Care. In this episode David Metcalf and Alex Cahana share their view on the current blockchain in the healthcare landscape, accompanied by a comment on industry discussions seen at HIMSS 2019 Global conference, where the book was presented to the public from the first time.  Other episodes on blockchain in healthcare: F021 What is the CDC doing with blockchain? (Jay Jemal, IT specialist) https://medium.com/faces-of-digital-health/f021-what-is-the-cdc-doing-with-blockchain-36c15dac3603 F020 Blockchain, value of data, and the role of legislation with adoption (Ray Dogum, Health Unchained) - https://medium.com/faces-of-digita

Every person is unique and we all differ in our looks, but have you ever wondered, how much do people differ on the inside? This is something surgeons are most familiar with. Rafael Grossmann is known in the digital health community as the VR surgeon. Originally from Venezuela, Rafael has been practicing medicine for a few decades in the US by now. In this episode he talks about technological advancements in surgery - from minimally invasive surgery to robotic-assisted surgery -, followed by his passion towards digital technologies, telemedicine, and VR and in the end comments the national crisis currently happening in Venezuela, and its effects on healthcare.

Hackathons have by today become a popular approach for bringing people with various backgrounds in the same room, offering them a concentrated time, usually during a weekend, to come up with innovative approached for various challenges. The speaker of episode 31 is Annie Lamontagne - Special Projects Advisor and former Head of Global Growth at Hacking health - a global digital health organisation, currently active in 17 countries. Annie talks about how are hackathons evolving through the years, what kind of experiences can Hacking health chapters share among each other, since each chapter is active in a different country with a different culture. Annie also mentioned a few inspiring examples of solutions that were a product of hackathons organised inside the hospitals.

Hal Wolf III became the CEO of HIMSS (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society, the largest global organisation connecting healthcare IT providers) in 2017. While having rich experiences in the healthcare industry, he started his career in a very different sector — the entertainment business. Hal first workes in Sales and Marketing for MTV Networks in the 80s, later as VP of Content at Time Warner. Then, after 20 years, did his professional development shifted to healthcare when he became the Chief Information Officer for Kaiser Permanente in Colorado.  Some questions addressed in the podcast:  What can healthcare learn from the entertainment industry?  What is the price of interoperability, what can we learn from Keiser Permanente, where $6 billion USD was spent to implement a unified system in 10 years time?  What is the role of HIMSS in the interoperability story? How has HIMSS changed since the acquisition of Health 2.0 in 2017? How to stay informed as a health executive in the era of overwhe

Investments in digital health have been rising for the last few years, encouraging innovation in applications of artificial intelligence, virtual reality, analytics, and other latest technologies in healthcare. At the same time, the next generations of doctors, who are supposed to embrace and use these inventions, are trained in an outdated model with little room for creative engagement. One of the people passionate about the re-invention of medical education is Dr. Nana Bit-Avragim, a digital health transformer and medical sciences expert. Nana is an MD/PhD, who formerly worked as Director of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at Charité Foundation and was the Head of Digital Health and Life Sciences program at the German hub of Singularity University. In the 29th episode of Faces of digital health, Nana discusses how new cross-disciplinary models within academia in collaboration with industry and startups should be established to upgrade and rethink medical education.

Chris Johnson is a Children’s Anaesthetist with 30 years of experience in clinical practice. Chris was the medical lead for the healthcare IT transformation of the Perth Children’s Hospital in Australia, which was planned after the institution relocated into a new building, approximately 10 years ago.  In the end, the robotics system was bought, but the EHR project had been stopped, leaving the hospital medical records management right where it was — on paper.  Several reasons contributed to the outcome in the huge process of change management. After all, the IT support projects presented only 25% of the budget for transformation.  Some questions addressed: What do anaesthetists do in practice? What are the digital trends in anesthesiology? Will doctors be replaced by automation and precision dosing algorithms? How does a tender for digital transformation of a hospital look like? Who has to be included? How long does it take? How can hospitals be more pleasant for patients? What is the role of architecture an

The first episode of Faces of digital health offers a reflection on digital health in 2018, followed by a discussion on digital health in Malta. Because the country is small, the adoption of new solutions could be faster compared to bigger countries. Stefan Buttigieg, Specialist Trainee in Public Health Medicine with a special interest in Clinical Informatics, Social Media and Digital Health, and the co-chair of Health 2.0 Malta believes in the bright future ahead, driven by AI, blockchain, and younger generations.  Some questions addressed:  What is the state of healthcare and healthcare IT in Malta? How big is the digital health community in Malta? What is the funding situation like for digital health in Malta? Is the national optimism and plans for digitilization driven by understanding or general hype of technologies such as artificial intelligence or blockchain?    

In 2012, right after finishing his PhD in neurobiology, Martin Inderbitzin got a rare type of pancreatic cancer. He found his strength in another patient's story. Martin's doctor told him about another young man, who survived and was now skiing in the mountains. For the doctor that was an anecdote, for Martin a mantra that kept his spirits up, every time he received a piece of bad news. He started thinking how impactful stories of others with similar struggles to our own can be. To help other patients like him, he started a media project My Survival Story. In the 25th episode of Faces of digital health Martin shares his knowledge regarding how to be a good presenter, and what is the role of digital health in mental health. 

What mistakes are entrepreneurs making? Why does the US seem like a better starting point compared to Europe in the early stages? How to look for support in the most initial stages of a company? In this episode: digital health investments and opportunities for startups. The speaker in this episode Jack van Lint. He is the Corporate Finance Director at NLC The Healthtech Venture Builder - a healthcare accelerator and incubator from the Netherlands supporting early-stage startups. ***   Additional episodes on financing: Ep. 18:What Forces Are Reshaping Early Stage Digital Health Funding? Recap: http://bit.ly/2Lblw1S iTunes: https://apple.co/2rHsumF Podbean: http://bit.ly/2C9dqEf   Ep. 12: Rethinking the Patient as Customer, Payment Models & Funding OptionsRecap: http://bit.ly/2zYLOjD Podbean: http://bit.ly/2QStm5O iTunes: https://apple.co/2UF4YUk   Ep. 10 and 11: Tackling the German Healthcare System Recap: http://bit.ly/2rx11E3 iTunes: Ep. 10: https://apple.co/2Py87l7 Ep. 11: https://apple.co/2RTK6H7 Podbean

In November 2018, Associated Press shocked the global medical community with a news from China: A Chinese researcher claimed that he helped make the world’s first genetically edited babies. He edited the genes of twins with CRISPR/Cas9 technology, with the aim to make the babies resistant to possible future infection with HIV, the AIDS virus. The medical community was more or less unanimous in condemnation of the act because CRISPR technology is so new. This was not the only news that resonated in global news in December: the startup Nebula Genomics announced it is offering free genome sequencing, in which the ownership and control of the data would be in individual's hands. Furthermore, patients could make money with their data, as the company predicts that companies and research organizations would be willing to pay for the cost of sequencing if in exchange they also get some key medical information about the person involved.  The expert in this episode is Natalie Pankova. Natalie has a medical background b

In the broadest possible sense, patient centricity is a mental shift from WHAT is done for the patient in the healthcare system, to HOW things are done. The HOW may include the used technology but also includes the environment. Walter Werzowa - Austrian composer, producer, and owner of LA-based music production studio Musikvergnuegen, and prof. dr. Klaus Laczika - An Austrian specialist in Emergency Medicine, Anaesthetics and Pediatrics, have been researching the effect of music on patients in the ICU for the last decade. They share their insight into the meaning of the environment in the care setting.  The next indispensable piece of equipment will have to be earphones.  Denise Silber, on the other hand, has been working for more than 20 years in the area of patient centricity and how to raise the patient-includedness in the healthcare system. She and Raquel Correia, a Paris based GP and an advisor to digital health startups share their views on what needs to be changed to prevent doctor burn-outs and enable

This episode is a recap of a few talks at 2018 Exponential Medicine. You will hear thoughts on interoperability, practical use of AI in enterprises, some bold ideas about the future medicine thanks to digital innovation by Vinod Khosla, and lucid thoughts regarding the affordability of novel digital health solutions and how we should reframe our thinking about management and leadership to improve global health. Speakers in episode 22: Shannon Sartin, Executive Director of the US Department of Digital Service at Health and Human Services, Lonnie Rae, the founder of a healthcare startup MEDAL, which is working on gathering patient data from various sources such as faxes, paper, and EHR system, Rajeev Ronanki, SVP & Chief Digital Officer, Anthem, Vinod Khosla, Founder of Khosla Ventures, Dr. David Bray, Executive Director for the People Centered Internet coalition. Other speakers from Exponential Medicine, featured in other episodes of this podcast: Shafi Ahmed - F018 Can Bolivia become the global digital hea

In 2017 media started reporting on promising blockchain projects inside the US Center for Disease Control (CDC). The hopes are that blockchain could help decrease the burden of reporting of epidemics, antibiotic prescriptions and the opioid crisis in the USA. In this episode, health IT specialist Jay Jemal talks about what potentials of blockchain were recognized by the Center for disease control in the USA. Jay Jemal is a solutions architect with the CDC, who is exploring how emerging technologies for data collection and analysis could benefit public agencies. In the past few years, he helped design collection systems for outbreaks such as Ebola, anthrax, E.coli. Recap of this episode: https://medium.com/faces-of-digital-health/f021-what-is-the-cdc-doing-with-blockchain-36c15dac3603 More on blockchain in healthcare:  F020 Blockchain, value of data, and the role of legislation with adoption (Ray Dogum, Health Unchained) - https://medium.com/faces-of-digital-health/f020-blockchain-value-of-data-and-the-role-of