Faces of Digital Health

In the last two years, the hype around blockchain settled down, and now projects can focus more on development rather than managing attention. Many projects have gone from an idea to a pilot program or an actual implementation. However, we probably won't see patient medical records on the blockchain soon, says Robert Miller - Director of Product Management and Strategy at Consensys Health. ConsenSys Health builds Ethereum-based solutions for cybersecurity, compliance, privacy, bioethics and identity, applying the deep technical capabilities of ConsenSys to advance the healthcare industry. The blockchain community knows Robert because of his regular newsletters about blockchain in healthcare. He is diligently following and reflecting on the development of the industry. We discussed why are patient health records on blockchain currently still a dream and which projects are slowly moving beyond the project phase. An interesting research initiative is MELLODY - (acronym for Machine learning ledger orchestration for drug discovery). MELLODY is a collaboration among 10 major pharma companies that are using a blockchain-based infrastructure and federated learning to speed up drug development. Robert also shared his view on MELLODY - and I also added the link to his analysis in the show notes. We also talked about the potential use of blockchain for vaccination certification and more. Further reading: Robert’s analysis of the data and privacy-related challenges in the MELLODY project. Recap of the show: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/f110-patient-records-on-the-blockchain-are-still-a-dream-robert-miller 

When this discussion was recorded on 20th November, New Zealand, which has 4.9 million people, only had 50 reported cases of COVID in the whole country. The reason the country is successful in containing the virus better than most countries in the world, is the discipline of the people, says Scott Arrol, the former CEO of NZ Healtchare IT - an organization connecting insurers, healthcare providers and the healthcare industry. Scott is soon leaving the organization after running if for over 6 years. He talked about the character of New Zealanders, the complexity of the healthcare system, the hurdles related to the digitalization of healthcare, and explained how New Zealand approached the COVID-19 pandemic, so today, unlike most of the rest of the world, people can attend live events. Enjoy the show, and to read the recap of the discussion or browse through other episodes as well, go to www.facesofdigitalhealth.com. Among the discussions about the healthcare system, you can listen to a recently published talk with dr. Louise Schaper about healthcare and digitalization in Australia, before that you can find discussions about Spain and France, episodes 97-100 focused on South America, and there’s been series about Asia and Africa published last year.    Leave a rating or a review: www.lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

In this episode, you will hear a discussion with Julian Flannery - the CEO of. Summus Global. Summus global provides access to specialists and physicians from across the world. The company has a network of over 4,000 specialists and physicians from 48 hospitals and dozens of fields, from oncology to cardiology, psychology, and pediatrics. Their customers come from the US, China, Canada, Philippines, Spain, England, United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, Luxembourg, Turkey, and Ireland. The CEO Julian Flannery and I talked about how the platform works, how do customers differ based on the country of their residence and more. Enjoy the discussion and to browse through other episodes as well, go to www.facesofdigitalhealth.com. If you haven’t yet, subscribe to the show to be notified about new episodes automatically. Coming up next are a discussion about the latest development in blockchain in healthcare and an introduction to the digital health landscape in New Zealand.   Leave a rating or a review: https://lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth  Summus Global: https://www.summusglobal.com/

Rajeev Ronanki is Chief Digital Officer at Anthem, which is striving to become a digital AI-first enterprise. In September Anthem launched a digital incubator where companies can test their solutions on Anthem’s anonymized data. Among other things Rajeev spoke about what kind of mindset shift happened in insurance companies due to COVID, how does an AI-driven insurance policy mindset look like and how will AI shape the future of healthcare.   Anthem's incubator: https://www.anthem.ai/  Leave a rating or a review: www.lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

We are in the middle of an unprecedented time of anxiety, depression and worries because of the global coronavirus pandemic. It’s affecting people’s jobs, a sense of security, and relative predictability, consequently our relationships and health, especially mental health. I think it’s safe to assume we wish for this to be over as soon as possible and that we could be in a different reality. To a certain extent, that’s actually possible, if you have virtual reality equipment. Virtual reality can have a literally healing effect. Over 5000 studies by today have shown the efficacy of VR for pain management, PTSD, eating disorders, mental health and more. In this episode, you will hear from dr. Brennan Spiegel a gastroenterologist who directs the Cedars-Sinai Center for Outcomes Research and Education. He recently published a book titled VRx in which he explains the applicability of VR and looks at this digital therapy from a philosophical and critical point of view. In this discussion, you will hear him explain what makes VR so healing, what are its potential side-effects and why different patients respond differently to it.   Leave a rating or a review: www.lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

Australia was in the global digital health-related news in 2018 of the national EHR project called My Health Record. The idea behind the project was to digitize the medical records of all the people from Australia. Today, 9 out of 10 Australians have My Health Record.  In the discussion you are about to listen to, dr. Louise Shaper, the CEO of Australasian Institute of Digital Health (AIDH), renowned speaker and a dedicated digital health evangelist, shared her deep insight into the state of digitalization of healthcare in Australia, the organizations driving technological progress in healthcare, and also her PhD about technology acceptance amongst healthcare professionals. Australasian Institute of Digital Health: https://digitalhealth.org.au/ Leave a rating or a review: http://www.lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth 

Spain has a universal healthcare system, where anyone that pays social security contributions is eligible for healthcare. From the digitalization perspective, Spain does not have a national institution to coordinate digital health projects. Instead, each of the Spanish regions has authorities with their own budgets. One of the most advanced regions is Catalonia. Cesar Morcillo Serra is an Internal Medicine specialist from Barcelona, who has a strong interest in eHealth. He had lead several Digital Health transformation projects inside the Cima hospital where he works in. In this discussion, he talks about what it takes for a hospital to be digitally advanced, what is a concept of a liquid hospital and how does the Spanish healthcare system works.    Cesar is the speaker at the Barcelona Health Hub Summit (29 October): https://bhhsummit.com/ Join free!  Episode recap: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/f-104-digital-health-in-spain-and-what-is-a-liquid-hospital-cesar-morcillo-serra  To learn more about the digital health ecosystem in Barcelona, listen to episode 63 with Aline Noizet: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/f063-how-to-build-a-community-in-healthcare-aline-noizet?rq=aline    Leave a rating or a review: https://lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

Chronolife is a French company innovating in the space of smart garments for remote patient monitoring. Clothes are not the main innovation of the company, their secret sauce is a patented neuromorphic (bio-mimetic) algorithm, HOTS (Hierarchy Of event-based Time-Surfaces). The algorithm detects and predicts deterioration in patients’ state of health and alerts caregivers to allow earlier intervention and avoid costly hospitalizations. The company’s mission is  to enable healthcare professionals to have timely information for earlier intervention and to ensure a continuum of care that fills the existing gaps from hospital to home. In this episode, the CEO Laurent Vandebrouck shares his thoughts about the French healthcare system in terms of digitalization, comments the position of smart garments on the market crowded with other kinds of wearables, and also answered questions like - can you destroy a smart shirt by not washing it currently?    Episode recap: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/f103-how-are-smart-garments-making-remote-patient-monitoring-comfortable-laurent-vanderbrouck-chronolife Leave a rating or a review: https://lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

Do you remember the first connected scale? It came to the market in 2009 by a French company called Withings. By today the company created a number of connected health devices and is increasing its efforts to expand its presence in the clinical space. Withings offers a range of products: a connected scale, a digital thermometer, a wireless blood pressure cuff, a mat to detect sleep apnea, a smartwatch with ECG, and sleep apnea monitoring was released in 2020.  In this episode, the CEO of Withings Mathieu Letombe talks about:  the landscape of connected health devices, quantification of health how companies can attract doctors to work with them given the busy schedules clinicians have.   Leave a rating or a review: https://lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

This episode is a collection of thoughts giving you a glimpse into the global digital health market. Leave a rating or a review: https://lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth Speakers: Dr. Daniel Kraft, one of the top opinion leaders in digital health, nicely summarized the current state of digital health in Episode 81.  Julien de Salaberry, the CEO of Galen Growth Asia emphasized in Episode 41 that is important to keep in mind when thinking about expanding in this area of the world.Guillem Serra, the CEO of the Spanish based company Mediquo, guest in Episode 84, says that in internationalization and looking at new potential markets, language is the most important factor to consider.  Different countries differ in their culture and how technologies are used. I’d say that different parts of the world “run” on different platforms. In China, society runs on WeChat. In India, the key communication platform in Whatsapp. Abhishek Shah, CEO of Wellthy digital therapeutics company from India, who was the guest of Episode 78, explained how the use of Whatsapp in India differs from the West. It is gaining a similar significance as WeChat has in China. This is why Wellthy conducted some of their clinical studies through Whatsapp. Have you ever wondered, what is the digital health scene like in Africa? You know, the continent that many people around the world talk about as a country, but actually consists of 54 countries? Among the speakers on the show coming from Africa, was the founder of Mobile Afya - Mariatheresa Samson Kadushi. She is a Tanzanian innovator passionate about disrupting the public health sector, which is in Africa marked by traditional beliefs. In Episode 056 she among other things explained how in Africa, worries about privacy in the digital age are not worries about how are global corporations are exploiting our data. Moving from Asia to Africa, European healthcare systems are often praised for universal access to care. However, as mentioned by the patient advocate Bettina Ryll in Episode 68, in Europe where you live significantly impacts your access to healthcare. Especially in rare diseases chances of survival of a patient can depend on where the patient resides and are there any clinical trials near her. People move, to get a chance at survival. This very much reminds me of the often-mentioned fact by US experts, that the ZIP code the biggest determinant of health is. From a business perspective, Europe is a complicated market. You need to tackle language barriers, the diversity of healthcare systems and policies. Kaia Health is a digital therapeutics startup that was founded in Germany and is now operating in the US market as well. In Episode 77 Mark Liber, the VP of business development at Kaia Health, talked about the differences they are noticing between the German and the US.  While we mostly perceive the future of healthcare digitization as a one-way progression street, Luis Santigo, the CEO of a Venezuelan healthcare IT company PEGASI explained how progress can get crushed when the economic situation of a country changes. In the last few years, in Venezuela, many hospitals had to switch from IT back to paper, because IT companies went bankrupt and ceased existing.