Faces of Digital Health

Kenya has a lot of talent and opportunities for innovation. Access to care is not a problem because plenty of community nurses are present nationwide. However, they have a limited problem and mostly focus on main infectious diseases, leaving serious conditions undiagnosed, says Emilian Popa, Founder and CEO of Ilara Health.Ilara health equips a network of small healthcare providers with lifesaving and essential diagnostic tools to improve the quality of medical care in Sub-Saharan Africa. In this episode, Emilian Popa talks about:  why health insurance is hard to scale in Africa, where people are concerned with daily costs and survival,  investments and how local VCs mostly invest in sectors like real estate and investments for health tech are supported by foreign investors,  why Ilara Health is expanding on the Kenyan market but not in Tanzania, South Africa, Nigeria or Egypt.  Transcript: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/kenya-ilara-health-diagnostics-africaWebsite: facesofdigitalhealth.com Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/Ilara Health: https://www.ilarahealth.com/about-us/Leave a rating or a review: https://lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

One of the biggest challenges for healthcare startups in Nigeria is access to market.“In Nigeria, healthcare is fragmented, making it difficult to find distribution channels. We have to be creative and may need to look outside healthcare for distribution channels.” , says Jennie Nwokoye is the founder and CEO of Clafiya - a digital primary healthcare service that connects individuals and businesses to health practitioners to provide convenient, quality, and affordable, on-demand primary care from their mobile phones.In this discussion, Jennie explains:  What are the healthcare challenges in Nigeria, How do startups do business in Nigeria and why is it difficult to scale, How do startups work with local and international investors and more Transcript: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/primary-care-nigeria-clafiyaNewsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/

One of the speakers at the Nextmed Health Conference 2023 said: “In the past, people didn’t age; they just died.” This is still a daily reality in many low-income countries, which face a lack of workforce, poor healthcare system structure, and lack of resources. In this episode, we will learn about Nigeria. Nigeria has 220 million people which is roughly ⅔ of the population of the US.While many healthcare-related resources are scarce, the Internet is available and so is the fierce ambition of local entrepreneurs. These use digital tools to bring healthcare information and care closer to patients or to upskill the workforce. So what does care in Nigeria look like? What challenges do startups face? Where do they get investments? Hear from: Charles Umeh, Chief Medical Officer of CribMD, Ossai Ifeanyi CEO of CribMD, Jennie Nwokoye, CEO of Clafiya and Christian Chidoziem, Pharmacy Student and Entrepreneur. Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/

Africa is a huge continent with 1.2 billion people and a diverse set of countries. Healthcare systems are generally poor, with workforce and supply chain struggles, and infrastructure challenges such as power outages. In this episode you will hear about how drones are used in Malawi for healthcare delivery. Herbert Weirather is the CEO of Jedsy - a technology company based in Switzerland with the ultimate aim of designing and developing high-end multipurpose drones. Jedsy is present in Switzerland, Malawi, India and Brazil. In this discussion, Herbert explained: What challenges are present in the medical supply chain in Africa, Which stakeholders does the company work with, what’s their business model, and why there is no such thing as competition in the medical supply drone delivery space, because healthcare needs all the help it can get.  Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/Jedsy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGaXHdjoQ-Q https://jedsy.com/

In June 2021, France announced a €7.5 billion Health Innovation Plan, as part of a broader financial investment to boost the French industry.  This funding goes beyond digital health, it’s aimed at supporting biotech development, startups, medtech, and more. In 2021, The eHealth Acceleration Strategy was launched, a large part of which includes upskilling and training new and existing healthcare experts, and medical and social workers in digital health. In today’s discussion you will hear from Louisa Stüwe is the project director of the Ministerial eHealth delegation at the French Ministry of Health. We discussed how the French strategy was designed, who was involved, and what has been realized to date. She also explains the process for reimbursement of digital therapeutics software medical devices and telemonitoring, how France supports the secondary use of medical data, and more. Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/Additional resources: French core information platfom for digital health information: https://gnius.esante.gouv.fr/en  TEHDAS state of digital health in 12 countries in Europe report: https://tehdas.eu/results/member-states-readiness-to-benefit-from-the-ehds-regulation-varies/  Health data hub: https://www.health-data-hub.fr/

The first efforts to establish ePrescribing in the US started in 2001. However, by 2014 only 4% of clinicians had adopted it. Electronic prescribing became legal in all 50 states by 2007. Eight years later, electronic prescribing of controlled substances and prior authorization were well established on the singular ePrescribing network. In 2022, a new player entered the market, founded by FDB - a global provider of clinical decision support tools and resources for medication.FDB Vela sets itself apart with newer technology and additional features. They are also working on building a veterinarian ePrescribing network. In today’s discussion with Lathe Bigler - Vice President of Clinical Network Services at FDB (First Databank) and General Manager of FDB Vela™, you will hear more about what ePrescribing entails under the new network. Additionally, you will learn about FDB's plans to enhance medication information for patients, improve accessibility to pharmacogenomics insights, and more.Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/ Leave a rating or a review: lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth Website: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com

A systemic approach to care for non-communicable diseases like hypertension and diabetes is Africa is in its early stages, with the biggest challenge for patients being the price of medications, says Anne Stake, Chief Strategy and Product Officer at Medtronic Labs. Medtronic Labs is a nonprofit organization that works with governments and local communities in across Africa to create local ecosystems for the management of hypertension and diabetes.In this episode, Anne Stake explains: how does Medtronic Labs work, why are they present in Africa, how to run successful non-communicable diseases programs in Africa, why regulation isn't as loose in less developed markets than the West might think, ...and more! This is a rerun of an episode first published in July 2022. www.facesofdigitalhealth.comExcerpt and full episode with Anne Stake: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/medtronic-labs-africa?rq=medtronicHerve Mwamba - South Africa & Africa More Broady: What’s The State of Medical Device Regulation? : https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/medical-device-regulation-mdr-africa?rq=herve%20 Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/ Leave a rating or a review: https://lovethepodcast.com/facesofdigitalhealth

Drug development is undeniably expensive. For years, the pharmaceutical industry cited an estimate of 3 billion US dollars. However, a recent study published in 2020 discovered that the median cost actually falls between 985 million and 1.3 billion US dollars. Even within this range, it remains a substantial amount. The high cost primarily stems from the significant failure rate of new potential medications that never progress beyond clinical trials. Computational biology and AI have already assumed significant roles in drug development. The aspiration is for them to expedite the creation of new, more precise, and tailored medications. Today, we will delve into biotech and explore how technology aids in predicting a specific patient's response to a particular drug. In a conversation with Rafael Rosengarten, the CEO of Genialis - a company using machine learning and high-throughput omics data to capture underlying disease biology and predict how patients will likely respond to targeted therapies, we explored the impact of computational biology on drug development and pricing, the application of generative AI in discovering novel molecules, and the challenges companies encounter in acquiring patient data to advance their work.Sponsor: Magic MindLearn more at: magicmind.com/digitalhealthUse the code: digitalhealth20Find more at:www.facesofdigitalhealth.comNewsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/

Chronic diseases are the result of a combination of genetic, physiological, environmental and behavioral factors. They require long-term management and often behavioral changes. Achieving long-lasting effects can be extremely difficult, and digital health solutions have since the beginning been seen as an important factor in assuring success, by providing patients with continuous monitoring and feedback. Omada Health is a US digital behavioral medicine company that uses digital tools and personalized support to help individuals living with prediabetes, diabetes, hypertension, and musculoskeletal issues. It’s been present on the market for over a decade, so in this discussion, you will hear the CEO Sean Duffy talk about what exactly does Omada do differently compared to traditional chronic care management providers, we discussed approaches to providing sustainable long-term chronic care management, and touched the topic of the sharp rise in popularity of GLP-1 drugs, we’ve seen in the last year. GLP-1 agonists are drugs that are used for treating diabetes but have become a popular weight loss tool for many people. SPONSORhttps://magicmind.com/digitalhealthFor discount, use the code: digitalhealth20

The field of generative AI companies is evolving fast and many companies, that have been exploring the field for years, are gaining in visibility. However, new companies are popping up as well. One of them is Hippocratic AI, founded in 2023. Hippocratic AI building a safety-focused large language model (LLM) for the healthcare industry. The company raised 50 million US dollars this year. In this episode, Munjal Shah, CEO and Founder of Hippocratic AI talked about what exactly does the company mean by positioning itself as a safety-based LLM, what convinced investors, how are they building the team, and why there are a lot of inefficiencies to be solved before we use generative AI for diagnosis.This episode will give you a basic understanding of:  how are large language models built,  what’s the difference between horizontally and vertically build models,  where LLMs could replace (yes, “replace” as in cater to the staffing needs in healthcare) the healthcare workforce  https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/Newsletter: https://fodh.substack.com/SPONSORLooking for an alternative to coffee?Magic MindGo to magicmind.com/digitalhealthuse the code DIGITALHEALTH20 to get a discount on your purchase