Empowered Patient Podcast

Dr. Kamal Golla, Vice President of Clinical Technologies and Performance at Evolent, highlights the complexities of cancer care and the need for care navigation to address medical, emotional, financial, and logistical challenges. This comprehensive approach leads to improved treatment adherence and patient satisfaction while reducing emergency room visits and hospitalization. The care team serves as an extension of the medical decision-makers, helping to manage care across multiple specialists, advising on overcoming side effects, and reducing logistical hurdles to ease the burden on physicians and caregivers, ultimately improving patient outcomes. Kamal explains, "Cancer care navigation is really about creating a roadmap for patients. It's making sure they're not left alone to piece together appointments, interpret side effects, or figure out how to pay for medications. The role of a navigator here is really to guide them through the whole journey. That includes the medical components that many folks are fa

Bill Snyder, CEO and Founder of Cylinder, is addressing the high prevalence of digestive health issues using a virtual care model to provide access to a coordinated care team, including dieticians and health coaches, to offer personalized care plans. GI conditions are complex and involve a combination of genetic predisposition, environmental factors, and dietary influences. There are strong correlations between the gut and brain, as well as digestive health and various physical and mental conditions. Cylinder fills a gap in traditional GI care, where physicians often lack extensive nutritional training. Bill explains, "First and foremost, we think about the patients that we serve, and the patients that we serve come to us from across the country. We serve patients in every state across the US, and they suffer from a variety of GI-related conditions. That's things like ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease, irritable bowel syndrome, and GERD. It's also a large population who don't have a formal diagnosis, but ar

Pat Michael, Director of Patient Contact Services at Nebraska Medicine, highlights the challenges of high-volume patient contact centers and how agentic AI can improve operational efficiency, enhance patient access, and allow human agents to focus on more complex and critical calls.  The AI agent offers patients self-service options for scheduling, cancellations, and medication refills, resulting in a 40% reduction in call volume to human operators. Integrating AI into the contact center also enables the prioritization of time-sensitive calls, such as those related to organ transplant coordination. Pat explains, "I'm the Patient Contact Services Director for Nebraska Medicine, which means I oversee our three main contact centers. They're our ambulatory contact center, which takes and schedules all the calls for our ambulatory clinic, and our radiology contact center, which schedules all of our outpatient radiology services. And then our medical communication center, which is our 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-we

Dr. Peter Altman, President and CEO of BioCardia, is focused on treating ischemic heart failure and chronic myocardial ischemia using autologous cells from the patient's bone marrow.  The company has developed a cost-effective model that utilizes a pre-procedure diagnostic to select the optimal patients for this point-of-care system, which processes their cells in a single procedure. A key technology is the Helix catheter system, which enables minimally invasive delivery of cells into the heart, aided by the Heart3D Fusion imaging platform that provides a 3D map for precise cell delivery. Peter explains, "BioCardia's focus is on ischemic etiology of heart disease. This is heart disease that results from poor perfusion, typically following, for example, a heart attack, which is an ischemic disease. And the two diseases we're working on are ischemic heart failure, which is often characterized by a large dilated heart. And in the second is chronic myocardial ischemia, which is characterized by what's called ref

Marissa Fayer, CEO of DeepLook Medical, points out the challenges of detecting breast cancer in dense breast tissue using mammography. The DeepLook DP Precise platform is a visual intelligence tool to help radiologists see inside dense tissue more clearly without disrupting their workflow, potentially reducing the need for additional tests or biopsies. A recent FDA mandate requiring providers to inform patients about their breast density has increased patient demand for better screening tools Marissa explains, "We're focused on breast imaging, and it's very specifically in dense breasts, because unfortunately, with dense, it's like seeing a cotton ball in the cloud. Radiologists have a really hard time seeing that in standard ways. This is a known problem. I developed the three mammography systems, so I absolutely know that it's a problem. We help radiologists visualize better with visual intelligence to be able to see inside these mammograms so that they potentially don't have to send their patients back fo

Dan Cohen, President and Co-Founder of Adhere+, is advancing the role and function of remote therapeutic monitoring by asking patients a few questions every day through a smartphone app. Gathering this kind of data makes in-person visits with providers more productive and insightful. It helps providers manage chronic conditions and pain by using direct and indirect questions to gain a holistic view of the patient's overall well-being. This type of real-world data shows promise for enhancing clinical trials and powering AI-driven healthcare insights. Dan explains, "At its core, what we're doing is monitoring patients in between their visits with physicians. Now, I know a lot of your listeners have heard about telemedicine and telehealth, and sometimes they think they're the same thing, but they're not. Telemedicine is a synchronous communication where you'll be on your computer on a Zoom call with your doctor. That's telemedicine, where the physician is actually treating you as you would be in the office." "T

Sam Libby is President and Managing Director of TCB Capital Advisors, a healthcare-focused investment and advisory firm with a focus on improving patient outcomes in oncology, neurodegenerative diseases, and women's health. The firm evaluates early-stage companies based on the strength of clinical data, scientific and medical expertise, and technology, which may have been overlooked or struggled to raise funding. Trends TCB is keeping an eye on include diagnostics and preventive healthcare, as well as the growing interest in women's health, an underinvested sector that presents significant opportunities for innovation and investment. Sam explains, "I think first and foremost, we look at the clinical data. So the way that we built TCD is that we have a team of experienced bankers and investors who work with early-stage companies. We also have on the other side of the house commercial experts and consultants who can do, I like to always say they can do all the things that bankers talk about. So, post-merger int

Jon Friis, Founder and CEO of Miiskin, provides a telehealth platform to independent dermatologists and clinics, enabling them to serve a broader patient audience.  Using an asynchronous model, patients submit their images and medical history for the provider to review, and then receive a diagnosis and treatment plan within 24-48 hours.  This approach improves efficiency in handling routine care and prescription renewals, adds flexibility for patient convenience, and enables providers to allocate more time to address complex and high-value procedures.  Jon explains, "Miiskin's mission is to make high-quality dermatology care more accessible and convenient without compromising standards and care. We see ourselves as a differentiator in the market because we're enabling providers with a dermatology platform that they can use for their audience. They're not contracting with us as a provider. We enable the clinics and the providers with this technology platform. So we give the control back to the providers so th

Sandra Johnson, Senior VP of client services at CliniComp, discusses the findings from a survey commissioned to explore the support for AI by hospital CIOs. While 80% view AI implementation as a priority, less than half have actually implemented AI tools, which is attributed to privacy concerns and the limitations of legacy systems. There was a strong desire for AI solutions to be embedded within existing systems to avoid the complexity of integrating third-party applications. The goal is to improve data exchange and interoperability to bring the focus back on the patient and improving outcomes.   Sandra explains, "The survey painted a really clear picture. Hospital CIOs are not asking if AI should be a part of their strategy, but more about how to implement it. There's a lot of support for AI adoption now, and the use cases that come first and foremost are reducing administrative burden and streamlining workflows. The survey showed that 80% of CIOs are looking to automate administrative tasks as one of thei

Dr. Ari Vojdani, Chief Scientific Officer at Cyrex Labs, describes the two primary components of the immune system--humoral and cell-mediated immunity and how the Cyrex diagnostics are designed to measure both. The Cyrex food immune reactivity testing measures antibodies against raw, cooked, modified, and processed food proteins as the structure of these proteins can change and affect immune responses. Cyrex is also developing tests to measure antibodies against various gut bacteria, fungi, and toxins, and how these relate to autoimmune conditions. Ari explains, "Cyrex performs lots of tests, but we can divide them based on the immune system. As you know, the immune system has two major components, the humoral and cell-mediated immunity. The humoral components of the immune system deal with measurements of antibodies. So when we get exposed to certain antigens, proteins of pathogens, food, or toxic chemicals, when they bind to human tissue, our body reacts to them, and the end result of that is specific anti

Kevin Freeman, Chief Commercial Officer at Health Catalyst, highlights the challenges mid-market healthcare systems are currently facing, including the predicted impact of Medicaid cuts and the increase in uninsured patients. There is a need to break down data silos and use AI and data analytics to improve the quality of care, reduce costs, and address clinician burnout. The Health Catalyst platform is designed to integrate existing technology, improve efficiency, and provide expertise and support to drive better patient outcomes and manage financially sound organizations.   Kevin explains, "Health Catalyst works with healthcare providers, really of all sizes. Historically, more academics and IDNs, but more recently, over the last six to seven months, have really focused on the mid-market health systems. Mid-market health systems still struggle with some of the same issues that large health systems do, but they lack the technology, expertise, and some of the clinical experience that drive outcomes. So, we're

Nick Nunez, a strategy and solutions engineer at RevSpring, discusses the significant staffing shortages and technology vendor fragmentation that hamper the healthcare revenue cycle teams.  RevSpring is addressing these issues by providing integrated analytics that function seamlessly with existing workflows and various dashboards, helping to prioritize work and eliminate inefficiencies. AI tools are being designed to support the financial and administrative aspects of healthcare, automating certain functions, augmenting human staff, and improving the quality of vendor and patient financial engagement. Nick explains, "RevSpring has a fairly broad footprint inside of the healthcare revenue cycle ecosystem here, and we support everyone from large health systems, IDNs, these integrated delivery networks, academic medical centers, to specialty clinics and smaller managed care organizations. We also have a footprint, actually, within our early out or bad debt vendors in healthcare. So we really do get an opportuni

Michael Palladino, VP of Sales and Clinical Solutions at OptimizeRx, is utilizing AI to educate patients and providers, promoting shared decision-making about which medications are most likely to yield the best health outcomes. The goal is to combat information overload by precisely targeting education to specific patients and delivering that information on the patient's preferred media delivery platform.  Technology-driven nudges deliver timely information, reminders about upcoming appointments, and address medication adherence issues.  Michael explains, "So OptimizeRx is a health technology company. We partner with the life sciences industry, and we help patients get on the right drug at the right time, educating both patient and provider. And we do that through some traditional methods of point-of-care. We also use our AI technology, which we will talk a little bit about today." "We've evolved as a company to be as individualized as possible, and that really has been using the technological advances of AI

Jim LaRoe, CEO of Symphion, highlights an often overlooked cybersecurity threat posed by network-connected printers in a hospital setting.  Modern printers are complex devices with numerous features that create vulnerabilities and potential access points to patient and hospital data for cybercriminals, yet they are generally managed outside of the IT security environment. The first step in ensuring printer security is to determine the number of printing devices on the network, their locations, and their configurations. Additionally, it is essential to ask the IT team to demonstrate security hygiene for the entire printer fleet. Jim explains, "We personally were exposed to the print industry in about 2015. And we noticed that the printers are really essential for patient care. They process, store, and transmit the most sensitive data, but they have grown up outside of the information security and supply chain. The security has been left vulnerable. In today's cybercrime growth industry climate, where opportun

Sinan Gölhan, Founder and CEO of GelTech, describes the characteristics and applications for hydrogels, which are bio-friendly, super-absorbent materials similar to natural tissue. In cancer treatments, hydrogels offer a way to deliver chemotherapy drugs directly to a tumor, which can significantly increase the accuracy and efficacy of the drug. GelTech has developed a robotic instrument to streamline the time-consuming testing process for new hydrogel treatments, automating repetitive actions, reducing inconsistencies, and enabling 24/7 testing capabilities. Sinan explains, "You could think of hydrogels like sponges. They're super absorbent, bio-friendly materials that are made of water. For this reason, scientists like myself essentially consider them the next best thing to natural tissue. Just like our own bodies, they're mostly made up of water. They have great applications in drug delivery, implant cosmetics, all these modern hydrogel face masks, and other types of substances." "I worked in hydrogel rese

Elizabeth Jeffords, CEO and President of Iolyx Therapeutics, discusses dry eye disease and its connection to autoimmune conditions. The company's novel therapeutic topical immune modulator is designed to treat the root inflammation in the eye, which systemic drugs often fail to reach due to the blood-retina barrier. Patients with dry eye disease often have multiple comorbidities and are excluded from clinical trials, making this research even more significant in finding treatments for a growing population. Elizabeth explains, "Some people have physical dry eye, i.e., they have a dysfunction in their meibomian glands, and they can't make enough tears or those tears aren't the right composition. But more than half of the patients with dry eye have an underlying autoimmune disease. And they might know that, and they might not. So, patients with either Sjogren's disease or any of the thyroid conditions, patients with rheumatoid arthritis, MS, connective tissue dysfunction, most of those patients have some ocular

Gene Mack, CEO and President of Gain Therapeutics, is combining AI-powered drug discovery with the development of allosteric modulators, drugs that bind to unique sites on proteins. The company's AI platform, Magellan, is crucial for accelerating drug discovery by reducing the time for computational screening of potential drug compounds.  Their lead compound is showing promising results as a potential disease-modifying therapy for Parkinson's disease, aiming to halt the progression of the disease rather than just treating symptoms. Gene explains, "So allosteric modulators of protein, it's a bit of a word salad, but what we're trying to achieve here is finding unique binding sites on proteins that are sort of away from the active site of that protein." "So, a lot of physics calculations go into these binding site calculations. The idea is to complete these quickly during the screening of hundreds or thousands of compounds. This process takes 10 to 15 minutes to run a set of computations and determine if a par

Paul Howe, COO of Protega Pharmaceuticals, is focused on how abuse-deterrent technology can address the opioid crisis and the need for mandates for insurance coverage of safer abuse-deterrent formulations. The SentryBond technology was specifically designed for immediate-release opioids to make it difficult to manipulate pills for abuse via crushing, inhaling, or injecting. Protega partnered with software company Opus to offer a program that helps educate chronic pain patients, manage their treatment, and provides physicians with risk stratification data to improve care and reduce the likelihood of abuse. Paul explains, "Most importantly from our standpoint is to protect from the risk of misuse, abuse, and diversion, which is escalation from orally taking medications to crushing, inhaling, injecting, or smoking. Unfortunately, when that escalation happens, many times patients end up on illicit fentanyl and heroin through the black market. So what we're trying to do is stop that escalation through our abuse d

Dr. George Magrath, CEO of Opus Genetics, discusses the company's experience in obtaining non-dilutive funding for its ultra-rare inherited retinal disease program. He highlights the challenges and advantages of this funding source, as well as the importance of establishing relationships with patient advocacy groups and foundations to mitigate risk and increase their attractiveness to traditional investors. The drive for non-dilutive funding for ultra-rare diseases is expected to become increasingly important in helping to get drugs to clinical trials. George explains, "Opus Genetics is a gene therapy company for eye disorders that occur in children. And these disorders are ultra-rare. It's 200 patients, a thousand patients per indication, and it's really good science. It's from Gene Bennett, who was the inventor of Luxturna, which was the first approved genetic medicine. And it does require some non-conventional thought on the financing, though, because these are so rare. And what we've done at Opus Genetic

Lindsay Mateo is the Chief Commercial Officer at Weave. This company has developed a platform to automate and streamline the regulatory documentation process for FDA submission for pharmaceutical and biotech companies.  The regulatory lifecycle for drug development currently involves data from various sources in digital and paper formats. Weave Bio's tools are designed to automate and streamline administrative aspects of the regulatory process and create a living digital record of the development of the drug, which supports collaboration and saves time. Lindsay explains, "I look at the regulatory life cycle for any given drug program, and experts are at the core of that. Those experts, who are scientists, strategists, and project managers, essentially put all the work into the documentation that goes to regulators like the FDA here in the US. And that information goes on to allow this drug to continue through various stages of development to ultimately get to market and obviously help patients." "That is eve