Diversity is an increasingly debated topic in startup investments, since founders of under-represented backgrounds may it be gender, race, age, and more too often experience inequality in opportunities. US VC funding for female-founded or co-founded companies has been trending up in recent years. However, last year women were impacted by the pandemic also on the funding level. According to Pitchbook, during the first quarter of 2020, 4.3% of VC deals went to companies founded by women, compared ...
Feb 04, 2021•33 min•Season 4Ep. 118
Music can change our mood, energize ur, make us feel invincible. It goes beyond that: it can heal. MedRythms is a digital therapeutics company building direct stimulation solutions that use clinical-grade sensors, AI-driven software and music to help restore function lost to neurologic disease or injury. Last year, the company received a Breakthrough Device designation from the FDA for its patented digital therapeutic that treats chronic stroke walking deficits. They are also doing Randomized Co...
Jan 28, 2021•42 min•Season 4Ep. 140
Medication management is a complicated, expensive, and complex healthcare problem. Because taking medications is only a small part of patient’s lives, taking them correctly can be complicated and burdensome. Patients might not take medications because that gives them the sense of having their lives under control and not dictated by medicine. They will get fatigued by pill reminders because getting constantly told that you have a condition, can get emotionally draining. This causes non-adherence ...
Jan 22, 2021•39 min•Ep. 139
Dr. Dimitri Varsamis is Senior Policy Lead for digital primary care at NHS England. End of 2020 he published a report titled Incentives and levers for digitizing and integrating primary care in New Zealand, Australia, and the USA - lessons for the UK’s NHS. Dr. Varsamis researched primary care digitalisation prior to the global coronavirus pandemic. In Australia, people are not required to register with a GP or a practice. Consequently, they see multiple GP which impacts the continuity/integrity...
Jan 14, 2021•39 min•Season 4Ep. 138
2021 is finally here, and as with any new year, we wish this one to be better than the previous one. 2020 sure changed the perspective of what that actually means. I am your host Tjaša Zajc and for the first episode of this year, I wanted to prepare an easy-going introduction to the year. You will hear a discussion with John Nosta. John is consistently ranked among the top names in digital health. He is an advisor to many digital health companies and the founder of the NOSTALAB—a digital health ...
Jan 07, 2021•51 min•Season 4Ep. 137
Recap: www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/digital-health-2021-predictions In this last episode of 2020, we will reflect on the year and look into the future with some of the experts and opinion leaders from the digital health industry across the world. You can hear from experts from the US, Israel, Mexico, Chile, UK, and South Korea. They shared their thoughts about the state and future of digital health globally. Speakers: Levi Shapiro, Investor, Digital Health instructor and founder of the mHea...
Dec 27, 2020•27 min•Ep. 136
Someday in the future, we will hopefully see 3D printed tissues and organs. To see where we are today, I spoke with prof. Frank Berry - Senior Scientist at the UHN Arthritis Programme at the Krembil Research Institute and Professor of Cellular Therapy at the Regenerative Medicine Institute (REMEDI), National University of Ireland Galway.
Dec 18, 2020•41 min•Ep. 135
The U.S. prescription drug market is worth $400 billion. Companies such as GoodRx, RxSaver and now Amazon Pharmacy are starting to bring pricing transparency. Online pharmacy services are projected to hit revenues of $131 billion by 2025 worldwide. The Amazon Prime prescription savings benefit can save members up to 80% off generic and 40% off brand name medications when paying without insurance. The pharmacy market is evolving and getting disrupted in the US. One of the players revolutionizing ...
Dec 11, 2020•44 min•Ep. 134
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 iden...
Dec 04, 2020•58 min•Season 3Ep. 133
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 yea...
Nov 27, 2020•52 min•Ep. 132
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 ...
Nov 20, 2020•41 min•Ep. 131
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 rati...
Nov 13, 2020•44 min•Ep. 130
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...
Nov 06, 2020•51 min•Ep. 129
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 digi...
Oct 31, 2020•45 min•Ep. 128
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 Digit...
Oct 24, 2020•36 min•Ep. 127
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 t...
Oct 16, 2020•35 min•Ep. 126
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...
Oct 09, 2020•35 min•Ep. 125
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 Se...
Oct 03, 2020•21 min•Ep. 124
This is the 4th part of a short series about healthcare and digital health in South America. After presenting Brazil, Colombian and Argentina, Luis Santiago talks about Venezuela and Chile.
Sep 26, 2020•46 min•Ep. 123
This is the third episode of the short series about digital health in South America. In the previous episodes you could listen to Adrian Turjanski from an Argentinian genomics company there called Bitgenia, another speaker came from Colombia - Javier Cardona, CEO of 1Doc3 talked about how to bring affordable access to healthcare to people in seconds, without the need for an appointment. See the recap of the shows here: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/digitalheath-south-america This epi...
Sep 18, 2020•38 min•Ep. 122
When Googling the Colombian healthcare system, there’s mostly praise about how good it is! The World Health Organization ranked Colombia’s healthcare system as number 22 in a review of 191 countries. Javier Cardona is the CEO of 1DOC3 - a Colombian company that offers affordable telemedical consultations in seconds; no appointment is needed. In this episode, Javier talked about the Columbian healthcare system structure, which ranks high according to WHO ranking. He also explained the needs and s...
Sep 10, 2020•43 min•Ep. 121
After a special series about digital health in Asia and Africa covered in 2019, the upcoming four episodes will present speakers from South America. A shoutout goes to Unity Stoakes and Jennifer Hankin from Startup Health, which connected me to the speakers in the upcoming episodes. All the companies are StartupHealth Transformers. In this discussion, you will hear Adrian Turjanski, Chief Science Officer at Bitgenia - an Argentinian startup bringing genomics closer to society, explains the curre...
Sep 04, 2020•39 min•Ep. 120
Why are clinical trials complicated and how is technology from platforms to AI helping accelerate trial development and data analysis.
Aug 28, 2020•44 min•Ep. 119
Germany is one of the European countries with higher healthcare expenditures. 11% of GDP goes to healthcare compared to the 9.6% European average. Patients can be covered under public health insurance, or if they earn more than 5000 euros monthly, they choose from private health insurance providers. Health insurance is mandatory but competitive as there are around 100 health insurance companies on the market. When Jens Spahn became the health minister In March 2018 Germany quickly became the Eur...
Aug 21, 2020•31 min•Ep. 118
There are well over 300.000 digital health apps on the market. However, only a third of them have been updated in the last 18 months, says Liz Ashal Payne - CEO and Founder of ORCHA - a UK based organization with a mission to distribute validated apps to patients who need them. Liz Ashal Payne - a digital health veteran, who started her career as a speech ad language therapist, worked as Assistant Director of Allied Health Professions (AHPs), she was a Clinical Programme Manager of Academic Heal...
Aug 14, 2020•40 min•Ep. 117
Despite enjoying clinical practice, Benedict Evans still came to a point where he felt he is not passionate enough about what he does, and as a surgeon, he realized he enjoys talking to patients more than treating them when they are under anesthesia. He went to a consulting position at McKinsey, then back to an NHS Trust to drive digital innovation and now to a VC position. Resources: InHealth Ventures: https://www.inhealth.vc/ Episode recap: https://www.facesofdigitalhealth.com/blog/f093-how-do...
Aug 07, 2020•30 min•Ep. 116
Leah Houston is an Emergency Physician who has been following blockchain development since 2012 and now designed a solution that would empower doctors, make their credentialing easier which would simplify transitions from one hospital to the next one if one wished to switch jobs. HPEC is restoring agency and autonomy to the physician-patient relationship with self-sovereign (physician-owned and controlled) digital identities and verifiable credentials. The key thing is that the solution is retur...
Jul 30, 2020•43 min•Ep. 115
This is the fourth episode in the short series about nurses who moved to entrepreneurship. Mary Lou Ackerman is Vice President of Innovation and Digital Health with SE Health. Mary Lou is a founding member of SONSIEL (Society of Nursing Scientist, Innovator, and Entrepreneur Leaders) and an active member of CHIEF (Canada’s Health Informatics Executive Forum) with Digital Health Canada. Her background is extensive — she has led the development and implementation of many business transformation pr...
Jul 23, 2020•54 min•Ep. 114
This is a third discussion in the short series about nurses going into entrepreneurship. Karmi Soder started working as a pediatric clinical care nurse in 1992. Today she is a skilled communicator with over 25 years of healthcare experience in clinical, administrative and tech, which she gained by serving as Chief Administrative Officer at Sutter Health, leading pediatric department for Kaiser Permanente, worked at Google and co-founded NewboRN Solutions — a registered nursing corporation, which...
Jul 16, 2020•54 min•Ep. 113
Sherezade Ruano is an Arrhythmia Specialist Nurse at Imperial College NHS Trust, Founder of RhythmiaBreath Medical Well-being programme and Co-Founder, CEO of RB Hub Digital Therapeutics. Passionate about the importance of mental wellbeing, stress and trauma in cardiac patients, Sherezade works closely with a team of world-renowned Mental Health specialists and Cardiologists offering outstanding services. In the interview she spoke about neurocardiology, struggles she came across as a nurse entr...
Jul 10, 2020•46 min•Ep. 112
