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On this week's episode of Data Book, Clay Ritchey, CEO of Verato, a next-generation patient-matching solution for healthcare, speaks with Chief Healthcare Executive. He discusses how patient-matching technology can alleviate stress for providers and improve patient care. He also talks about the financial benefits this technology can have for hospitals and health systems, as well as potential data privacy concerns.

Clay Ritchey, CEO of Verato, highlights the administrative and financial benefits that patient-matching technology can provide hospitals and health systems, as well as how it can improve the patient experience.

Podcast: Match Made in Hospitals — Patient-Matching Technology Can Improve Healthcare

Technology is everywhere in healthcare, and the list of ways that digital solutions can improve health outcomes and cut costs is endless: technology is used to improve consumer engagement, identify patients who are at risk of events like a heart attack, and increasingly to help different parts of the healthcare system to talk to each other.

But when technology falls short of its promise, it can add costs and burdens for those who use it. The best example might be the electronic health record.

Next-generation digital providers are helping to leverage technology to find the value long promised. Today, DataBook welcomes CitiusTech, a next-generation specialist provider that works with payers, providers, medical technology and life science markets.

In an interview recorded earlier this year, Chief Healthcare Executive Associate Editorial Director Mary Caffrey spoke with 2 leaders of Citius Tech about meeting healthcare challenges with digital solutions. Her guests are Sridhar Turaga, the senior vice president for Digital Innovation & Data Science, and Shyam Manoj Karunakaran, who is senior vice president and market head for Health Plans.

In June, after this interview was recorded, Citius Tech announced an acquisition of SDLC Partners of Pittsburgh, expanding its footprint in the payer solutions space.

In an interview recorded earlier this year, Chief Healthcare Executive Associate Editorial Director Mary Caffrey spoke with 2 leaders of Citius Tech about meeting healthcare challenges with digital solutions. 

Podcast: Using Digital Solutions to Address Technology Shortfalls with Citius Tech Senior VPs

Between artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots and personalized text message appointment reminders, it has become routine for health systems to leverage mobile-based technology in one way or another. At one health system, the surgical center is using text messages to inform surgeon's of their appointments for the day, all while sending reminders to patients. 

In this episode of Data Book, we speak with Lora Swenson, business manager at KU MedWest. Swenson will discuss how KUMedWest is leveraging PerfectServe's technology to improve the patient experience and make workflows more efficient. Swenson talks about the technology, how she implemented it into the surgery center at the hospital, how it benefits patients and physicians alike and what other C-suites and healthcare executives need to do to boast such a platform.

Make sure you like this podcast, subscribe and follow 

™ on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook to stay up-to-date on the latest health tech news.

 and let me know what you want to hear on upcoming episodes of the podcast.

Breaking Down the HHS Interoperability Rules

How C-Suites Can Help Physicians Experiencing Burnout (Part Three)

Med School Culture and Introducing New Health Tech (Part Two)

Lora Swenson, business manager at KU MedWest, discusses how a text message platform improves workflows and patient satisfaction.

Podcast: How Text Messages Can Improve A Surgeon's Workflow

This is the final part of a three-part podcast. Make sure you start by listening to parts 

Physicians are experiencing burnout at such high levels. In an effort to reduce the damaging effects of this epidemic, C-suites have an opportunity to intervene and implement practices that reinforce work-life balance and overall well-being. 

Janae Sharp, founder of Sharp Index, a nonprofit dedicated to reducing physician suicide and burnout, and Dalton Ruer, a data scientist storyteller, are back on Data Book for part two of a special three-part series about physician burnout.

In the final part of this three-part podcast, we will discuss protocol if a physician reports feeling burnt out, steps C-suites can take to reduce burnout in their health system and how physician performances can be impacted due to burnout.

AI, Big Data and Existing Challenges (Part Two)

How Clinical Decision Support Tools Can Improve Outcomes (Part One)

Steps executives can take to reduce burnout in their health system.

Podcast: How C-Suites Can Help Physicians Experiencing Burnout (Part Three)

This is part two of a three-part podcast. Listen to 

The medical school process is rigorous. Students who typically excel in school are faced with even more work and hours of being out in the field. The addition of technology in healthcare presents a new challenge for young professionals, who might not have had the time to learn how to use them. Although these innovations were made to improve efficiency, outcomes and patient satisfaction, they can also lead to burnout. And sometimes, the pressure and fear of potential burnout turns people away from entering the field, which could lead to an even worse provider shortage.

In part two, we discuss the culture of med school, how med school can better prepare young physicians to use new technologies and if a fear of burnout is keeping young professionals from pursuing a career in medicine.

Janae Sharp and Dalton Ruer discuss the culture of med school, learning about new tech and how both affect burnout and the decision to enter the field. 

Podcast: Med School Culture and Introducing New Health Tech (Part Two)

Clinical decision support tools have the power to help clinicians make more accurate diagnoses. These technologies have the potential to be lifesaving in areas such as cancer, vascular disease and infection, where conditions are often missed or misdiagnosed.

On part one of this special two-part episode of Data Book, Paul Cerrato, former

, which is co-authored by John Halamka, M.D., president of the Mayo Clinic Platform; the cause of diagnostic errors; and how machine learning can improve patient outcomes.

Cerrato has more than 30 years of experience working as a research analyst, medical journalist, clinician, and educator and has written extensively on clinical decision support, electronic health records, protected health information security and practice management. For listeners attending HIMSS 2020 in Orlando, Florida, Cerrato and Halamka will be leading a preconference session “

” on Monday, March 9 from 1:30—2:10 p.m. and an educational session “

Reinventing Clinical Decision Support With Machine Learning

” on Tuesday, March 10 from 12—1 p.m.

Make sure you like this podcast, subscribe and follow Inside Digital Health on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook to stay up-to-date on the latest health tech news.

Using Analytics, Precision Medicine to Improve Preterm Infant Outcomes

How FDA Is Navigating the Digital Transformation

Clinical decision support tools can be lifesaving.

Podcast: How Clinical Decision Support Tools Can Improve Outcomes (Part One)

Over the last decade, technology in healthcare has made incredible strides. From AI outperforming human experts to smartwatches that monitor a patient's heartbeat, it’s safe to say that the digitization of healthcare is improving outcomes and experiences. 

On this episode of Data Book, Shereese Maynard, M.S., MBA, a healthcare strategist and key opinion leader, discusses the technologies that influenced the last 10 years and makes projections on what the industry might expect in the future. Maynard also provides opinions about some past disappointments and the technologies and ideas she thought she would see but have not yet come to fruition.

Playing a Medical Video Game for CME Credit

Shereese Maynard, M.S., MBA, discusses the influence of health tech in the 2010s and makes projections on what's to come.

Podcast: Health Tech in the 2010s and Beyond

In the digital age of healthcare, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is tasked with a difficult task: Approving safe and effective health tech, medical devices and digital health tools. As more entrants submit their technology to the agency, it is crucial that the federal regulator ensures the products will improve the lives of users.

At HLTH2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada, Amy Abernethy, M.D., Ph.D., principal deputy commissioner and acting CIO of the FDA, sat down with the hosts of Data Book to discuss how the agency creates new digital health guidances, the intersection of digital health and precision care, real-world data and the approach to approving new devices.

 and let us know what you want to hear on Data Book this season.

Featuring Amy Abernethy, M.D., Ph.D., principal deputy commissioner and acting CIO of the FDA.

Podcast: How FDA Is Navigating the Digital Transformation

Like healthcare, times are changing here at 

On the first episode of season five, hosts Jack Murtha and Tom Castles say their goodbyes and hand off the microphones to Paul Abrams, MBA, director of Health Care Specialty Group at MJH Life Sciences, and me.

 first launched in March 2018 and featured a story about a hacker collective called the Dark Overlord. Murtha and Castles would tell a story, interview a guess and say goodbye with some words from a health IT leader.

Over time, the two tweaked the formula and the podcast entirely, and it appeared to show off. Since 

 first aired, the podcast has had 10s and 10s and 10s of thousands of listens and has featured some top health IT thought leaders, including Eric Topol, M.D., David Albert, M.D., Rasu Shrestha, M.D., MBA, Geeta Nayyar, M.D., MBA.

Now, it’s time for new hosts and new stories. Whether it’s interviews on the conference floor, learning more about new medical devices entering the space or diving into health IT news, Paul and I look forward to continuing to update 

In this episode, we wanted to let our audience get acquainted with who we are and our plans for 

Navigate the digital transformation with confidence. 

Data Book Podcast: The 'Not Glamorous' Part of the Job

Data Book Podcast: Rediscovering Healthcare's 'Why' With Rasu Shrestha

Why Health Systems Should Build Their Own AI Models

Get to know the new voices behind Data Book. 

Podcast: What's New with Data Book?

How can health systems enact major change? Whether the transformation centers on value-based care, clinical tech or business initiatives, the answer to this question doesn’t come easily. But the industry is full of health systems and healthcare leaders who have ushered in meaningful change, in the face of cultural and technological resistance.

In this episode of Data Book, we tell the story of how Ascension Health — the largest Catholic and nonprofit health system in the U.S. &mdash; rallied its leaders and employees to make one such major change. Way back in 2002, the health system set out to eliminate preventable deaths in its hospitals and clinics. Eight years later, Ascension found that it had saved patients from 1,500 to 5,000 avoidable deaths per year.

Of course, this tremendous feat didn’t 

. It took evidence-based tactics, micro-goals, top-down and bottom-up buy-in, committed leadership and an across-the-board desire to reach this destination. Without any one of these attributes, Ascension’s plan might have failed to cut the number of preventable deaths.

Still, this sort of change is different from those facing tech-forward healthcare leaders in 2019. How can health systems implement, for example, artificial intelligence systems — and not just for the sake of them, but to revamp how clinicians and administrators work and how patients heal? And what about value-based care? Wearables data?

There are few proven roadmaps to follow. Sure, the successes are out there, and they’re often willing to tell their stories. But healthcare stands at the edge of the unknown.

To help understand the path forward, Data Book welcomes Andrew Pecora, M.D., chief innovation officer for Hackensack Meridian Health and a founder of the health data startup Cota. In our conversation, the renowned oncologist discusses how healthcare leaders can enact major changes, what kinds of changes they should consider and how to ensure a smooth cultural transition.

Anyway, thank you for listening to Data Book. Got a story of successful enterprise-level change? Or maybe a big failure? Let us know.

Get the best insights in healthcare analytics 

Implementing AI Is Simpler Than You Think

Is Anyone Obligated to Incite Healthcare Innovation?

How can health systems navigate technological and systemic changes? Data Book explores the Ascension Health story and talks with Andrew Pecora, M.D.

Podcast: Tech Is Easy. Change Is Hard.

Virtual care can reduce healthcare disparities even after the pandemic ends.

Telehealth Increased Healthcare Access for Hispanic, Low-Income Populations During COVID-19

Rural populations have the opportunity to leverage telemedicine to improve health outcomes.

Telehealth Models Result in Positive Outcomes for Rural Populations

The interventions are especially helpful for patients in rural and underserved populations.

Telepsychiatry Substantially Improves Outcomes for Patients With Complex Psychiatric Disorders

Although the world is very much still in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, a panel of experts tackled lessons learned so far. 

COVID-19 Amplified Where Data, Technology Could Be Put to Better Use

Twistle's CEO, Kulmeet Singh, says he's come up with a reliable way to measure return on investment for his company's remote monitoring software solutions.

Measuring the ROI of Remote Patient Monitoring

Craig Newman, the chief strategy officer at HealthChannels for ScribeAmerica, discusses how technology can be used to help reduce the amount of time and energy providers spend doing administrative tasks.

How can technology help reduce the administrative workload for doctors so that they can provide better care to patients?

Great question. I think everything is all about how do you make it easier for physicians to focus in on patient care? The last thing we want to do is actually create new sequential processes or new workflows that take the provider away from the patient.

And so, when I think about the model itself, and this is going to be different, again, based on the care environment that the providers working in — I'll just use an ambulatory clinic — I think about segmenting that work pre-visit, during the visit, and post-visit and looking at how we can offset some of that work with technology. For some, the technology is still not up to snuff to offload everything for that provider.

So, let me give you a prime example. So, let's talk about documentation of the physician itself and doing a clinical documentation. There's a whole notion of how do we leverage artificial intelligence (artificial intelligence) to actually drive value at the point of care to help with physician documentation. AI is incredibly effective when we talk about like radiology, or coding, or billing practices because there's tremendous data and very little variability.

Think about your primary care office. You've got different voices, different templates, different processes, different people coming in and out, maybe different caregivers, a ton of variability that exists for providers today. Technology alone — AI and machine learning models — can't solve the problem. And so, I think what we're seeing happen in the market, and what we've done with our product line Speke, is actually blend front-end technology that creates a seamless workflow for the provider. Imagine being able to walk into a room, hit a single button, and it could capture the entire conversation between a patient provider. No periods, no stop phrases, no clicking around in the EMR (electronic medical record), no nothing. And then, you leave the room, you hit stop, you can verbalize something after the fact, move on to your next patient, and never be tethered to the computer. And then, within moments to 24 hours, that note is structured in the EMR.

How did that happen? Well, we take that smart technology optimization process — sort of audio preprocessing, and speaker segmentation and machine learning — we route it to back-end labor to do QA (quality assurance) and CDI (computer design and integration) and then offload the clerical task from the doctor, doing that work behind the scenes a little bit asynchronously. Just by doing that little step, you can free up time. And getting back to that what we talked about previously around time driven activity-based cost, you've got to create time for the physician and offload those clerical tests.

We're seeing the same thing to providers, pre- and post-visit who were using technologies like chatbots or robotic process automation technologies, that can help make sure that we automate as many processes as possible. But then, we still need to make sure that there's human glue involved, who can help them with support strategies like doing comprehensive chart prep, helping tee up where there are care gaps to close, helping them with their specificity, acuity, documentation, or even making sure their charts are completed, efficient, and on time so the bills get out, so they don't have outstanding charts and their DSOs [daily sales outstanding] don't get screwed up throughout the course of the week or month.

So, I think it's a balance of technology and labor working in concert together. It's not an and/or [situation]; it's a both.

Craig Newman: How Technology Can Reduce Administrative Burden for Physicians

Healthcare is a field where employees have the opportunity to directly impact the lives of patients and their families every day. With new digital health innovations coming to market, technologies can improve patient outcomes and satisfaction.

At HLTH2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada, Luke Bonney, co-founder and CEO at Redox, and Mandira Singh, head of product and partnerships at Collective Medical, discussed why they work in the digital health space.

Editor’s note: This transcript has been lightly edited for style and clarity.

 I think for myself and for a lot of people in Redox, digital health and what we do specifically offers an opportunity to (a) solve huge problems and (b) solve problems that impact ourselves and the people we love.

 I actually started my career in finance. Initially I was an investment banker who covered retail, healthcare and consumer. And I'll never forget one of the first meetings I had with a biotech company. What really struck me was that these entrepreneurs who were so early — and being able to solve an infant indication &mdash; were just so passionate about what they were doing. And that is what has driven me through my whole career.

 We literally have a saying at Redox that we use to kick off almost every single one of our meetings, which is that ‘We are all patients.’ And it's true. And because it's true, it really helps ground us.

We’re impacting so many patients at Collective. We work with some very vulnerable patients, whether that's babies who are born addicted to methamphetamines or the homeless in California who are trying to find care that is continual and logical. These are very vulnerable patients.

And it says what we're building is not for the sake of building great technology. What we're building is technology that can fundamentally improve our healthcare.

the ability to impact those lives with scalable solutions and technology and it is a truly amazing opportunity.

There's just not that many places where you can find that alignment. So, when you do, you can become part of a team of people that are really passionate about the problem you solve.

This is an industry that is so ripe for changing and we've seen that change happen in real time, which is an amazing thing to see. There just aren't that many industries like that and I think that the path we're going as we continue to attract best in breed talent to the industry, we are going to see the system turn and change and that is such an exciting thing to be part of.

Why Digital Health Tools Focus on Chronic Conditions

Using Tech to Address Behavioral Healthcare Gaps

Part one of interviews featuring experts explaining why they got into the digital health space.

Why Did You Go into Digital Health?

Real-time data give both patients and physicians an opportunity to intervene early on if something alarming shows up. From vital signs to medication adherence, real-time data can lead to improved patient outcomes and decreased hospitalizations for patients.

At HLTH2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada, David Van Sickle, CEO of Propeller Health, a digital health company, further discussed the importance of real-time data from digital health apps.

Editor’s note: This transcription has been lightly edited for style, length and clarity.

 Real-time data are important in asthma and COPD because things can change so quickly for a patient with one of those conditions. They can be affected by their environment; they could have some kind of a viral infection that causes them to worsen. So, by monitoring the use of the medications that people take to relieve symptoms, we can get a pretty quick vital sign, if you will, of how people are doing and when they're not doing well and need more attention, as well as chronically. We want to understand who's not being optimally or appropriately managed and help them and their physician get them on the right treatment faster and as soon as possible.

Picky Eating mHealth App Provides Real-Time Data to Parents

Why Leveraging Real-Time Data is Important for Healthcare

The Importance of Real-Time Data from Digital Health Apps

Non-traditional brands like Uber, Amazon, CVS and Walmart continue to push further into healthcare. While this might create competition for health systems and physicians in the traditional healthcare office setting, the ultimate goal is to help patients stay healthy, which could mean accessing care in more convenient, new and different ways.  

At HLTH2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada, Sean Mehra, co-founder and chief strategy officer at HealthTap, and Veeneta Lakhani, senior vice president for health services at Vida Health, offered insights into non-traditional brands moving further into healthcare.

Editor’s note: The following transcription has been lightly edited for length, style and clarity.

 You're beginning to see a lot of non-traditional companies entering the healthcare space from retailers like Amazon who have a digital first strategy to retailers like CVS, Walmart and Walgreens that have always had a local brick and mortar strategy.

 I think this is an exciting time in healthcare. We're seeing a lot of evolution of non-healthcare brands and transportation organizations that are coming in to make sure that we can reduce barriers to people getting to the doctor's office and getting their breast cancer screenings. It's amazing. It's great to see that kind of outpour and that last line sort of support happen. That's an example.

 All of these players are beginning to realize this opportunity to cater to these U.S. consumers. Because they have an established relationship with so many U.S. consumers, either because they physically walk into their stores and pharmacies, or because they are going to the website to buy goods and services all the time, they're realizing that there's an opportunity for them to sell healthcare goods and services more affordably and more conveniently then otherwise available to them through their insurance company or local healthcare provider.

 We're seeing TV and technology organizations that are normally outside of healthcare now step in and really try to provide more continuity of care right from the home.

 So that's why it's not surprising when you see folks like CVS, Walmart, Amazon and Walgreens thinking about launching clinics and integrating them with their pharmacies and figuring out ways to give you discounts on the next over the counter cream or diaper rash ointment that you need to buy your baby.

 It’s an exciting time in healthcare to see all of that evolution. And it's going to take a village to get to where we need to get.

 All of this really boils down to a very interesting facet of healthcare, which all these players are go be paying attention to. And that is primary care because it is the part of healthcare that 

 80% of the time. If we could just see someone that's local and convenient for the cold and the sniffles before it becomes something worse, we can get people good healthcare at the right time and stay healthier.

Health Systems Must Beware of Retail Telemedicine

Tech Giants Will Continue Moving into Healthcare

How Software and Retail Partnerships Can Shape the Future of Healthcare

Two experts give insights into why non-traditional brands are moving into the healthcare sector. 

Digging Deeper: Non-Traditional Brands Moving Further into Healthcare

, according to a survey conducted by American Well. But what are the drivers behind the adoption?

Danielle Russella is the president and general manager of the health plan solutions organization at American Well. At HLTH2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada, Russella discussed why reimbursement and better workflow efficiency could be behind the increased use of telehealth solutions. 

 I would say the biggest one on the provider front when you talk about provider adoption is around reimbursement. Providers were a lot more susceptible to wanting to incorporate technology into routine care for their patients when reimbursement played a role.

It takes it a step further, you know, parity — they want to be paid the same thing for seeing that patient as they would in the office setting. That was a huge barrier, and more and more health plans are now covering those visits and reimbursing providers for seeing members and patients. That's contributing widespread to adoption coupled with efficiencies. There's a lot more to do with a lot less providers, tools and capabilities and things that can allow the provider to be more efficient &mdash; technology is huge in that regard. Having the medical record and having information right in front of you. The ability if you have a canceled appointment, working at home, working in the in the morning, there's so many different ways that a provider can really tap into technology to become a lot more efficient.

Not to mention, think about load balancing and areas of specialty or rural areas where you might have the one psychiatrist who is not very reachable. Distance and radius play a huge factor in preventing access. So, if you're a provider sitting in the middle of Chattanooga, Tennessee, and you can project your expertise, using technology, it’s a great motivator for a provider.

And if they can get paid for it, it’s even better.

Reimbursement could drive the adoption of the tools.

Increasing Telemedicine Adoption

With the market for wearable devices heating up each day, health systems have a decision to make about which technology it should choose. What should health systems be looking for when making the choice?

At HLTH2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada, Natalie Schneider, vice president of digital health at Samsung Electronics America, discussed how healthcare executives should approach implementing wearables into their health system due to the wide array of options.

Editor’s note: This transcription has been lightly edited for style and clarity.

 The space has become so congested. I think when you walk through the exhibition hall here at HLTH, you just see hundreds and hundreds of really impressive digital health companies.

I think hospitals should think about first determining the KPIs that they want to move. Is it readmission rates? Is it the amount of hours spent documenting patient consults? What is it that you're trying to solve for?

Health systems need to establish what they want the wearable device to be used for.