Is 2025 a pivotal inflection point for AI in health care? Dr. Connie Lehman, Co-Founder of Clairity, thinks so, and she has strong cause for optimism. Her organization’s software-as-a-medical-device product, Clairity Breast, recently received authorization from the Food and Drug Administration as the first AI platform that predicts a woman’s five-year risk of developing breast cancer.
On this episode, Dr. Lehman shares her journey with Clairity, from the paper she read as a medical student that sparked the idea, to her experience navigating the new domain of image-based risk assessment with the FDA. Her current focus is on implementing the technology through education and advocacy.
Dr. Lehman is passionate about advancing medicine toward risk assessment and disease prevention. Understanding risk empowers patients and their health care providers to choose the best path. Dr. Lehman envisions a future where image-based risk information is accessible and available to improve health outcomes for all.
Can AI empower the doctor-patient bond? Dr. Michael Suk, orthopedic surgeon, visionary leader and innovator, believes it can. In this discussion, he explores how AI can help to free up time for patients and speaks about the current AI adoption, highlighting its use in documentation and clinical decision support. He stresses the need for ethical AI solutions and for clinicians to be involved in the design of technological solutions. The conversation touches on the pioneering lifetime joint replacement warranty, illustrating how forging lasting partnerships can lead to improved outcomes, fewer complications and lower costs. Dr. Suk explains that the next evolution of health care demands a purpose-driven, holistic approach and explores how trust, connection and technology will intersect in the future. Tune in for this thought-provoking discussion that challenges the status quo and focuses on the doctor-patient bond.
What if aging meant maintaining independence and dignity at home and in the community? In this episode, Dr. Sarita Mohanty, President and CEO of The SCAN Foundation, speaks about the foundation’s innovative community-based, person-centered approach to elder care for marginalized adults. The conversation touches on common challenges like fragmented care, affordability, cultural barriers and loneliness – a major public health issue. Did you know that loneliness can harm your health as much as smoking 15 cigarettes a day? Mohanty discusses the importance of designing systems with the input of older adults in mind for policy and system reforms. She explains that technology offers significant potential for prediction, prevention and intervention, and stresses the importance of adaptable, unbiased AI algorithms. Tune in for the foundation’s formula for purposeful and dignified aging and Mohanty’s insights into the role of technology.
Get ready for a behind-the-scenes journey into Nashville’s booming health care sector with Apryl Childs-Potter, President of the Nashville Health Care Council. In this episode, Childs-Potter speaks about the council’s unique ecosystem, where leaders from payer, provider, tech and educational organizations come together to create a space for dialogue to enhance collaboration across common goals and challenges. The city’s collaboration culture fosters innovation, economic growth and improved outcomes. Childs-Potter reveals how the council’s programs and events connect everyone from emerging leaders to executives, accelerating careers, forging vital networks and improving the health care industry overall. The conversation highlights the power of AI to reduce administrative burden for health organizations, improve clinical decision support and enhance member experience. Tune in for Childs-Potter’s formula for efficient and booming health care systems and her insights on the role of AI.
Jens Dommel, Head of Healthcare EMEA at AWS, explores the transformative power of AI in health care for decision support and shares what his experience tells him successful implementations look like. Common global health care challenges – such as an aging population, burnout, preventable adverse events and costs – are on the rise. Dommel emphasizes the potential of AI in enhancing efficiency, reducing costs, and improving outcomes and access. Dommel discusses the importance of accessible and integrated data, governance, trust and scalability for AI models. Dommel explains that successful digital transformations happen with the right skills, clearly defined goals by the leadership team, and a strategy of starting small and scaling up. He emphasizes the importance of strong regulations such as the European Health Data Space (EHDS) and EU Artificial Intelligence Act in fostering international cooperation, innovation and trust. Tune in for insights on building scalable solutions and unlocking the true value of data and AI.
As an attending physician, principal investigator and academic publisher, Dr. Ashita Batavia has a deep appreciation for the importance of data in clinical development. In her role as Head of Hematology and Oncology Data Sciences, R&D, at Johnson & Johnson, she’s helping shape the future of clinical trials.
In this podcast episode, Dr. Batavia shares her ideas for improving clinical trials and delivering better therapies to patients. She is particularly interested in pragmatic trial designs where data and AI help reduce the burden of trial participation for patients and providers without compromising the collection of safety and efficacy data.
Dr. Batavia leaves us with her belief that bringing together multimodal health data is key to fully unlocking advanced analytics capabilities in clinical research and explains why achieving a first win is the springboard to building a culture of data-driven innovation.
Stacy Hurt has found her dream job as Chief Patient Officer at Parexel. On this episode of The Health Pulse, Hurt shares how her 25-year career in health care, along with personal experiences as a caregiver and Stage 4 cancer survivor, fuel her passion for patient advocacy. From AI’s clinical applications to patient data ownership, Hurt sees all innovations through the lens of patient empowerment – offering time, information, resources and hope. Tune in for her insights and inspirations for organizations and patients alike.
The work of delivering innovative therapies to patients must be done well and quickly. This became the leadership mantra for Nevine Zariffa, former Head of Biometrics and Information Sciences at AstraZeneca, following her personal battle with cancer. Diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) at 33, Zariffa's cancer has been in remission for 25 years thanks to an investigational drug she received through a compassionate use clinical trial.
In this episode, Zariffa joins Alex to discuss the evolution of AI in the pharmaceutical industry. She emphasizes the importance of a strong connection between business leaders and data scientists in scaling AI projects. Tune in to discover Zariffa’s formula for effective change management and her insights on the future of AI in pharma and health tech.
What is a learning health care system, and how close are we to achieving it? According to Dr. Marc Berger, we have a long way to go, but there’s plenty of cause for optimism. Berger is a physician, scientist and researcher who spent much of his career in clinical and outcomes research in the pharmaceutical industry.
Now semiretired and consulting, Berger recently joined host Alex Maiersperger on the podcast. He explained that a true learning health care system removes the barriers between research and patient care. This goal requires digitization and integration of all health care data in a responsible way to better inform decision making, and it will need computing and analysis power the world has yet to master. It’s a big task, but Berger’s message is clear: If we continue to make progress, stay humble about what we don’t yet know and are kind to one another, we’ll get there.
Lita Sands, Managing Director of Life Sciences at Deloitte, is passionate about how people and technology come together to create a healthier future.
In this episode, Sands explains to Host Alex Maiersperger why life sciences organizations must strengthen their relationships with health care and ensure data and analytics form the backbone of their companies. According to Sands, technology is easy, while change management and the partnership between business and IT represent critical challenges.
When it comes to generative AI, Sands advises life sciences organizations to focus on what she calls “no regrets bets,” emphasizing the importance of a person in the loop. Tune in to learn more.
Dr. James Hildreth, MD, PhD, President and CEO of Meharry Medical College, is a passionate leader speaking about health equity, the power of AI in medicine and how aspiring physicians can be supported throughout their studies.
In this episode, Hildreth speaks about the influence of social determinants of health-on-health equity and offers advice on reducing inequities. Host Alex Maiersperger and Hildreth discuss impactful AI use cases in health care, such as the documentation of notes from patient and physician interactions, so that physicians can focus their time on the patient. Hildreth explains that AI can accelerate the discovery of disease causes, drugs and new interventions and that representation matters so that the data sets from genome sequencing also include people of African ancestry to ensure discoveries are representative of the diverse population and interventions are working. Lastly, Hildreth shares his leadership experience in making medical school more affordable for aspiring doctors and the importance of exposure to technology and AI from an early age.
Dr. Onyi Daniel, Sinai Health System Board Member and former Vice President for Data and Analytics Strategy at Highmark Health, is a passionate health tech leader who speaks about change management, AI use cases, health equity and the importance of responsible AI.
In this episode, Daniel shares her leadership experience and explains why it is incremental that health care leadership can articulate the vision for technological change and define the associated value. Host Alex Maiersperger and Daniel discuss emerging AI use cases in the health care industry, such as ambient listening or code generation, which can improve productivity and experience and reduce burnout. Despite the infinite opportunities that new technologies bring, Daniel emphasizes the importance of upstream data collection, data quality, governance and inclusion, ensuring models and outcomes represent diverse populations to enhance health equity.
Artificial intelligence holds tremendous potential for advancing clinical research. On this episode of The Health Pulse podcast, host Alex Maiersperger connects with Dr. Greg Goldmacher, Associate Vice President for Clinical Research and Head of Clinical Imaging and Pathology at Merck. Goldmacher identifies AI’s ability to automate advanced image measurements and improve insight into disease biology to support clinical development. From a clinical radiology perspective, AI has the potential to improve diagnosis and opportunistic screening for earlier disease detection. Goldmacher leaves us with his thoughts on the synergies needed within life sciences organizations to bring clinical development and data science teams together and move AI projects from idea to execution.
In a world where your zip code can have as great an impact on your health as your genetic code, how can we create a healthier future for everyone? On this episode of The Health Pulse, we hear from Dr. Joyonna Gamble-George, a neuroscientist at the Yale School of Public Health, and Dr. Karriem Watson, Chief Engagement Officer of the National Institutes of Health’s All of Us Research Program, about how the All of Us program deepens our understanding of social determinants of health and addresses health care disparities.
The All of Us Research Program is a diverse, representative database composed of health data from more than 1 million people. The program has 10,000 registered users of different backgrounds and skill sets and helps them better understand and solve health challenges. Tune in to hear these health care research leaders reflect on the impact of precision medicine and how AI and other cutting-edge technology are advancing research and closing the digital divide.
Dr. Otis Brawley, Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of oncology and epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University, is passionate about cancer research, prevention and high-quality cancer care. He served as Chief Medical and Scientific Officer and Executive Vice President of the American Cancer Society from 2007 to 2018 and has published over 200 scientific articles.
In this episode, Dr. Brawley speaks about the impact of socioeconomic factors on cancer rates. Smoking, obesity and poverty are leading causes of cancer in the United States. With cancer rates rising, Dr. Brawley emphasizes the importance of prevention and risk reduction, including healthy lifestyle choices such as regular exercise and a healthy diet. Dr. Brawley is passionate about reducing cancer care disparities and saving lives with accessible, high-quality care, including appropriate screening, diagnostics and treatments. Having the correct data and technology in place can help to identify high-risk individuals and plan interventions early to prevent diseases. Lastly, Dr. Brawley shares valuable insights on carcinogens and practical tips on how to prevent cancer.
Dr. Maya Said, Founder and CEO of Outcomes4Me, aims to empower cancer patients worldwide to be proactive about their care with information and technology.
On this episode of The Health Pulse podcast, Said shares how a personal health scare illuminated for her how overwhelmed cancer patients feel when they face understanding their diagnosis and treatment options, finding the best providers and clinical trials, managing treatments and costs, and navigating their lives and relationships during treatment. The experience inspired her to launch the platform Outcomes4Me, which uses data and AI to help cancer patients become more informed and connected to improve their outcomes – at no cost.
Tune in to learn more about the role of data in addressing disparities in cancer care and how generative AI is poised to revolutionize treatment.
Dr. Michael von Wagner, Chief Medical Informatics Officer at University Hospital Frankfurt and a pioneer in interoperability, speaks about the importance of a seamless data exchange for personalized patient treatments and efficient health care systems.
On this episode, Dr. von Wagner joins Alex Maiersperger to discuss health data standardization, new regulations, and two pioneering data and AI projects at University Hospital Frankfurt. A team of experts came together at the hospital to integrate data from different sources into a dashboard that monitors trends in the development of antibiotic resistance, enabling optimization of treatments. In another project, they collaborate with another major university hospital and general practitioners to combine research and clinical data on rare diseases to help GPs with evidence-based diagnoses.
Dr. von Wagner is optimistic about the future of health care with AI-based solutions for clinical decision support, but also explains why risks and opportunities need to be evaluated carefully. He emphasizes that the interoperability, flexibility and scalability of AI-based solutions are key to a successful future.
GenAI is rapidly making the once impossible possible. On this episode of The Health Pulse, SAS’ AI Product Strategy Advisor Marinela Profi chats with Host Alex Maiersperger about just how fast the needle is moving and what we can and cannot likely expect large language models (LLMs) to solve anytime soon.
Some of the GenAI use cases Profi is most excited about are in the health care space, helping providers accelerate tasks and glean valuable information for diagnostic and care decisions. She shares a balanced perspective on the possibilities and caution required when applying generative technology in health care and life sciences, highlighting the importance of explainable AI and a human in the loop.
There is no shortage of interest around large language models (LLMs) in the health care and life sciences space. Are organizations able to successfully operationalize LLMs in a cost-efficient, regulatory-compliant and ethical manner?
On this episode of The Health Pulse podcast, SAS Global Medical Director Dr. Steve Kearney and host Alex Maiersperger discuss key considerations around the application of LLMs. Explore how organizations are improving data interoperability and converging across health care and life sciences – thus positively impacting patient outcomes and experiences.
Health equity is a hot topic in health care, and Dr. Pooja Mittal speaks about key success components, including the importance of trust, technology and strong relationships with communities.
Bringing health stakeholders and community members together is crucial to building trust and providing culturally relevant care that drives better health outcomes.
From a young age, Dr. Mittal realized that health care is not equitable, and challenging environmental conditions cause higher disease rates. With a mission to reduce health disparities, Dr. Mittal became a physician and Chief Health Equity Officer at Health Net.
She believes technology is key to making care more equitable and supporting patients from historically disadvantaged communities, as it enables access to data to better understand needs, access to telehealth, enabling patients to receive care remotely and access to culturally sensitive technology, supporting unique needs.
