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Dr. Niral Shah, Chief Medical Officer at ATC West Healthcare, describes how locum tenens clinicians provide flexible, temporary staffing for hospitals facing coverage gaps, particularly in critical specialties and rural areas. Building long-term relationships with hospitals allows ATC West to respond to immediate needs, and the system is built to give clinicians the flexibility to control their schedules and limit factors that lead to burnout. One interesting trend is a shift from near-retirement physicians to a younger demographic just out of medical training who prioritize work-life balance and are still searching for a longer-term home base. Niral explains, "So first, for definitional purposes, let me tell you what a locum tenens is. A locums, the best way of thinking about it, is sort of a substitute teacher, if you will, but for a physician. And so it can be any type, just like you can have a substitute science teacher or a substitute math teacher or whatnot. You can have a locums doc that is a hospitalist, an emergency room physician, or even a surgeon. And so we don't schedule things out in advance, just like you would for elective stuff."  Niral explains, "So first, for definitional purposes, let me tell you what a locums is. A locums, the best way of thinking about it, is sort of a substitute teacher, if you will, but for a physician. And so it can be any type, just like you can have a substitute science teacher or a substitute math teacher or whatnot. You can have a locums doc that is a hospitalist, an emergency room physician, or even a surgeon. And so we don't schedule things out in advance, just like you would for elective stuff."  #ATCWestHealthcare #LocumTenens #Locums #PhysicianStaffing #PhysicianWellness #HealthcareWorkforce #HospitalStaffing #EmergencyMedicine #RuralHealthcare #CriticalCare #HealthTech #AIHealthcare #MatchmakingTechnology #HealthcareInnovation ATC-west.com Listen to the podcast here

Dr. Niral Shah, Chief Medical Officer at ATC West Healthcare, describes how locum tenens clinicians provide flexible, temporary staffing for hospitals facing coverage gaps, particularly in critical specialties and rural areas. Building long-term relationships with hospitals allows ATC West to respond to immediate needs, and the system is built to give clinicians the flexibility to control their schedules and limit factors that lead to burnout. One interesting trend is a shift from near-retirement physicians to a younger demographic just out of medical training who prioritize work-life balance and are still searching for a longer-term home base. Niral explains, "So first, for definitional purposes, let me tell you what a locum tenens is. A locums, the best way of thinking about it, is sort of a substitute teacher, if you will, but for a physician. And so it can be any type, just like you can have a substitute science teacher or a substitute math teacher or whatnot. You can have a locums doc that is a hospitalist, an emergency room physician, or even a surgeon. And so we don't schedule things out in advance, just like you would for elective stuff."  Niral explains, "So first, for definitional purposes, let me tell you what a locums is. A locums, the best way of thinking about it, is sort of a substitute teacher, if you will, but for a physician. And so it can be any type, just like you can have a substitute science teacher or a substitute math teacher or whatnot. You can have a locums doc that is a hospitalist, an emergency room physician, or even a surgeon. And so we don't schedule things out in advance, just like you would for elective stuff."  #ATCWestHealthcare #LocumTenens #Locums #PhysicianStaffing #PhysicianWellness #HealthcareWorkforce #HospitalStaffing #EmergencyMedicine #RuralHealthcare #CriticalCare #HealthTech #AIHealthcare #MatchmakingTechnology #HealthcareInnovation ATC-west.com Download the transcript

Dr. Ross Harper, CEO of Limbic, discusses computational psychiatry and how AI can address the critical shortage of mental health professionals by using a validated voice AI agent that delivers structured cognitive behavioral therapy under clinician oversight.  The company has achieved regulatory milestones in the US and UK and shows that 24/7 access to therapy allows clinicians to dramatically scale patient capacity and serve a broader population. This is not a wellness approach but a clinical solution that addresses regulatory positioning, reimbursement, professional credibility, and data privacy while keeping a human in the loop to preempt concerns about replacing clinicians and misleading patients. Ross explains, "One of the principles guiding our approach is that, fundamentally, we are building an AI agent that can actually work with patients across the care continuum, from initial intake and triage all the way through to actually receiving treatment and then hopefully recovery. And so, in order to build a dataset to support the AI research and the AI development, you have to have the agent working with patients, collecting their data, learning from the experiences at the point of care. Then you need to combine that with real structured clinical data from the electronic health record." "What we do is we, of course, make sure that we always have the necessary permissions from both the legislation, the regulation, and the patient. They always give us permission to use their data in a way that allows us to offer them a better AI experience. But really it's about combining all of these different threads from within a clinical setting so that we can actually build a best-in-class healthcare solution rather than another wellness app that sits in the app store." #Limbic #ComputationalPsychiatry #AIMentalHealth #HealthcareAI #MentalHealthOutcomes #CognitiveBehavioralTherapy #HealthEquity #AIBias #InclusiveHealthcare #TechForGood #GlobalHealth limbic.ai Listen to the podcast here

Dr. Ross Harper, CEO of Limbic, discusses computational psychiatry and how AI can address the critical shortage of mental health professionals by using a validated voice AI agent that delivers structured cognitive behavioral therapy under clinician oversight.  The company has achieved regulatory milestones in the US and UK and shows that 24/7 access to therapy allows clinicians to dramatically scale patient capacity and serve a broader population. This is not a wellness approach but a clinical solution that addresses regulatory positioning, reimbursement, professional credibility, and data privacy while keeping a human in the loop to preempt concerns about replacing clinicians and misleading patients. Ross explains, "One of the principles guiding our approach is that, fundamentally, we are building an AI agent that can actually work with patients across the care continuum, from initial intake and triage all the way through to actually receiving treatment and then hopefully recovery. And so, in order to build a dataset to support the AI research and the AI development, you have to have the agent working with patients, collecting their data, learning from the experiences at the point of care. Then you need to combine that with real structured clinical data from the electronic health record." "What we do is we, of course, make sure that we always have the necessary permissions from both the legislation, the regulation, and the patient. They always give us permission to use their data in a way that allows us to offer them a better AI experience. But really it's about combining all of these different threads from within a clinical setting so that we can actually build a best-in-class healthcare solution rather than another wellness app that sits in the app store." #Limbic #ComputationalPsychiatry #AIMentalHealth #HealthcareAI #MentalHealthOutcomes #CognitiveBehavioralTherapy #HealthEquity #AIBias #InclusiveHealthcare #TechForGood #GlobalHealth limbic.ai Download the transcript here

Dr. Niki Panich, Chief Medical Officer at Penguin AI, is addressing healthcare administrative and cognitive challenges with AI-powered tools that provide transparent, traceable, real-time clinical decision support.  The platform tackles utilization management and prior authorization by identifying relevant data in a glass box approach that lets clinicians see exactly how decisions were reached. The technology aims to improve inter-rater reliability and reduce bias, bringing more consistency to the healthcare environment and helping build trust in the use of AI.  Niki explains, "Penguin AI is solving some of the biggest challenges in healthcare when it comes to administrative burden, cognitive burden, and things that take physicians' brainpower and time away from their patients. And we do so by delivering cutting-edge technology, AI agents, and the ability to surface facts in real time for clinicians."  "One of the first use cases that we've looked at is around utilization management and prior authorization. And we know that one of the frustrations for physicians, being one, is that we often don't know what we need authorization for. And when we figure out that we need authorization, how it's being evaluated, how it's being adjudicated, and whether or not what we've submitted actually is able to answer the questions that are being asked of us. And so part of our tooling looks at, at the time of submission, have I submitted the right documents to actually answer the questions that the payer is going to ask of me? " #PenguinAI #GlassBoxAI #DigitalTwinHealthcare #PriorAuthorization #UtilizationManagement #BiasInAI #SocialDeterminantsOfHealth #FoodAsMedicine #LongitudinalCareJourney #DataVisualization penguinai.co Listen to the podcast here

Dr. Niki Panich, Chief Medical Officer at Penguin AI, is addressing healthcare administrative and cognitive challenges with AI-powered tools that provide transparent, traceable, real-time clinical decision support.  The platform tackles utilization management and prior authorization by identifying relevant data in a glass box approach that lets clinicians see exactly how decisions were reached. The technology aims to improve inter-rater reliability and reduce bias, bringing more consistency to the healthcare environment and helping build trust in the use of AI.  Niki explains, "Penguin AI is solving some of the biggest challenges in healthcare when it comes to administrative burden, cognitive burden, and things that take physicians' brainpower and time away from their patients. And we do so by delivering cutting-edge technology, AI agents, and the ability to surface facts in real time for clinicians."  "One of the first use cases that we've looked at is around utilization management and prior authorization. And we know that one of the frustrations for physicians, being one, is that we often don't know what we need authorization for. And when we figure out that we need authorization, how it's being evaluated, how it's being adjudicated, and whether or not what we've submitted actually is able to answer the questions that are being asked of us. And so part of our tooling looks at, at the time of submission, have I submitted the right documents to actually answer the questions that the payer is going to ask of me? " #PenguinAI #GlassBoxAI #DigitalTwinHealthcare #PriorAuthorization #UtilizationManagement #BiasInAI #SocialDeterminantsOfHealth #FoodAsMedicine #LongitudinalCareJourney #DataVisualization penguinai.co Download the transcript here

Maureen McBeth, Senior Manager of Clinical Research and Education at ImpediMed, discusses how sarcopenia, age-related muscle loss, significantly impacts the ability of cancer patients to tolerate treatment, yet has historically not been considered very relevant. ImpediMed has developed an FDA-cleared digital health platform that uses bioimpedance spectroscopy technology to provide rapid point-of-care analysis to identify muscle mass deficits and track the effectiveness of interventions. Frequent monitoring provides actionable data to personalize treatment dosing and optimize care.  Maureen explains, "So the Sozo digital health platform is what is called bioimpedance spectroscopy. So that's a mouthful. So we often pronounce it as BIS. And what this technology does is it takes 256 different frequencies, and it simultaneously scans your body. So in about 30 seconds, we can look at all the fluid in your body, and then that helps us estimate tissue outputs." "So by looking at the fluid, we can tell how much muscle you have or how much fat you have. And what's most important is that we're the only bioimpedance spectroscopy device that's FDA-cleared to assess things like body composition in healthy or unhealthy individuals. So this is not just a device for the gym. And furthermore, in August, we received our clearance from the FDA to help aid in the assessment of sarcopenia."  #ImpediMed #Sarcopenia #BreastCancer #Oncology #CancerSurvivorship  #BioimpedanceSpectroscopy #BodyComposition #ChemotherapyDosing #MuscleMassMatters #DigitalHealth #OncologyResearch #PrecisionMedicine #PatientEmpowerment ImpediMed.com  Listen to the podcast here

Maureen McBeth, Senior Manager of Clinical Research and Education at ImpediMed, discusses how sarcopenia, age-related muscle loss, significantly impacts the ability of cancer patients to tolerate treatment, yet has historically not been considered very relevant. ImpediMed has developed an FDA-cleared digital health platform that uses bioimpedance spectroscopy technology to provide rapid point-of-care analysis to identify muscle mass deficits and track the effectiveness of interventions. Frequent monitoring provides actionable data to personalize treatment dosing and optimize care.  Maureen explains, "So the Sozo digital health platform is what is called bioimpedance spectroscopy. So that's a mouthful. So we often pronounce it as BIS. And what this technology does is it takes 256 different frequencies, and it simultaneously scans your body. So in about 30 seconds, we can look at all the fluid in your body, and then that helps us estimate tissue outputs." "So by looking at the fluid, we can tell how much muscle you have or how much fat you have. And what's most important is that we're the only bioimpedance spectroscopy device that's FDA-cleared to assess things like body composition in healthy or unhealthy individuals. So this is not just a device for the gym. And furthermore, in August, we received our clearance from the FDA to help aid in the assessment of sarcopenia."  #ImpediMed #Sarcopenia #BreastCancer #Oncology #CancerSurvivorship  #BioimpedanceSpectroscopy #BodyComposition #ChemotherapyDosing #MuscleMassMatters #DigitalHealth #OncologyResearch #PrecisionMedicine #PatientEmpowerment ImpediMed.com Download the transcript here

Jake McCarley, Co-Founder and CEO of Alluvium, highlights how chatbots have evolved from simple question-and-answer functions to actively helping patients navigate complex health systems. The Alluvium platform integrates existing EMR systems with real-time information to provide intelligent patient support, helping patients reach the right site and provider and optimizing clinical resources. While chatbots offer advantages through memory and convenience, they remain best suited for tasks that don't require human judgment, such as automating administrative activities and streamlining access. Jake explains, "It's interesting how chatbots have evolved. I think they were originally more geared toward question-and-answer, which was an upgrade from the Google experience, where you had to go through all these hyperlinks and try to figure out what you were trying to solve for. So I think that was the initial experience, and they continue to evolve toward more action-oriented steps. I don't just want to know something interesting about what I'm looking for, like a dinner reservation or getting in to see a physician. I want to be able to actually take action on something from that chat experience. And so chat is evolving so I can take action on that, and I want to be able to interact with that chat consistently across my mobile device, my iPad, and my desktop. So it's really becoming a central point for how a consumer or a patient engages with most of what they're doing, which is kind of wild how fast that's happening."   "I think that interface just makes it easy because we're outsourcing some of the cognitive functions we would typically employ to make some of those decisions. So I think anything that's easy is generally popular. I think the second is memory. I think that's a huge difference between how traditional searches happened and just having a building context or an awareness of things you talked about before or things you've mentioned, and then taking those conversations and looping them into how it's going to process that discernment for the thing you're doing in the moment." #AlluviumHealth #HealthcareAI #PatientAccess #HealthTech #DigitalHealth #HealthcareLeadership #HealthSystemManagement #AIinHealthcare #PatientExperience #HealthIT #FutureOfHealthcare #Chatbots #HealthcareInnovation #HospitalManagement #RuralHealthcare #HealthcareStaffing  alluviumhealth.com Listen to the podcast here

Jake McCarley, Co-Founder and CEO of Alluvium, highlights how chatbots have evolved from simple question-and-answer functions to actively helping patients navigate complex health systems. The Alluvium platform integrates existing EMR systems with real-time information to provide intelligent patient support, helping patients reach the right site and provider and optimizing clinical resources. While chatbots offer advantages through memory and convenience, they remain best suited for tasks that don't require human judgment, such as automating administrative activities and streamlining access. Jake explains, "It's interesting how chatbots have evolved. I think they were originally more geared toward question-and-answer, which was an upgrade from the Google experience, where you had to go through all these hyperlinks and try to figure out what you were trying to solve for. So I think that was the initial experience, and they continue to evolve toward more action-oriented steps. I don't just want to know something interesting about what I'm looking for, like a dinner reservation or getting in to see a physician. I want to be able to actually take action on something from that chat experience. And so chat is evolving so I can take action on that, and I want to be able to interact with that chat consistently across my mobile device, my iPad, and my desktop. So it's really becoming a central point for how a consumer or a patient engages with most of what they're doing, which is kind of wild how fast that's happening."   "I think that interface just makes it easy because we're outsourcing some of the cognitive functions we would typically employ to make some of those decisions. So I think anything that's easy is generally popular. I think the second is memory. I think that's a huge difference between how traditional searches happened and just having a building context or an awareness of things you talked about before or things you've mentioned, and then taking those conversations and looping them into how it's going to process that discernment for the thing you're doing in the moment." #AlluviumHealth #HealthcareAI #PatientAccess #HealthTech #DigitalHealth #HealthcareLeadership #HealthSystemManagement #AIinHealthcare #PatientExperience #HealthIT #FutureOfHealthcare #Chatbots #HealthcareInnovation #HospitalManagement #RuralHealthcare #HealthcareStaffing  alluviumhealth.com Download the transcript here

Dr. Christopher Moertel, Global Head of Clinical Development at Healx, describes how AI is transforming the discovery and development of treatments for rare diseases. Healx is using computational chemistry and AI to match disease pathways with existing compounds to identify drugs that may be repurposed or combined for new therapeutic applications. Bypassing the traditional laboratory model of drug development shows promise for accelerating the identification of treatments for conditions that have historically had few options. Christopher explains, "For many years, the pure focus was on AI development and developing it to a point where it could identify diseases and drugs that basically match one another. And it's just in the last two years that we've become a clinical-stage company. Our AI-enabled discoveries are now in the clinic with great hope for helping patients, and so far so good. We've assembled a clinical team now that is still smaller than our technology team, but it's obviously being felt by the organization. So it's been an exciting time for me having joined the organization just over a year ago and really watching the rapid growth of the clinical program whose genesis was in a computer."   "These are on-the-shelf medicines, of which there are thousands throughout the world. And so these medicines now are available in cyberspace, if you will. And what our company does that's different is we don't have a lab per se, as you would imagine it. We don't have rats and mice as you would imagine them. We have people who have degrees like computational chemists that is chemistry through a computer without any test tubes or beakers." "And we have all of the compounds that are out there, their structure. We have the defined chemical pathways that a lot of diseases take. And over time we've gone from DNA to RNA, now to chemistry, and have really seen how these chemical pathways could be exploited. And once they find a chemical pathway that we think is important in the disease process, then we go out and find compounds literally on the shelf that may influence that chemical pathway."   #HealxAi #RareDisease #NF1 #Neurofibromatosis #PediatricOncology #AIforGood  #DrugDiscovery #PatientVoice #Biotech#AIDrugDiscovery #PrecisionMedicine #ClinicalTrials #HealthcareInnovation #Biotech #PatientCare healx.ai Listen to the podcast here

Dr. Christopher Moertel, Global Head of Clinical Development at Healx, describes how AI is transforming the discovery and development of treatments for rare diseases. Healx is using computational chemistry and AI to match disease pathways with existing compounds to identify drugs that may be repurposed or combined for new therapeutic applications. Bypassing the traditional laboratory model of drug development shows promise for accelerating the identification of treatments for conditions that have historically had few options. Christopher explains, "For many years, the pure focus was on AI development and developing it to a point where it could identify diseases and drugs that basically match one another. And it's just in the last two years that we've become a clinical-stage company. Our AI-enabled discoveries are now in the clinic with great hope for helping patients, and so far so good. We've assembled a clinical team now that is still smaller than our technology team, but it's obviously being felt by the organization. So it's been an exciting time for me having joined the organization just over a year ago and really watching the rapid growth of the clinical program whose genesis was in a computer."   "These are on-the-shelf medicines, of which there are thousands throughout the world. And so these medicines now are available in cyberspace, if you will. And what our company does that's different is we don't have a lab per se, as you would imagine it. We don't have rats and mice as you would imagine them. We have people who have degrees like computational chemists that is chemistry through a computer without any test tubes or beakers." "And we have all of the compounds that are out there, their structure. We have the defined chemical pathways that a lot of diseases take. And over time we've gone from DNA to RNA, now to chemistry, and have really seen how these chemical pathways could be exploited. And once they find a chemical pathway that we think is important in the disease process, then we go out and find compounds literally on the shelf that may influence that chemical pathway."   #HealxAi #RareDisease #NF1 #Neurofibromatosis #PediatricOncology #AIforGood  #DrugDiscovery #PatientVoice #Biotech#AIDrugDiscovery #PrecisionMedicine #ClinicalTrials #HealthcareInnovation #Biotech #PatientCare healx.ai Download the transcript here

Dr. Aneel Nimba, Medical Director at Faron Pharmaceuticals,  discusses the company's innovative approach to treating higher risk myelodysplastic syndromes, a group of rare blood cancers, with its lead drug candidate that targets the CLEVER-1 receptor which controls the tumor microenvironment. This first-in-class monoclonal antibody stimulates the immune system, directly affects abnormal blast cell metabolism and stimulates bone marrow. When combined with limited current treatments, clinical data are showing a path to transform a life-threatening disease into a manageable chronic condition.  Aneel explains, "The main target that we're essentially going for in cancer at Faron is a target called CLEVER-1, and that stands for common lymphatic endothelium vascular receptor one. But essentially, it's a target that hasn't been looked at before. The team at Faron has been working on it for the last 20 years, and we're learning more and more now that it's involved in controlling the tumor. "    "That's important because it also helps with what we call this concept of synergy with other anti-cancer drugs and helps them do their job better at killing cancer. But there are so many other things that CLEVER-1 is involved in downstream within the cells, particularly in higher risk myelodysplastic syndromes or HR-MDs. And so it's truly what we call a first-in-class drug. And I'm quite fascinated with the data that's coming out. I mean, I joined Faron about 16 months ago, and it's definitely an interesting target, not only in blood cancers, but also has the potential in solid tumors." #FaronPharmaceuticals #Bexmarilimab #Hematology #MyelodysplasticSyndrome #BloodCancer #ClinicalTrials #ImmunoOncology #HMA #Azacitidine #BoneMarrowFailure #GeriatricOncology #PrecisionMedicine #IPSSM #CLEVER1 #MonoclonalAntibody #FDA #EHA2024 #MDS #HRMDS #CancerResearch #NovelImmunotherapy  Faron.com Listen to the podcast here

Dr. Aneel Nimba, Medical Director at Faron Pharmaceuticals,  discusses the company's innovative approach to treating higher risk myelodysplastic syndromes, a group of rare blood cancers, with its lead drug candidate that targets the CLEVER-1 receptor which controls the tumor microenvironment. This first-in-class monoclonal antibody stimulates the immune system, directly affects abnormal blast cell metabolism and stimulates bone marrow. When combined with limited current treatments, clinical data are showing a path to transform a life-threatening disease into a manageable chronic condition.  Aneel explains, "The main target that we're essentially going for in cancer at Faron is a target called CLEVER-1, and that stands for common lymphatic endothelium vascular receptor one. But essentially, it's a target that hasn't been looked at before. The team at Faron has been working on it for the last 20 years, and we're learning more and more now that it's involved in controlling the tumor. "    "That's important because it also helps with what we call this concept of synergy with other anti-cancer drugs and helps them do their job better at killing cancer. But there are so many other things that CLEVER-1 is involved in downstream within the cells, particularly in higher risk myelodysplastic syndromes or HR-MDs. And so it's truly what we call a first-in-class drug. And I'm quite fascinated with the data that's coming out. I mean, I joined Faron about 16 months ago, and it's definitely an interesting target, not only in blood cancers, but also has the potential in solid tumors." #FaronPharmaceuticals #Bexmarilimab #Hematology #MyelodysplasticSyndrome #BloodCancer #ClinicalTrials #ImmunoOncology #HMA #Azacitidine #BoneMarrowFailure #GeriatricOncology #PrecisionMedicine #IPSSM #CLEVER1 #MonoclonalAntibody #FDA #EHA2024 #MDS #HRMDS #CancerResearch #NovelImmunotherapy  Faron.com Download the transcript here

Michelle Skinner, Chief Clinical Executive at TeleTracking, uses an AI-powered predictive modeling platform to coordinate fragmented hospital operations from patient placement through discharge. The core problem it is addressing is the emergency department boarding time, the interval between admission and the transfer of the patient to an appropriate inpatient bed when necessary.  The TeleTracking platform uses computational twin technology to run scenario planning, match bed demand with discharge readiness, and prioritize workflows across departments to reduce boarding time, safety risks, and caregiver anxiety.  Michelle explains, "TeleTracking is a healthcare technology company, and we help health systems turn fragmented operations into coordinated decisions across both inpatient and ambulatory care. We have a platform called Operations IQ. It's an AI-powered enterprise operations platform that works alongside the electronic health record, or EMR. It connects patient placement, discharge, transport, environmental services, and all the other workflows within a shared operational view. The work we do creates capacity, improves access, and, most importantly, for many organizations right now, strengthens their financial performance. So we definitely want to ensure that we're thinking about both access and experience, which are two very important things to most healthcare organizations right now, as well as their financial performance when that's appropriate and relevant." "I've spent my entire career in healthcare, so I'm a nurse by background, and I started as a candy striper when I was 14, and then in the emergency department as a patient registrar on the night shift. And I saw it even then, and it really hasn't changed much in those 30-plus years. So when you think about how the ED flow looks, and most departments look, they're looking at their individual departments. They're optimizing their own workflows instead of thinking about things on a coordinated level. So when you push on one side of the balloon, the other side has to give somewhere." #TeleTracking #PatientFlow #EDBoarding #PatientThroughput #HospitalOperations #HealthcareEfficiency #PatientCare #HealthSystems #EmergencyMedicine #HealthTech #CaregiverBurnout #AIinHealthcare teletracking.com Listen to the podcast here