computing as he is discussing diabetes management with a patient . He loves to coach medical students and electrical engineering teams focused on technology and has served as the capstone mentor for award-winning engineering teams at the university .
Interview Questions :
1 . What influenced you to start working with the biotech and medical device industry ?
In a single word , frustration . Frustration that little innovation was being developed around primary care or health care delivery as well as frustration with the quality of products being developed and deployed within health care settings to create profit and without focus on efficient care delivery by those who are trained to deliver care .
2 . What was the first project you were involved in ?
When I saw Google Glass , I immediately felt that it had a role in telemedicine . Our team was part of the Explorer program where you were able to work with Google Glass for your specific needs in technology application . Through this work , we learned about an early-stage company that created the first HIPAA telemedicine software that would run on the Glass hardware . We identified nursing homes as ideal places to place this technology to address the demand for physicians within local nursing homes . In our region , fewer physicians provided care for nursing home patients , and we were able to address specific questions utilizing the Glass units without driving to a facility or to answer the clinical question through a phone call or fax .
This first project helped pave the way to work with other smart glass companies and gave me a lot of confidence that what I had to offer from my clinical experience mattered in product development .
3 . Do you wish that you had been introduced to this realm of medicine at an earlier point in your career ?
Yes and no . The most important thing to me is that I learned to practice good medicine . My core training has been extremely beneficial in that I learned to practice medicine in a rural environment with committed faculty members who held deep appreciation for the communities and regions they served . Everything I do now is with the understanding of being within an exam room , being in the emergency room , being in the critical care unit and being in a patient ’ s home . Technology is not , nor will it ever be , a replacement for humanity . Technology done well must allow for humanity to be expressed . Well-designed technology should augment the human experience and not detract from it . We have seen and suffered through too much technology that was hopeful . However , it was poorly designed in a “ rush to market ” strategy that did not take time to appreciate the nuance of providing care for patients .
4 . How has technology changed the scope of your practice over time ?
Technology has made me optimistic and hopeful ; however , we are abysmally behind in realizing technology ’ s full promise in the most basic ways . Technology has not changed my practice enough . We still deliver care in antiquated ways when compared to how we could be delivering care through a blended model of messaging , telephone , telemedicine , e-health , augmented reality , care coordination , laboratory assessment , delivery scale and home-based care .
5 . What is the next big breakthrough in medicine ?
Data , without a doubt . We have not been able to unify data in a way that will create discovery of a significant magnitude . Data must be refined , shared , aggregated and utilized in ways to improve efficiency , discovery and new models of care as we move into new areas of health care delivery . It is stupefying to think that in 2023 we have better sharing of financial data than we do of health care data . Poor data management practices will continue to lead to high costs , suboptimal health care outcomes and mediocre results all throughout our health care system .
6 . Are you in favor of health systems integrating medical innovation in their training programs ?
Without a doubt , health systems need to integrate medical innovation in medical schools , residency programs , fellowships and physician practice groups . We have created a physician work environment designed for burnout that we are witnessing every day . Innovation needs to welcome physicians who are brilliant researchers as well as physicians who are providing care that keeps the patients of this country moving . How can this be done ? Physicians must be seen as innovators and not producers of relative value units . Physicians are not commodity producers , yet the system has valued them based on productivity and not creativity . This must stop ! The limit on bringing medical innovation into training is going to be the threshold that organizations set for innovation . We glamorize innovation as only being for cutting edge biotech ; however , innovation can exist in basic ways , in low-tech ways . Every great challenge has communication at its core . We should never stop innovating on how we can communicate better , more effectively , more completely and more appropriately to all who work to serve patients .
( continued on page 18 ) August 2023 17