HLTH Day 1

Bill Russell 00:00:03 today in health it Sunday at the health conference. Bill Russell 00:00:06 My name is bill Russell. Bill Russell 00:00:07 I'm a former CIO for a 16 hospital system and creator of this week in health. Bill Russell 00:00:12 A channel dedicated to keeping health it staff current and engaged. Bill Russell 00:00:16 VMware has been committed to our mission to providing relevant Bill Russell 00:00:18 content to health it professionals. Bill Russell 00:00:20 Since the start, they recently completed an executive study with MIT. Bill Russell 00:00:25 On the top healthcare trends, shaping it, resilience, covering how the pandemic Bill Russell 00:00:29 drove unique transformation in healthcare. Bill Russell 00:00:31 This is just one of many resources they have for healthcare professionals for this Bill Russell 00:00:36 and several other great content pieces. Bill Russell 00:00:38 Check out vmware.com/go/healthcare. Bill Russell 00:00:42 All right, Bill Russell 00:00:43 here's what I've decided to do this week. Bill Russell 00:00:45 I'm going to do a daily diary from the conference. Bill Russell 00:00:47 Talk about what I heard, who I ran into. Bill Russell 00:00:50 What's going on. Bill Russell 00:00:51 I'm also recording a few short interviews, five to 10 minutes, Bill Russell 00:00:54 which I will air on the show later this week and early next week. Bill Russell 00:00:58 And Hey, if you're at the conference, just, I am me through Twitter or Bill Russell 00:01:01 LinkedIn, I would love to chat with you. Bill Russell 00:01:04 Today I got here around three o'clock in the afternoon. Bill Russell 00:01:08 The safety procedures are the first thing that you experienced at the conference. Bill Russell 00:01:11 Health teamed up with clear that the company that does the airport Bill Russell 00:01:16 fast pass kind of thing, and impact health to provide the tech user Bill Russell 00:01:21 experience process and the testing. Bill Russell 00:01:24 And I will say I was fairly impressed. Bill Russell 00:01:26 They processed some 2000 people on Sunday and the line was about 20 Bill Russell 00:01:30 minutes long and the test took about 20. Bill Russell 00:01:33 And I understand that that's 40 minutes, but think about it a hundred percent Bill Russell 00:01:38 vaccinated and a hundred percent tested. Bill Russell 00:01:40 It's hard to not feel safe in that environment. Bill Russell 00:01:43 It makes me feel like wearing a mask might be a little bit of overkill, Bill Russell 00:01:46 but those are the rules in the state of Massachusetts, regardless of if Bill Russell 00:01:50 you've created a safe space or not. Bill Russell 00:01:52 So that is what's going on. Bill Russell 00:01:54 So we have a hundred percent vaccinated, a hundred percent Bill Russell 00:01:56 tested, and everyone is wearing. Bill Russell 00:02:00 The first thing to note is that this conference is a digital Bill Russell 00:02:04 health innovation conference. Bill Russell 00:02:07 Most of you, my listeners are not here. Bill Russell 00:02:10 Investors are here. Bill Russell 00:02:11 Life sciences is here. Bill Russell 00:02:12 Pharma is here. Bill Russell 00:02:13 And any health tech company that is looking for investors in the Bill Russell 00:02:18 next five years is in the building. Bill Russell 00:02:21 Don't get me wrong. Bill Russell 00:02:22 Healthcare companies will be represented, but mostly by those who are making Bill Russell 00:02:26 the deals on behalf of their health. Bill Russell 00:02:28 Th the conference we'll have roughly 6,000 people according to their marketing. Bill Russell 00:02:34 I don't know if that is going to be a combination of digital and onsite, Bill Russell 00:02:38 but as I said earlier, about 2000 people were tested here on Sunday. Bill Russell 00:02:42 So the conference feels like it's filling up pretty well. Bill Russell 00:02:45 I sat in on a couple of the main stage discussions and it's important to Bill Russell 00:02:49 note that they are not presentations. Bill Russell 00:02:51 They are discussions. Bill Russell 00:02:53 Everyone had a partner to bounce the questions off of Bill Russell 00:02:55 after the opening remarks. Bill Russell 00:02:57 So following the opening montage of statistics, which was a very Bill Russell 00:03:01 interesting video worth taking a look at, if you can get your hands on it Bill Russell 00:03:05 and an opening, , let's say one minute light show in anticipation of the Bill Russell 00:03:10 start, Jonathan Weiner, the founder and CEO of health got up there and. Bill Russell 00:03:15 Uh, I acknowledged the contributions of healthcare as Bill Russell 00:03:18 a community and thanked them. Bill Russell 00:03:20 He then ran through a couple of stats. Bill Russell 00:03:22 , 5 million people have died from COVID around the world. Bill Russell 00:03:25 And one in five have died from COVID in the U S and those are startling numbers Bill Russell 00:03:31 to be sure he challenged leaders. Bill Russell 00:03:33 He gave a couple of things. Bill Russell 00:03:34 I'm not going to give you his whole speech here, but he said, leaders will need to Bill Russell 00:03:37 become more comfortable talking about. Bill Russell 00:03:40 And it was due to some of the statistics that he talked about Bill Russell 00:03:43 that this really has impacted , the minority communities much more so than Bill Russell 00:03:49 the, , fluent and white communities. Bill Russell 00:03:51 He said, there's also this, this mistrust of healthcare that needs to be overcome. Bill Russell 00:03:56 And he would like to see us focus on the root cause. Bill Russell 00:03:58 And finally, he finished up by talking about defeating, missing information. Bill Russell 00:04:02 He said one in five, Vaccine is a carrier for a microchip. Bill Russell 00:04:08 I don't know about that stat that I would love to see where that comes from. Bill Russell 00:04:12 I I've yet to talk to anyone now. Bill Russell 00:04:14 That's not true. Bill Russell 00:04:14 I've talked to one person who believes that this is a bill gates kind of Bill Russell 00:04:18 microchip kind of thing, but, and I've talked to an awful lot of people. Bill Russell 00:04:23 So I can, I find that hard to believe. Bill Russell 00:04:25 I feel feels like the kind of thing that is an urban level. Bill Russell 00:04:29 But his point of defeating misinformation is, well-made Bill Russell 00:04:34 The first two to take the stage where Dr. Bill Russell 00:04:36 Allen Levin, who is an EVP president for CVS Caremark and Chrissy Farr formerly Bill Russell 00:04:42 with NBC now with OMERS ventures. Bill Russell 00:04:46 And they had a discussion really around medications, cost of Bill Russell 00:04:50 medications after they got through some preliminary conversations from. Bill Russell 00:04:54 And she asked him, what can be done about the cost of that medication? Bill Russell 00:04:58 And he talks about the things that they do at CVS for their employees. Bill Russell 00:05:02 And he said, we use a formulary that is a very highly generic. Bill Russell 00:05:06 He talks about the first thing you have to do is drive generics. Bill Russell 00:05:09 And he gave some use cases where generics generally, when they become Bill Russell 00:05:13 generics, the use of those drugs. Bill Russell 00:05:16 Precipitously and they should, there's still a very effective drugs Bill Russell 00:05:20 in the treatment of these diseases. Bill Russell 00:05:22 So he says, drive generics, number one, number two is drive competition. Bill Russell 00:05:26 And he talks about the fact that when drugs get about seven or eight options Bill Russell 00:05:31 or competitors, that they see the price drop very rapidly, very significantly. Bill Russell 00:05:37 So he obviously is a person who believes in the free market. Bill Russell 00:05:41 He goes on to talk about reference price. Bill Russell 00:05:43 And, the fact that you could set the reference pricing based on category or Bill Russell 00:05:47 base it on the U S versus international. Bill Russell 00:05:49 But he said the challenge is that he believes we're on the edge of Bill Russell 00:05:52 a major advancement in the cost of development of new drugs. Bill Russell 00:05:56 And if we go after setting, the reference pricing, we may set it above what the Bill Russell 00:06:02 market actually sets the price at. Bill Russell 00:06:03 I have no idea if that's actually true, but it is an interesting. Bill Russell 00:06:07 Uh, against reference pricing and I'll have to look into Bill Russell 00:06:10 that a little bit further. Bill Russell 00:06:12 He was asked about the threat of a player like Amazon, and he opened Bill Russell 00:06:17 with the phrase, which I think there's a lot of wisdom in one Bill Russell 00:06:19 underestimates Amazon at its own peril. Bill Russell 00:06:22 And that's good to hear from him. Bill Russell 00:06:24 He talks about the fact though that PBMs are pretty well established. Bill Russell 00:06:29 I mean, there's only a handful of them. Bill Russell 00:06:31 Well, there's a handful of the major. Bill Russell 00:06:33 And they have scale. Bill Russell 00:06:35 And he talks about the fact that scale matters and scale takes time. Bill Russell 00:06:38 He talks about the fact that people are comfortable with the Bill Russell 00:06:41 PBMs that they require visibility. Bill Russell 00:06:44 PBMs have been pushed into visibility by their clients. Bill Russell 00:06:47 So the clients know that they're making money, but they know exactly how much Bill Russell 00:06:50 in how and why they're making the money. Bill Russell 00:06:53 So he said, there's a big barrier for them to. Bill Russell 00:06:56 But they have a long time horizon. Bill Russell 00:06:58 They have a fair amount of money and they have a lot of ingenuity. Bill Russell 00:07:00 And so clearly they are someone to keep an eye on the next two that came onto the Bill Russell 00:07:06 stage where Ken Frazier with Merck and Heymont Tonasia with general catalyst. Bill Russell 00:07:12 They had a very interesting back and forth. Bill Russell 00:07:13 They talked a fair amount about how health equities, and then Bill Russell 00:07:19 they turned the conversation to. Bill Russell 00:07:21 innovation in what they're doing in that space. Bill Russell 00:07:24 In 2019, this was Heymont Tonasia talking. Bill Russell 00:07:26 He sent in 2019, they went to their partnership and they said, over Bill Russell 00:07:30 the next decade, we want to make a difference in the healthcare space. Bill Russell 00:07:34 And they said, , we want to think intentionally about a Bill Russell 00:07:39 set of companies that can be built to address the challenges. Bill Russell 00:07:42 And he said everything that we thought we were going to do over 10 years, well, Bill Russell 00:07:47 probably happen over the next four years. Bill Russell 00:07:48 And that is due to the COVID accelerate. Bill Russell 00:07:51 That they have experienced. Bill Russell 00:07:53 He went on to say a couple of interesting things. Bill Russell 00:07:55 He said, we talked about disrupting industry with tech, but people Bill Russell 00:07:59 don't want their care disrupted. Bill Russell 00:08:01 People want to trust their care provider. Bill Russell 00:08:03 So that's an interesting snippet right there in and of itself. Bill Russell 00:08:06 He talked about this idea of building health. Bill Russell 00:08:09 And this concept of intentionally partnering to build out companies that Bill Russell 00:08:13 make health care, proactive that reduce the health burden on GDP and make Bill Russell 00:08:20 care accessible and affordable to all. Bill Russell 00:08:23 So that's the framework they're looking at to really build out these companies and Bill Russell 00:08:26 to build out these partnerships really. Bill Russell 00:08:28 So he drove home the. Bill Russell 00:08:30 That it's not one company that is going to be doing this, but it's Bill Russell 00:08:33 going to be companies in concert that are going to be doing this. Bill Russell 00:08:37 And he left us with this. Bill Russell 00:08:39 How do we do this transformation without causing disruption? Bill Russell 00:08:41 We were building companies that can drive out jobs, but we are Bill Russell 00:08:44 missing an elderly care workforce and a mental health workforce. Bill Russell 00:08:48 And what he sees is and movement of people around healthcare. Bill Russell 00:08:54 Address those areas that are underserved today with areas that can be replaced Bill Russell 00:08:59 with potentially technology process and some other things in the future. Bill Russell 00:09:05 The last session that I sat through was Dr. Bill Russell 00:09:09 Karen DeSalvo chief health officer for Google health and Lydia Ramsey Bill Russell 00:09:13 freelancer with business insider. Bill Russell 00:09:15 She's the healthcare editor. Bill Russell 00:09:17 And I love the fact that lydia just asked the question, why the Bill Russell 00:09:20 reorg what's going on at Google. Bill Russell 00:09:22 And I love the answer because it gives us a little more insight into what is going Bill Russell 00:09:27 on at Google and how they think at Google. Bill Russell 00:09:30 So here's some of the things that Karen DeSalvo had to say, this Bill Russell 00:09:35 company understands that we have a lot to do to improve medical care, Bill Russell 00:09:38 but health is a lot more than that. Bill Russell 00:09:41 So health not healthcare. Bill Russell 00:09:43 And she says Bill Russell 00:09:44 the reason for being is to develop better health and quality of life around the Bill Russell 00:09:48 world, the strategy, all assets of the company, how can we impact millions Bill Russell 00:09:53 around the world in an equitable way, high quality information to navigate their Bill Russell 00:09:58 health journey and to personalize it. Bill Russell 00:10:01 And she talks about the scale of Google and we all know Bill Russell 00:10:03 there's 600 billion in pre. Bill Russell 00:10:05 Of our health information since the start of the pandemic care studio and Bill Russell 00:10:09 AI for healthcare and awareness and context for public health information. Bill Russell 00:10:13 When asked, do you feel pressured to build this into a business? Bill Russell 00:10:16 She said, no, we don't. Bill Russell 00:10:18 That phrase in and of itself is really interesting to me. Bill Russell 00:10:20 And I don't doubt that that is true. Bill Russell 00:10:22 And I think Google will figure out how to monetize it later, but they're Bill Russell 00:10:27 really about the information business gathering information, organizing that Bill Russell 00:10:31 information, and they will figure it out. Bill Russell 00:10:34 But that is the world that they live in and they want to Bill Russell 00:10:37 be preeminent in that space. Bill Russell 00:10:39 And so for now they're comfortable just saying, Hey, figure out how Bill Russell 00:10:43 we can build better health in an equitable way around the world. Bill Russell 00:10:48 And that's how they're thinking. Bill Russell 00:10:50 I have a lot more questions, I'll let you piece those things together to. Bill Russell 00:10:54 Think about what the world of Google really looks like, but perhaps in Bill Russell 00:10:57 the future, we can sit down with Dr. Bill Russell 00:10:59 DeSalvo and have a deeper conversation on it, because I don't know about Bill Russell 00:11:03 you, but I have more questions about where Google wants to go with this. Bill Russell 00:11:07 And what kind of partnerships are they looking for? Bill Russell 00:11:09 How are they going to partner with healthcare delivery organizations? Bill Russell 00:11:13 What are they doing around the care experience and care gaps Bill Russell 00:11:18 and those kinds of things? Bill Russell 00:11:18 I don't expect them to do that. Bill Russell 00:11:20 But I'm wondering what the conversations look like behind the four walls. Bill Russell 00:11:24 Those are my thoughts. Bill Russell 00:11:25 You're gonna wanna check back as the week continues, I'll drop more of Bill Russell 00:11:28 my daily diaries and the interviews will start later on this week. Bill Russell 00:11:32 That's all for today. Bill Russell 00:11:32 If you know someone that might benefit from our channel, Bill Russell 00:11:34 please forward them a note. Bill Russell 00:11:35 They can subscribe on our website this week, health.com or wherever you listen Bill Russell 00:11:39 to podcasts, apple, Google, overcast, Spotify, Stitcher, you get the picture. Bill Russell 00:11:43 We are. Bill Russell 00:11:45 We want to thank our sales sponsors, who are invested in our mission to develop Bill Russell 00:11:48 the next generation of health leaders. Bill Russell 00:11:50 VMware Hill-Rom Starbridge advisors, McAfee, and a networks. Bill Russell 00:11:55 Thanks for listening.