Autonomous Health Podcast

In this episode, we speak to Dr. Arta Bakshandeh, Chief Medical Informatics Officer of Alignment Health. Dr. Bakshandeh talks about his journey as a physician, seeing the power of machine learning and AI, and its impact on health plan members. Alignment Health, a consumer brand name of Alignment Healthcare (NASDAQ: ALHC), offers benefit-rich Medicare Advantage plans across 6 states, designed around the idea of driving more personalized healthcare for seniors.
We talk about the change in thinking that is occurring inside health plans around the adoption of machine learning and AI. Dr. Bakshandeh highlights what it takes to drive true AI/ML use cases in healthcare versus clinical rules that have been around for decades.
Dr. Bakshandeh also shares many important insights and lessons along the journey of building an AI-centric health plan. For example, the importance of investing in core data platforms and infrastructure, a missing step that limits most healthcare organizations. Or the approach to creating an ROI framework that demonstrates the value of investing in AI and ML, and getting buy-in on these investments from the CFO and business leaders.
Finally, we end the episode with insights about where generative AI can play a role in the workings of a health plan.
A little more about our guest, Dr. Arta Bakshandeh:
Dr. Arta Bakshandeh is chief medical informatics officer for Alignment Health. Dr. Bakshandeh – or Dr. B. – began his career as a hospitalist and quickly became a medical director building care models for patients with Medicare and Medicaid. He joined the Alignment family in 2014 to help build Alignment's clinical model and clinical command center. He works side-by-side with data scientists to develop and implement Alignment’s clinical data analytics platforms and home monitoring programs for patients with chronic illnesses. To date, he has been integral in deploying over 170 data science models across clinical and health plan operations. Outside of Alignment, he is an assistant clinical professor of internal medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California (USC) and Co- CEO of Global Physicians Corps, an NGO providing sustainable care in Tanzania and Ethiopia. In addition, he continues to work on the front lines treating patients statewide both in the hospital and virtual.

#autonomoushealth #tech #ai #machinelearning #healthcare
Thank you for listening!
Subscribe here to be notified every time we release new episodes!
You can also find our podcast episodes on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/@AutonomousHealth
Learn more at: https://www.autonomoushealth.com/
Come follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/autonomoushealth/
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Autonomous Health is...
Produced & Hosted by: Anmol Madan
Edited by: Losa Amara Meru
Marketing: Erin Garcia Miller
About Your Host:
Anmol Madan is an entrepreneur, computer scientist, and executive who has been leading the digital health and AI revolution over the past two decades. Anmol has co-founded or held executive roles at multiple unicorns in the emerging field of digital healthcare; a field which has existed for less than two decades. His professional contributions in the field have received hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from leading VCs, and been featured in such media as CNBC, New York Times, Washington Post, and Wired Magazine. His scientific contributions have been published in dozens of scientific articles in leading computer science and digital health journals, and led to over 30 issued and pending US patents.
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In this episode, we talk to Cody Simmons, CEO at DermaSensor. DermaSensor achieved internet-fame in late Jan 2024, when it received FDA clearance for its approach using non-invasive spectroscopy for skin cancer and melanoma detection.
According to Cody, there have been hundreds of researchers in both academia and industry, with the first research papers in the late 1980s. So why go after a novel hardware centric-approach? Hasn’t #machinevision already solved this? Not so fast. There is not a single image-based skin cancer AI tool available for use in the US that's approved by the FDA. Cody talks about the fundamental challenges in imaging data when it comes to detecting cancer-related signals, and the value of spectroscopy.
We also talk about #imaging and machine vision in general. The FDA today has over 500 approved clinical AI applications, most of which are in the field of imaging and radiology. Cody shares his insights and views on the broader space; and gives us clues on how PCP-approved devices may eventually make their way to the home.

Cody is the CEO of DermaSensor, a health technology company that has raised $27 million to launch the world’s first point-and-click skin cancer detection tool for primary care providers. As a bioengineer and entrepreneur, Cody has spent all of his career bringing new health technologies to physicians and patients. He is a frequent speaker at health technology and entrepreneurship events, and Cody was included on the Forbes 30 Under 30 in healthcare.

#autonomoushealth #tech #ai #machinelearning #healthcare
Thank you for listening!
Subscribe here to be notified every time we release new episodes!
You can also find our podcast episodes on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/@AutonomousHealth
Learn more at: https://www.autonomoushealth.com/
Come follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/autonomoushealth/
And continue the conversation on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AutonomousHeal
Autonomous Health is...
Produced & Hosted by: Anmol Madan
Edited by: Losa Amara Meru
Marketing: Erin Garcia Miller
About Your Host:
Anmol Madan is an entrepreneur, computer scientist, and executive who has been leading the digital health and AI revolution over the past two decades. Anmol has co-founded or held executive roles at multiple unicorns in the emerging field of digital healthcare; a field which has existed for less than two decades. His professional contributions in the field have received hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from leading VCs, and been featured in such media as CNBC, New York Times, Washington Post, and Wired Magazine. His scientific contributions have been published in dozens of scientific articles in leading computer science and digital health journals, and led to over 30 issued and pending US patents.
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In this episode, we speak to Bagirathi Narayanan, Chief Architect at Teladoc Health.
Bagirathi talks about her journey as an enterprise software architect in the finance-tech world, and what made her come to healthcare. While both are heavily regulated and have similar technology challenges; the complexity of the ecosystem in healthcare is remarkably high. Bagirathi talks about how these industries approached the cloud-first and mobile-first transformation; and what lessons apply to being an AI-first healthcare enterprise in 2024.
Software engineers and product managers sometimes have a love-hate relationship with architects. Bagirathi shares her thoughts on where software architects add the most value (hint: not just technology blueprints; but tying them to the bigger business goals); and also where they are the most misunderstood.
Why aren’t large healthcare companies good at software engineering and data platforms? Bagirathi talks about the cultural issues of being a healthcare services company; but also the margin pressures of being a healthcare company. Non-profit health systems often run at single-digit margins; which makes it harder to invest in technology.

Bagirathi Narayanan is the SVP, Chief Architect at Teladoc Health, leader in whole-person health virtual care. Bagirathi spearheads enterprise architecture at Teladoc Health with a mission of architecting the future of digital health.
Before joining Teladoc Health, Bagirathi spent over 20 years leading business-technology transformations at enterprise scale in Fortune 50 companies across banking, finance, insurance, and high-tech industries. She has held various senior technology leadership roles, leading large global teams in engineering, software development, infrastructure, technology strategy, architecture, and operations. Bagirathi is an industry expert in digital transformation, product-platform strategy and architecture, legacy modernization, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and scaled enterprise agile transformation. She holds a consistent track record of maximizing business value, improving customer experience, and delivering operational excellence by leveraging cutting-edge technologies and building high-performing teams.
Bagirathi holds a master’s degree in Information Technology and Management and is an Executive Scholar in Finance and Strategy from Kellogg School of Management. She is a passionate advocate of ma

#autonomoushealth #tech #ai #machinelearning #healthcare
Thank you for listening!
Subscribe here to be notified every time we release new episodes!
You can also find our podcast episodes on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/@AutonomousHealth
Learn more at: https://www.autonomoushealth.com/
Come follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/autonomoushealth/
And continue the conversation on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AutonomousHeal
Autonomous Health is...
Produced & Hosted by: Anmol Madan
Edited by: Losa Amara Meru
Marketing: Erin Garcia Miller
About Your Host:
Anmol Madan is an entrepreneur, computer scientist, and executive who has been leading the digital health and AI revolution over the past two decades. Anmol has co-founded or held executive roles at multiple unicorns in the emerging field of digital healthcare; a field which has existed for less than two decades. His professional contributions in the field have received hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from leading VCs, and been featured in such media as CNBC, New York Times, Washington Post, and Wired Magazine. His scientific contributions have been published in dozens of scientific articles in leading computer science and digital health journals, and led to over 30 issued and pending US patents.
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In this episode, we talk to Dr. Geeta Nayyar, healthcare executive and author. Dr. Nayyer joins us to talk about her recent WSJ bestseller, Dead Wrong, and the role of technology in misinformation.
Dr. Nayyar picks up the conversation talking about her personal experiences with mis-information in healthcare; and what drives people to question the incentives of a healthcare provider - be it the AIDS epidemic, or the recent COVID pandemic. Poor access to information not only lets patients down; but can also drive provider burnout.
Is there a link between technology and misinformation? Dr. Nayyar, dives into the role of technology in accelerating or preventing mis-information. Why do healthcare organizations think of marketing, patient acquisition and retention as distinct from care delivery and clinical outcomes? Why do organizations work in silos? Dr. Nayyar talks about the importance of helping clinicians build more authentic, accountable, consumer-centric relationships on social media. Dr. Nayyar talks about how generative AI could be an exciting tool of positive education; but also drive misinformation if it’s not leveraged with the appropriate oversight, best practices.
Mentioned In This Episode:

• Dead Wrong, by Geeta Nayyar

About Our Guest:
Dr. Geeta Nayyar, MD, MBA, is a globally recognized healthcare technology leader steering the industry toward a new era. The former chief medical officer of Salesforce and AT&T and a consultant to the industry’s most influential organizations, Dr. G leverages new innovations, including artificial intelligence, to achieve previously unimaginable health and business outcomes. She serves on the board of the American Telemedicine Association.
Dr. G is the author of the USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestselling book, Dead Wrong: Diagnosing and Treating Healthcare's Misinformation Illness, a post-pandemic look at the rise of medical misinformation in the digital age. In the book, she shows how healthcare organizations can apply emerging technologies to improve health literacy and advance strategic business goals.
Dr. G is a widely sought-after thought leader who has spoken at hundreds of events and appeared on media outlets such as CNBC, CNN, CBS, ABC, PBS, and Yahoo! Finance.

#autonomoushealth #tech #ai #machinelearning #healthcare
Thank you for listening!
Subscribe here to be notified every time we release new episodes!
You can also find our podcast episodes on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/@AutonomousHealth
Learn more at: https://www.autonomoushealth.com/
Come follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/autonomoushealth/
And continue the conversation on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AutonomousHeal
Autonomous Health is...
Produced & Hosted by: Anmol Madan
Edited by: Losa Amara Meru
Marketing: Erin Garcia Miller
About Your Host:
Anmol Madan is an entrepreneur, computer scientist, and executive who has been leading the digital health and AI revolution over the past two decades. Anmol has co-founded or held executive roles at multiple unicorns in the emerging field of digital healthcare; a field which has existed for less than two decades. His professional contributions in the field have received hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from leading VCs, and been featured in such media as CNBC, New York Times, Washington Post, and Wired Magazine. His scientific contributions have been published in dozens of scientific articles in leading computer science and digital health journals, and led to over 30 issued and pending US patents.
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Health equity has been an important discussion in the last several years in the healthcare community. In this episode, we go deeper into the challenges in health equity with Stefany Goradia.
We begin by talking about the current state of health inequity in the US healthcare system in both access to care, and clinical outcomes. We talk about how health equity is complementary to social determinants of health. Stefany provides examples of these that we see everyday in the US healthcare system, from outcomes for maternal health, to economic aspects of the healthcare systems.
We dive into the history and root cause. Are people just starting to realize the health inequity in case? Is it driven by funding? Or are these deep-seated challenges that have existed over the last half-century. Stafany shares her insights. We talk through both the challenges for organizations in both measurement and improving these metrics.
Finally we de-couple algorithmic bias from health equity, and spend a few minutes on where the two intersect.
About Our Guest:
Stefany Goradia is a lover of data, healthcare, teaching, and impossibly complex problems. Her career from corporate analyst to 2x startup exec gives her over a decade of "in the trenches" healthcare analytics and program leadership experience spanning the entire health ecosystem. Stefany has always wanted to make the world better for those who need it the most. She co-founded a health data startup in 2017 that was acquired in 2021 by a data science and engineering scaleup, and now works with healthtech founders to grow, scale, and launch innovative technology that helps the underserved and achieves more tangible, equitable outcomes. Stefany also speaks, writes, and teaches others on how to drive more impact through expert use of health data.

#autonomoushealth #tech #ai #machinelearning #healthcare
Thank you for listening!
Subscribe here to be notified every time we release new episodes!
You can also find our podcast episodes on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/@AutonomousHealth
Learn more at: https://www.autonomoushealth.com/
Come follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/autonomoushealth/
And continue the conversation on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AutonomousHeal
Autonomous Health is...
Produced & Hosted by: Anmol Madan
Edited by: Losa Amara Meru
Marketing: Erin Garcia Miller
About Your Host:
Anmol Madan is an entrepreneur, computer scientist, and executive who has been leading the digital health and AI revolution over the past two decades. Anmol has co-founded or held executive roles at multiple unicorns in the emerging field of digital healthcare; a field which has existed for less than two decades. His professional contributions in the field have received hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from leading VCs, and been featured in such media as CNBC, New York Times, Washington Post, and Wired Magazine. His scientific contributions have been published in dozens of scientific articles in leading computer science and digital health journals, and led to over 30 issued and pending US patents.
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