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Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #111

AI Is Changing Healthcare — But At What Cost?

With Akifa Khattak

Artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming healthcare delivery, but its regulatory, legal, and economic implications remain uncertain. In this interview, Akifa Khattak, a healthcare attorney and biotech expert, explains how AI is reshaping governance, infrastructure, and reimbursement models across the industry. She outlines the emerging risks tied to data ownership, liability, and energy-intensive infrastructure, while highlighting the growing role of agentic AI in clinical workflows. As healthcare systems adopt AI-driven tools for decision support and automation, leaders must balance innovation with oversight. This discussion explores how policy, transparency, and shared accountability will determine whether AI improves patient outcomes or introduces new systemic risks.

Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #110

What Clinical AI Is Doing Well... and Where It Still Needs Work

With Dr. Peter Brodeur

As clinical AI adoption accelerates, healthcare leaders face a critical question: what is truly ready for practice versus what remains experimental? In this conversation, Dr. Peter Brodeur, a physician-researcher at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and contributor to the ARISE Network report on clinical AI, breaks down where the field stands today. Drawing from a comprehensive review of emerging evidence, he highlights both promising advances and persistent limitations in AI-driven clinical decision support, patient-facing tools, and workflow integration.

The discussion explores the concept of the “jagged frontier,” where AI systems demonstrate superhuman performance in controlled settings yet fail unpredictably in real-world scenarios. Dr. Brodeur also emphasizes the growing importance of safety evaluation, human-computer interaction design, and outcomes-based benchmarking. For healthcare executives, clinicians, and digital leaders, this interview provides a grounded, evidence-based perspective on how to responsibly implement AI while improving patient outcomes and operational efficiency.

Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #109

Why Most AI Startups Fail in Healthcare

With Dr. Bernardo Perez-Villa and Dr. Peter Alperin

Why do so many AI startups fail in healthcare despite strong funding and promising innovation? In this interview, Dr. Bernardo Perez-Villa and Dr. Peter Alperin break down the structural, financial, and operational realities that determine whether digital health solutions succeed or fail. While AI offers unprecedented potential to augment clinical decision-making, real-world adoption depends less on technical performance and more on workflow integration, reimbursement strategy, and stakeholder alignment.

The discussion highlights a critical disconnect between clinical research success and practical implementation, emphasizing that healthcare systems are inherently risk-averse and resistant to disruption. From regulatory hurdles and CPT reimbursement challenges to product-market fit and go-to-market strategy, the conversation provides a clear-eyed view of what it takes to build viable healthcare AI solutions. For healthcare leaders, innovators, and investors, this interview offers actionable insights into navigating the complex healthcare innovation landscape.

Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #108

The Payment Crisis Behind Healthcare

With Monique Lappas

The financial crisis in healthcare is deeper than most clinicians and executives realize. In this interview, Monique Lappas, founder and CEO of Qualify Health, explains how hospitals lose billions annually due to denied claims, underpayments, and patient affordability challenges. Drawing from her background in finance and healthcare consulting, she outlines how AI-driven automation can identify financial assistance opportunities, reduce bad debt, and improve revenue cycle performance.

Lappas reveals how her company uses intelligent workflows to match patients with copay programs, charitable foundations, and financial aid in real time. The result is a rare alignment of incentives: hospitals recover revenue while patients avoid overwhelming medical debt. This discussion also explores systemic issues such as Medicaid reimbursement gaps, payer dynamics, and the growing burden of administrative complexity. For healthcare leaders, the message is clear: leveraging AI in revenue cycle management is no longer optional—it is essential for financial sustainability and patient access.

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Series Highlights

Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #100

How Patient Design Shapes the Future of Healthcare

With Dr. Bertalan Meskó

Dr. Bertalan Meskó, MD, PhD, Director of The Medical Futurist Institute, explains the concept of patient design and why it is critical to the future of healthcare. In this interview highlight, he defines patient-centered design and describes how involving patients in decision-making improves innovation, trust, and outcomes. For clinicians, executives, and health system leaders, this perspective provides clarity on how to integrate patient voices into care models and digital health solutions. With global experience analyzing medical technology trends, Dr. Meskó emphasizes that designing healthcare systems without patient participation is not only outdated but also ineffective. This discussion offers practical insights for leaders aiming to strengthen healthcare delivery through patient involvement.

Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #99

The Role of AI in Future Value-Based Care Reimbursement

With Stephen Speicher, MD, MS

Dr. Stephen Speicher, Senior Medical Director at Flatiron Health, offers a thought-provoking look into how artificial intelligence may become a requirement—not just an option—in future value-based care models. In this clip, he explores whether insurers might eventually mandate AI use in clinical decision-making as a condition for reimbursement, especially if AI demonstrates measurable improvements in patient outcomes. While the cost of AI today often falls on the healthcare provider, Speicher suggests a future where insurers not only pay attention to AI utilization but actively incentivize or even demand it. This shift could redefine how 'value' is operationalized in value-based healthcare, raising new questions about reimbursement, care quality, and access. His insights offer a forward-looking framework for understanding the evolving intersection of health tech and reimbursement models.

Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #99

Informed Consent and AI: Should Patients Have a Choice?

With Dr. Stephen Speicher

Dr. Stephen Speicher, Head of Clinical Oncology and Safety at Flatiron Health, shares insights on the evolving dynamics of informed consent in the age of artificial intelligence. As AI tools become increasingly embedded in clinical workflows, Speicher discusses whether patients should be informed, opt out, or share responsibility in these decisions. He addresses the ambiguity surrounding consent for ambient AI tools and the ethical dilemmas clinicians face when transparency meets technological complexity. The conversation underscores that as AI shifts toward becoming a standard of care, questions of healthcare informed consent and patient privacy become not only technical but deeply human. Speicher provides a thoughtful, systems-level view of this important intersection of AI and informed consent.

Podcast episode thumbnail image From Interview #100

Why Talking to Your Future Self Helps You Act Now

With Dr. Bertalan Mesko

Dr. Bertalan Mesko, Director of The Medical Futurist Institute, reveals how vision writing and the concept of “future selves” can dramatically impact our present-day decisions. In this segment, he shares how imagining yourself in future scenarios—whether as a parent, professional, or even a teenager with braces—can create emotional alignment and long-term motivation. Vision writing isn't a rigid forecasting tool, but a narrative-driven method to make future thinking more personal and actionable. Healthcare professionals and digital health strategists may find particular value in the psychological dimension of foresight, as it supports not just innovation planning but also behavior change—an underutilized lever in organizational and patient transformation.

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About the Series

AI and Healthcare—with Mika Newton and Dr. Sanjay Juneja is an engaging interview series featuring world-renowned leaders shaping the intersection of artificial intelligence and medicine.

Dr. Sanjay Juneja, a hematologist and medical oncologist widely recognized as “TheOncDoc,” is a trailblazer in healthcare innovation and a rising authority on the transformative role of AI in medicine.

Mika Newton is an expert in healthcare data management, with a focus on data completeness and universality. Mika is on the editorial board of AI in Precision Oncology and is no stranger to bringing transformative technologies to market and fostering innovation.

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