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Philips is a health tech leader focused on

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innovation that improves the health and well-being of

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people. Our health care technology and informatics solutions

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help care teams diagnose, treat, and manage more

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patients with greater precision, speed, and confidence across

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the care journey. With Philips, clinicians are empowered

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with streamlined insights in the moments that matter

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for every patient. Better care for more people.

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Philips.

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This is Gracelyn Keller with the Becker's Healthcare

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Podcast, and we are live at the 9th

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annual health IT, digital health, and RCM conference.

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I'm currently joined by Louis John Son, who

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is the chief medical information officer at Ochsner

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Health. So, Louis, thanks so much for joining

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me today, and I'd love to get us

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started by having you introduce yourself and tell

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us a little bit more about your background.

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Sure. Thanks for having me. I'm a general

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surgeon, by training, but now I am in

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the CMIO role at Ochsner, Ochsner, and I've

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been there for, 16 years.

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And,

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I was originally involved in started to get

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involved in health care leadership

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around 2012.

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And then in 2019, I transitioned to the

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the IT world, and I've been in the

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CMIO role since 2020.

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Wonderful. Well, thanks for being here. And I'd

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love to start our conversation today with AI

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adoption. So this is exploding right now in

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health care. In your view, what is the

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most significant or promising application of AI right

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now, and how is that informing your organization's

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innovation strategy?

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Forming your organization's innovation strategy?

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Yes. I think right now, as as far

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as what's what's had the biggest impact

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is ambient

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technology.

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You know, I was just talking to a

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physician this week who is extremely proficient with

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technology, extremely proficient in the EMR.

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But

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e even with that, the, ambient technology was

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saving her about an hour a day. And

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she told me that she, you you know,

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was no longer having to kind of redo

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her clinic in her mind every day,

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because it was catching all these these details

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that you would have to go back and

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remember. So even for someone that was that

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was very efficient to begin with, it was

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still saving an hour. We've seen

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lots and lots of similar stories. I'm sure

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you've heard as well, of people who have

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been affected like that. And that's

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a a really big deal, you know, when

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you talk about

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just,

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you know, there are a finite number of

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hours in the day. People have limited free

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time. Getting an an extra hour is huge

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for people. So I think that's what's had

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the biggest impact so far. And I think

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as far as what's more promising, you know,

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what what I initially found more exciting was

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kind of the generative

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AI applications where they're generating content, for example,

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creating drafts to in basket messages.

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But,

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you know, if you look at at some

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of the other things that are coming in

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terms of summaries, and they, you know, I

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initially thought summaries weren't really as exciting. But

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if you look at the ability to customize

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a a summary of the patient chart and

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tell it that you want, you you know,

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to look back 3 months or you want

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a 1 paragraph or a 2 paragraph,

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or a bulleted list of the patient's chart

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and you wanna know you know, focus on

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labs and not as much on vitals and

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tell it kind of tailor it to what

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you want. I think that has the potential

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to save people a lot of time as

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well.

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And let's shift gears a little bit toward

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data.

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With the, you know,

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great volume of data that we're seeing now

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that we're integrating

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all of these different AI technologies and innovations,

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I'd like for you to kinda go in

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a little more detail about the different types

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of data and how these, play a role

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in the overall health care.

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Yes. We we do use a massive amount

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of data, and, you know, everyone has their

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their their different dashboards and and data sources

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that they use, the data integration tools. We

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have we have all that. We have great

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dashboards. But I think just as important as

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as having the data is how you you

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explain the data to people and explain the

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why behind why it's important. And I think

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that, you know, we have we have clinical

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data, and then we have kind of efficiency

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data that we look at in terms of

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how how much time people are spending in

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EMR, whether they might be struggling. And I

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think as a CMIO, we spend a lot

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of time

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explaining a lot of the the technical data

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to to physicians or or, you know, helping

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physicians with with the EMR and things like

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that. But I think the the reverse is

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also important in terms of explaining

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the why behind the clinical data to some

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of the IT staff, which may not have

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the clinical background. So I I always focus

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on that and try to go over all

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of our clinical data, you know, our metrics,

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how we're doing on

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hypertension control, diabetes control, and those population health

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metrics and explain to to everyone

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why those are important. Why does it matter

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that someone has a normal blood pressure, a

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normal blood sugar, and and how it impacts

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their health so that everyone understands

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what we're all working towards and why we're

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doing what we're doing.

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100%.

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And as we talk about greater volumes of

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data, all these different types, and then we're

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adding adoption of new technologies into the mix,

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our IT staff becomes significantly more burdened.

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So I'd love to hear how you think

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health care organizations can better support both our

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IT and and clinical teams as well as

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they carry

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out innovation efforts. And if you've seen any

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pitfalls in this.

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I think health care organizations can help their

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IT team by,

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by providing clear prioritization.

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I think that's that's really the most important

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thing. That's something we put a lot of

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time and effort into, because if you I'm

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sure you've heard people say, if everything's a

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priority, then nothing is a priority. And

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you have to be clear with people about

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what what do you wanna do and what

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are you not gonna do? Because you can't

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you can't do everything. And people have lots

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and lots of great ideas. And it's not

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really about how great the idea is. It's

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more about what do we have the capacity

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to do? And what if we think this

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idea is high priority, what are we going

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to divert resources from and stop doing so

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that we can do that instead? So we

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work a lot with our operational leaders and

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our clinical leaders and our service lines to

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determine

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what are your top 3 or your top

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5,

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priorities. And and you have to sometimes

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make a lot of difficult decisions to determine

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that, but I think it's really important so

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that everyone knows, you know, what what their

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focus should be.

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And as we wrap up our conversation

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today, I'd love to know your top piece

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of advice for health care leaders as they

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prepare for further advancements in

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technology and greater demands for care.

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My advice for health care leaders would be

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to be willing and ready to to pivot,

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and change force because I think you you

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never can predict what's coming. I think if

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someone had made a

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in 2019, it made a 5 year plan

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of of of what they thought was gonna

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happen. I I don't think it it would

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bear any resemblance to what really happened over

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the the past 5 years. I think that

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will continue to be to be true. I

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think there will continue to be to be

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challenges and changes, and you have to you

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have to be willing to change for us

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and be willing to learn,

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in order to adapt to to whatever's next.

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Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for joining

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me today, Louis, on that Becker's healthcare podcast.

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Again, we are live at the 9th annual

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health IT, digital health, and RCM conference.

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Thank you.