Welcome everyone to the Becker's Healthcare podcast series.
I'm Mariah Muhammad, writer and moderator with Becker's
Healthcare. And I'm thrilled to have with me
today doctor Arturo Loiza Bumia,
cofounder of Massive Biomedical
Director of Oncology Research and System Wide Chair
of Medical Research at Capital Health. Doctor, welcome
to the Becker's Healthcare podcast. We're very excited
to have you join us today. To get
us started, would you mind please introducing yourself
and telling us a bit about your background?
Yes. Absolutely. Thank you so much for the
opportunity to be here at the podcast. So
as you mentioned, yeah, our tour guides have
been, I'm the cofoundature medical officer of MasseyBio,
which is a company that uses AI
and detailed health solutions to help patients who
find clinical trials at scale and kind of
relieving the physicians like myself very busy to,
keep them off that task and focus on
clinical practice. And also I'm the director of
oncology research and shadow research system wise for
Capital Health, which is a health system in
New Jersey and Pennsylvania. So,
happy to be here.
I my my passion is, you know, as
you can imagine, a medical oncology, but also
the integration of technology
and digital health
and that major intersection around clinical trials and,
as a way to optimize workflows to make
things better for all of us. We're pretty
busy in our practices and in health systems
and now with
every extra click,
things are becoming much more, burnout prone. So
we wanna make it value based solutions that
we can get that to help myself and
my own practice. I still practice in the
clinic. So,
so happy to,
discuss with, all of you at Becker's opportunities
to optimize those.
Yeah. Yeah. Of course. Thank you again for
giving us that introduction.
So with everything that you're doing and, you
know, a part of, what are some of
the biggest issues you're following in health care
this year?
Yeah. So in 2024,
one of those things that are coming up
is the use of AI. Right? So everyone
is talking about AI, but how do we
really implement
those solutions,
at the point of care in front of
the patient? What is more important? So,
to me is,
finding those use cases that are focusing on
clinical decision making.
How can we use that, to expand precision
medicine, for example, biomarker testing for the right
patient,
at a right time so we don't have
to be dealing with
under genotype patients who may actually may miss
the chance
of a targeted drug that is going to
make a difference in their lives.
And also how,
that can help to
optimize
pathways and patient journeys, particularly with cancer.
So it's one of those things that I
feel that technology can really make a difference,
but make it equitable,
because the digital divide is real and not
every single
cancer patient has the same tools. So how
can we democratize this using this new, you
know, language models and in other technologies
such as ambiance AI or,
just,
integrated support within the electronic health record, but
make it very patient centric.
And and lastly, all the the issues that
I'm following is the implications on all this
on regulatory changes. So for example,
the evolution of telemedicine. Right? So there's a
lot of, effort happening right now trying to
make telemedicine
a must,
but how we can convince all the stakeholders
that is the right path and how to
keep the quality
of those visits and those assessments
in the right way while with implementing that.
And lastly for me is the part of
the security. Right? So as we're using more
systems,
and, you know, with those ransom attacks and
things are happening,
we want to use those tools, but also
prevent that,
makes us completely dependent on technology.
So, how can we create that value model
that uses not only the technology, but also
makes it safe,
and less biased and and also makes our
lives easier. So, those are challenges of course,
but, with challenges comes opportunity. So that's what
I'm more excited about this year.
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. I definitely think AI is
such a hot, you know, topic for this
year, and there are so many different opinions
on how to use it. I definitely agree
with you there. Is there anything else that
you are kinda excited about or anything that
is making you nervous, whether it's anything you're
seeing in the news, anything that you're currently
doing at your organization?
Well, so something that always makes me nervous
is,
are we going to be able to keep
the pace of growth in healthcare without
the fear of too much consolidation
and that leading to maybe
less access to patients. So I think having
you know, those things in perspective is always
gonna be essential. And I think AI and
and other tools have a role
to do to do in this, in with
these problems.
As we have been talking with different stakeholders,
you know, in Becker's and beyond, one thing
that is clear is that,
we're all excited about using
innovation to improve
the quality of the patient care,
but, also how,
you know, there there's some disparities
across different institutions of which solutions do they
use.
Interoperability
is still a problem between electronic health systems,
because, you know, even if I have, you
know, one system today,
the other health system across the hallway has
a different one, and all of them requires
a different login.
So,
as we are getting into more and more
technologically driven systems,
how are we gonna be able to really,
make it completely interoperable. Right? And connect the
dots, making it very centric to the patient
in front of us, to myself if I
am, you know, a patient of the health
system.
I I wanna have that
clarity and and and make it really open,
so information flows freely,
safely, and also helps us to,
prevent,
you know, issues with utilization
and and and, you know, health care costs
are just going through the roof.
So,
it's kind of finding that balance
and and how,
the technology advancements,
you know, they're outstripping the regulatory frameworks and
ethical guidelines so we can ensure, you know,
patient access and and safety and equity.
Yeah. Thank you so much for giving us
that insight. And, doctor, before I let you
go, last thing I really wanted to ask
you is, what would the most effective health
care leaders need in order to be successful
in the next 2 to 3 years, would
you say?
I mean, I think to be successful in
next 2, 3 years,
health care leaders, they need to be
learning and be adapt to leveraging technology,
data analytics and understanding the models that we
have been using. They're
up for
for
innovation,
disruption, replacement,
and particularly around operational efficiencies.
So
the the telehealth systems, they were great for
billing and to operationalize
certain processes that we do in practices.
But, now we it's it's a time to
foster,
inter institutional,
interdisciplinary
collaborations, still agile in response to all these,
you know, healthcare
landscapes are changing constantly.
And also, I think that to be successful
you have to develop really strong communication skills,
not only with the stakeholders internally,
but, with the others around you and and
even competing health systems, competing,
you know, population,
access,
to really make it
very effective. This is a time for collaboration,
in the health system so we can really
be effective. So to me, it's all a
call of, you know, talk to each other,
and meet up,
be go beyond just the the brands and
and really learn what's out because that's gonna
help us to become successful as a country,
as a in, you know, health system as
a whole, which is always challenging, but it
has a lot of opportunity. So,
so that's what I I welcome folks to
do so and and and and happy to
be part of the conversation.
Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing those
final thoughts, doctor. This has definitely been an
informative discussion. So, again, I wanna thank you
so much for coming on Becker's Healthcare. I
look forward to connecting with you again soon.
Likewise. Thank you so much.
Alrighty. And that was the end of the
podcast. I think it went really, really well.
How do you feel?
Feel yeah. I feel great. Yeah. No. So
as long as it makes sense what I
said, I'd be just just talking. So Yeah.
Yeah. Of course. So, well, I think it
went really good.
And, again, the podcast team will get in
touch with you about 2 weeks out,
and provide you that, link, so you can
share it and listen to it for yourself.
So, if you have any other questions, feel
free to email me or the podcast team
anytime.
Excellent. Sounds good. Thank you so much. Well,
I hope you have a great rest of
your day.
Same to you. Take care. Alright. Bye.