Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Improving Surgical Navigation & Recovery Through AI-Driven Patient Engagement with Amrit Kirpalani

Transcript

Improving Surgical Navigation & Recovery Through AI-Driven Patient Engagement with Amrit Kirpalani · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

• 0:02
  - There's a small circle of people who truly
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  - understand what it takes to lead a health
• 0:05
  - system right now. The decisions are enormous.
• 0:08
  - The variables are constantly shifting, and the stakes
• 0:11
  - of getting a call wrong don't stay contained.
• 0:14
  - That's not a complaint. It's a structural reality.
• 0:17
  - And it's why the most effective c suite
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  - leaders are deliberate about where they go to
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  - pressure test their thinking.
• 0:22
  - Becker's fourteenth annual CEO and CFO roundtable
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  - brings together more than 1,500
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  - executive level attendees
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  - and nearly 400 speakers for four days built
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  - around growth, financial sustainability,
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  - workforce strategy, and the leadership questions that don't
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  - have easy answers.
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  - Join us November second through the fifth in
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  - Chicago.
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  - For the agenda and event details,
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  - visit beckershospitalreview.com
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  - and click on the events tab in the
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  - upper right.
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  - This is Scott Becker with the Becker's Healthcare
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  - Podcast.
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  - I'm thrilled today to be joined by a
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  - brilliant leader and CEO.
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  - We're joined today by Amrit
• 1:01
  - Kripalani, and Amrit's gonna talk about
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  - his business,
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  - his career,
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  - where he's most focused today, and a lot
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  - more.
• 1:11
  - Amrit, could you take a moment and introduce
• 1:13
  - yourself
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  - and tell us about Novanav?
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  - Absolutely, Scott. So firstly, thanks for having me
• 1:19
  - on the show today. Super excited about the
• 1:21
  - conversation.
• 1:22
  - Quickly about myself,
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  - background's primarily in data, analytics, technology,
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  - and came to Novanav frankly because of an
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  - experience I had with my mother.
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  - She had to undergo
• 1:35
  - total knee replacement.
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  - I'm here in Dallas
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  - and, had the opportunity where I had some
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  - time on my hands, and I would join
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  - her to
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  - those various meetings and appointments with her surgeon.
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  - And, Scott, one of the things that I
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  - saw with mom's experience,
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  - and she was in her mid seventies at
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  - the time, so she's feeling somewhat anxious about
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  - the procedure. It's a major event.
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  - And, fundamentally, Scott, what happened,
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  - they handed her a stack of paper
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  - that
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  - said, missus Kerpalani,
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  - here's what you need to do before the
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  - total knee replacement surgery.
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  - If you have any questions, give us a
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  - call.
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  - And frankly, she was overwhelmed. It was a
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  - lot of information to take in,
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  - clearances that need to be taken care of,
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  - get your lab work done.
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  - This is when medication needs to be stopped
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  - and adjusted. This is the equipment you need
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  - to have for the home and the bathroom
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  - so you don't have a fall.
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  - And post discharge, the procedure went well. It
• 2:35
  - was a similar experience, except this time,
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  - it was an even thicker stack of paper
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  - in the hospital,
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  - put it into a beautiful binder with tabs
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  - in the middle.
• 2:45
  - And that was frankly overwhelming again for mom.
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  - So she came home,
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  - complications are moving up and down, pain levels
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  - are moving up and down.
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  - She's asking me questions.
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  - I'm not a doctor,
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  - would reach out to the doctor's office and
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  - fabulous, fabulous surgeon,
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  - excellent staff. But
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  - as as maybe we all experience, it's sometimes
• 3:07
  - difficult to get a hold of your doctor.
• 3:09
  - So I ended up reaching out to some
• 3:11
  - friends and asking them questions.
• 3:13
  - And frankly, Scott, that's the experience that sparked
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  - the idea for Novanav.
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  - And what we do as an organization,
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  - we're an AI enabled
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  - surgical solution
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  - specifically
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  - focused on helping patients get ready
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  - for major procedures and surgeries.
• 3:32
  - And then from a recovery perspective,
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  - make sure that the patient is recovering well.
• 3:38
  - And in particular,
• 3:40
  - if there's a complication that's developing,
• 3:43
  - something that seems like it could be emergent,
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  - we bring that information
• 3:48
  - to the care teams that support the patient
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  - through real time alerts,
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  - risk scoring. And so that's what we're focused
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  - on. It's making the experience easier for the
• 3:57
  - patient.
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  - It's making,
• 4:00
  - administrative burden lighter for staff members to manage
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  - their patients,
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  - make sure that patients show up ready for
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  - that major procedure or surgery.
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  - We all know that OR block time really
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  - matters, and so that's a thing that we
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  - we think about and we help make sure
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  - again that the patient shows up. And then
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  - post discharge,
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  - it's all about ensuring that the patient's recovering
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  - as a surgeon wants them to. That's what
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  - we're focused on.
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  - Talk about the growth of the business and
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  - how it's going.
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  - And so I take it the nav stands
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  - for navigation or tell me if I'm wrong.
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  - That's right. Origin story, the name too. And
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  - then and then tell us how how it's
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  - going and how you got started. I mean,
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  - it's a big undertaking and a brilliant needed
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  - undertaking because this navigation is such a key
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  - part. Systems know it's a problem, but it's
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  - also they don't get paid for, so they're
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  - often not staffing it as well as they'd
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  - even like to. But tell us about sort
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  - of getting started and how it's going. Yeah.
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  - No. Fabulous question. Where,
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  - we spent before even building the platform
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  - several months,
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  - order magnitude,
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  - eight, nine months, interviewing surgeons,
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  - interviewing their care teams as well. So think
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  - of the MAs, the PAs,
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  - schedulers, nurse navigators, etcetera.
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  - So we really use that time to understand
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  - what are the key elements of the workflows
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  - that the care teams have
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  - that result in some of that burden that
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  - we were talking about.
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  - What are the things from a patient perspective?
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  - So we spend time speaking with patients, my
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  - mom and other patients included,
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  - to really understand, okay, what is it that
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  - the patient needs? And so
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  - through those conversations, we heard things like,
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  - depending on where the patient is in the
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  - country or depending on where the practice hospital,
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  - etcetera, is in the country,
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  - language matters.
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  - So multimodal sorry. Multilanguage
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  - became important.
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  - Number two, we heard that sometimes there's literacy
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  - challenges with understanding,
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  - of the instruction. So we really had to
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  - think through,
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  - how to make sure that information is being
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  - presented to the patient in a manner that's
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  - understandable,
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  - digestible.
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  - And then the other thing that we heard,
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  - in order to get a patient
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  - to really adhere to that protocol,
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  - you need multiple mechanisms and multiple ways of
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  - communicating with the patient
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  - so that the patient is following up and
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  - doing the things that they're supposed to. And
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  - so for example,
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  - instead of just relying on,
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  - an email or a text message, we really
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  - think about it in the manner that we
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  - call
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  - multimodal.
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  - And so this was
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  - even before writing one line of code,
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  - to make sure that the platform
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  - is
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  - relevant for the care teams, is relevant for
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  - the patients.
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  - And,
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  - what we went through, Scott, was an entire
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  - process where we took what we heard,
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  - we converted it into,
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  - digitized workflows,
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  - an example piece of software.
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  - We presented it to the care teams. We
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  - presented it to surgeons,
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  - patients as well,
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  - continue to get feedback for a number of
• 7:07
  - months.
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  - And then early last year, so this is,
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  - really early twenty twenty five,
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  - we took the platform to market and the
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  - feedback has been phenomenal.
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  - One of the things that we hear regularly
• 7:20
  - is
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  - why don't other companies do it this way
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  - or why aren't the workflows
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  - optimized in the manner that Novanet has?
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  - And my short answer is, I'm not sure.
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  - We came about to what we do as
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  - a result of listening to
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  - our potential customers, listening to what actually use
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  - the platform,
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  - both on the patient side and the provider
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  - and the care team front, and that's where
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  - we landed. And by the end of twenty
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  - twenty five,
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  - deployments with multiple hospitals,
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  - ambulatory surgery centers,
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  - medium and large practices,
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  - We naturally focus on a handful of service
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  - lines or specialties
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  - just beginning because that's where the volume is.
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  - But the platform itself has been built in
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  - a manner that's agnostic.
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  - And then, with the number of the the
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  - regulatory
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  - imperatives that are out there from CMS, and
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  - we're seeing payers pick up on this as
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  - well,
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  - adoption has been,
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  - fantastic. It's been very brisk.
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  - And, so we're super excited about the direction
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  - we've been going.
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  - We continue to listen to what customers,
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  - meaning the providers and the care teams, are
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  - asking for,
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  - along with the information and feedback that we're
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  - getting from patients as well.
• 8:37
  - You mentioned the concept. There's two concepts I
• 8:39
  - wanna pick up on. You mentioned the concept
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  - a moment ago being multimodal.
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  - And how important is that in today's world?
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  - Because people get their information in so many
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  - different ways. That's one. And then second, what
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  - were the key specialties that you focused on
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  - to begin with?
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  - Yeah. No. The major specialties,
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  - for now again, the platform's built in a
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  - manner where it's protocol agnostic.
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  - Orthopedics is a big one for us. GI,
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  - I think colonoscopies
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  - and such.
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  - Cardiovascular,
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  - general surgery,
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  - those are probably our big four.
• 9:13
  - But the point around multimodality
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  - was really driven
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  - as a result of, an insight
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  - from a behavioral analytic and psychology perspective where,
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  - again, in order to get a patient to
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  - do what it is that we're intending on
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  - having them do, so for example,
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  - if you need to make sure that clearance
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  - is being received,
• 9:34
  - thirty days before the surgery,
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  - typically what happens and through those interviews and
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  - what we've seen with the data,
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  - if you let a patient know and you
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  - text them and you remind them about it,
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  - they may look at it, they may forget.
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  - But if you surround them with the combination
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  - of engagement, and so the way we do
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  - it is
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  - app and sorry. Text and email
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  - are only used to nudge a patient and
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  - indicate
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  - you have a task that's
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  - due. And then they come into a web
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  - application that's connected to the EMR.
• 10:05
  - So we have data about the patient. We
• 10:07
  - know the procedure. We know when, where, which,
• 10:10
  - doctor, etcetera.
• 10:12
  - The web application environment has more information about
• 10:15
  - that individual task along with a number of
• 10:19
  - other supporting mechanisms.
• 10:21
  - So think educational content,
• 10:23
  - videos, articles, you know, etcetera.
• 10:26
  - But then let's say a patient's not responding
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  - to the text message, the web application prompt,
• 10:32
  - that's where the other modalities start to kick
• 10:35
  - in, which are AI voice assistant that can
• 10:37
  - actually call a patient,
• 10:39
  - remind them about what's coming up. And so
• 10:41
  - that's another example, but then also connectivity into,
• 10:45
  - various
• 10:46
  - wearable and connected devices that give us also
• 10:49
  - biometric data. So all of those modalities work
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  - together
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  - fundamentally to capture data about both
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  - how a patient is engaging
• 10:57
  - or maybe not engaging
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  - along with a feedback loop that's used from
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  - an analytic perspective
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  - to highlight risk,
• 11:05
  - highlight issues that a patient may be having
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  - so that we're surfacing that to the care
• 11:09
  - team in a very proactive manner.
• 11:12
  - Umrit, thank you so much. Talk to us
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  - for one moment about what you're most focused
• 11:17
  - on and excited about as we get into
• 11:19
  - the second half of the year this year.
• 11:22
  - A number of things. I mean, from a
• 11:24
  - data perspective, the insights that we're starting to
• 11:27
  - get to
• 11:28
  - around the behavior with the patient,
• 11:31
  - evaluating
• 11:32
  - what the patient is indicating to us and
• 11:35
  - how we utilize that from a risk perspective,
• 11:38
  - that's exciting.
• 11:40
  - Number two, I think this is a double
• 11:42
  - edged sword. I think we all hear, we
• 11:44
  - all see it. AI adoption continues to increase.
• 11:47
  - There's also hesitation
• 11:49
  - around using AI in certain ways.
• 11:51
  - So we continue to watch that. I think,
• 11:54
  - the benefit of technology, whether it's AI or
• 11:56
  - otherwise,
• 11:57
  - to make an experience easier,
• 12:00
  - better,
• 12:01
  - more integrated, more seamless for a patient. I
• 12:04
  - think bringing those types of tools,
• 12:06
  - both for the patient and also the care
• 12:09
  - teams that serve them,
• 12:11
  - is a major trend that we're seeing regardless
• 12:14
  - of the size of a facility, a practice,
• 12:16
  - etcetera. I think that's exciting.
• 12:18
  - Some of the headwinds that I think the
• 12:21
  - the hospitals are facing,
• 12:23
  - larger ASCs, some of the larger practices,
• 12:26
  - we know operating margin is under constant pressure,
• 12:30
  - given what CMS is doing, given what some
• 12:32
  - of the federal regulations are. That's adding more
• 12:35
  - pressure to the mix.
• 12:37
  - So, you know, some of the other trends
• 12:39
  - that we're watching,
• 12:41
  - the rural health fund, for example, is a
• 12:43
  - major opportunity for rural markets.
• 12:47
  - That's being, I think, received with mixed
• 12:50
  - mixed,
• 12:51
  - you know, is this really gonna benefit me
• 12:53
  - as a facility or maybe not? But there's
• 12:55
  - opportunities on the regulation side that, gives there's
• 12:59
  - headwinds for
• 13:00
  - the facilities, but at the same time, there's
• 13:02
  - some tailwinds that may be also supporting some
• 13:05
  - unlock there.
• 13:06
  - But those are probably the three big things.
• 13:08
  - Right? It's AI adoption, the data that we
• 13:10
  - can see,
• 13:11
  - how we can make sure that patients are
• 13:13
  - engaging as they need to,
• 13:16
  - and then in particular, some of the things
• 13:17
  - that are coming out from CMS, whether it's
• 13:19
  - team
• 13:20
  - or, on the rural health fund side.
• 13:23
  - Well, truly remarkable, Amrit, what you folks are
• 13:26
  - doing and congratulations.
• 13:28
  - We look forward to watching the growth of
• 13:30
  - Novanav.
• 13:31
  - Literally fantastic. Thank you so much for joining
• 13:34
  - us today on the Becker's Healthcare podcast. Just
• 13:36
  - a pleasure to visit with you and incredible
• 13:38
  - what you're doing.
• 13:39
  - Thank you, Scott, for having me. This has
• 13:41
  - been, fun to chat.