Gabriela Pelin, Chief Innovation Officer, Avaneer Healthcare
Eric Piscini, Global Vice President, Emerging Business Networks, IBM Watson Health
Moderator: Siobhan O’Connor, Media Executive and Journalist 


Brainstorm Health 2022 - Is Blockchain Reviving Health Care’s Capabilities? 

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Gabriela Pelin, Chief Innovation Officer, Avaneer Healthcare
Eric Piscini, Global Vice President, Emerging Business Networks, IBM Watson Health


Is Blockchain Reviving Health Care’s Capabilities? 


Gabriela Pelin, Chief Innovation Officer, Avaneer Healthcare
Eric Piscini, Global Vice President, Emerging Business Networks, IBM Watson Health



Brainstorm Health 2022 - Is Blockchain Reviving Health Care’s Capabilities? 


Good morning everyone. Blockchain is probably one of the most talked about and least understood items in the news this year and today we're thankfully not gonna be talking about crypto, but instead the potential for the so called trust list technologies on the delivery of health care. Um we were talking backstage and we'd like a show of hands in the room if if you had to just find Blockchain in one sentence, put up your hand, if you think you could do it. Alright. Oh wow, okay, we've got a few. Alright, alright, we see you, we're not going to call you up here instead we're going to go to our panelists um starting with you eric please tell us what you do and give us our your one sentence definition of luxury. Thank you. So I work for Watson hairs, IBM Watson hers and uh we build things in health care and that's the bottom line but we've done a lot of different solutions over the rest two years now and we'll talk about that later. Um my definition of Blockchain, I think it's an interesting one because I've been in Blockchain for eight years and I My my definition evolved but very basically think of it this way we were in the Web one era where we were able to read things on the internet now we moved into the web to era where we were able to read and write into the internet, so we were writing on facebook and twitter and so on and now we are in the phase of web three where we can read, write and own portion of assets, digital assets on the internet and that's what Blockchain, the neighbors. That piece of ownership is what is how I define Blockchain today Debbie, what do you think? So I first I'm going to say who I am. I work for Avenir health and it's a network of payers and providers and other health care companies that I want to be this web three for healthcare and I agree with erIC and if you wanted to know but what is it then just imagine like all these virtual servers that each of the participants in this community has one of them and each of them would have a copy of a distributed ledger and what's beautiful about that is that you always have the right up to date copy which makes everyone be on the same page and how easy it is to make everyone in healthcare on the same page. Mhm. Not easy. Not easy. Um All right. Let's get into it. It's been said that Blockchain can revolutionize healthcare if you agree and I assume you do because you're here. Can you explain why and please bring this down to earth for us especially in terms of patient benefits. So Gabby, given your work with avenue, let's start with you the patients today have an experience of healthcare that is somewhat disconnected and some of us especially if there are chronic diseases or multiple procedures that need to happen, feel the abrasiveness of the system, of how difficulties to figure out the administrative part so that everyone else can focus on care delivery and accelerating care delivery. And what this technology can do is by providing a trust layer. It could make the participants in care um for the person work together so that the experience with health care of this person changes dramatically and they can have, they can just have this notion of healthcare working better for them and and their families, which I think we all deserve. And we are looking forward to. So that's where the passion comes from having a Blockchain deployed in healthcare. So what that enables, if I'm understanding correctly is, you know, let's say I I've been seeing a primary care physician for however long, but I have a new diagnosis and I need to go see specialists or I need to travel out of state or I maybe need to see multiple specialists and instead of me schlepping around my physical records, are trying to get copies of my electronic records that would make that experience more seamless for the patient is that correct? That's correct. Um eric let's go, let's go to you. Yeah. So I'm gonna start with the question, how many of you have been in or leaving new york in new york state? Maybe not, but so if you have you have been using the excess your path, which is a application to demonstrate your vaccination status and testing results to different businesses in the state of new york. Uh you've been using that solution without knowing it was a Blockchain based solution And that's what we built. So now we have 10 million users in the state of New York using that solution. So that makes it very real right. The Blockchain can enable the ability for individuals to collect information from different sources. In that case, COVID-19 vaccine reserves and expose this information while preserving their privacy, Choose someone else business stadium an airline to be able to travel or to ever to enjoy the game again. And that is what Blockchain the neighbors overall. And so to piggyback from that, Gabby was saying what if you extrapolate this case from COVID-19 to healthcare in general. Now I can be as a patient, as a member, as a citizen, I can be in charge of my own data and I can decide who I'm going to share this data with and why and for how long and so all of that technology now is available to us in order to do that. So, um that's really, I think what I would say about Blockchain today, that's exciting to me because completely changed the dynamic of this industry and many industries. Yeah, I think it's Excelsior is such a great example because so few people do know that it is Blockchain and Blockchain enabled and I think another piece just to like double click on is the ability to share the relevant information without it being all of the information. You know when you go to the doctor's office, they're still asking for your social security number. Sometimes it's like they don't need that on a piece of paper. Yeah. Um Okay. So let's make your work very really, you just both gave really great examples in terms of what you're doing at IBM and what you're doing at Avenir, bring it down to earth so that the other leaders, industry leaders in the room kind of understand and then we'll do our final question in a few minutes where you know, you can ask the room for what what you want. But let's start with. All right. So what does this network mean that we're building? We came to the table with the idea that the administration of health care, it's probably not where we all need to compete. We probably don't need to figure out like let's have it in this system this one way and this other system this other way because that approach over the years has created the issue of interoperability and and this is why the person is feeling abrasion with the health care system because communication is not fluid between the different participants in the patient care. So what if we said all right, So maybe the back office and all of the administration needs to be done in a community type approach to say Alright payers providers, pharmaceutical companies? Everyone who touches that person and helps with their care delivery. Would you agree to do coverage in the same way? Like why do we need coverage in many different ways? We can just all do it in the same way and everybody has the same approach and the same interoperable stack in order to consume um coverage. So we are looking at this type of interoperability that makes um the competitive environment more focused on outcomes more focused on the real value add in in healthcare is healing people. And the back office administration has been unfortunately slowing it down more than it's more than it needs to and the players and the providers that are working with us right now to be the so called guinea pigs. Um they believe that um that effort of being the guinea pigs will be able to transform healthcare for which is the better of um of care delivery and the better of people. Mhm. Yeah I think so. You know we we we um we are the phase and I'm sure you know that we are leaving IBM. So we are going to be our own entity and so as part of that we are resetting a lot of the product activities that we have as a company and one of the things we are doing is we are expanding this definition that I just mentioned about the accessible path we call that digital health pass. But we are expanding the definition into this notion of health space at the individual level, whether it's a member of patient, a citizen traveler, you have your own airspace and you want to control and and and and change this is the way you exchange information. So we are now saying let's build this into our existing set of products that we have and we have many different products services servicing provided a pair of government and life sciences. So now we are embedding those capabilities into our clinical trial platform into our population health platform And now you can offer you can imagine right, all the things we can do if we invade those capabilities into the solution. So I'm really excited about this because it's really changing the way we operate as a business and I think we can do something really different. And I talked to many of the startups over the last 24 hours now and I think there is a lot of energy around this topic. It's incredible I can as you were talking I just a million possibilities sort of started running through my mind which I won't share with the audience but um governance frequently used word in Blockchain, let's talk about how um with how governance can change how Blockchain can improve health ecos, how does good governance change the business of Blockchain powered healthcare. I think we'll start with you on that one. Alright, that's the hard one. Um um Well I think the way the way we think about Blockchain today and web three in general, it's a team sport. All right, so you have to be together, Gabby explained very well that you have to be together to deliver some value and health care is a team sport. We all know that. And so I think this merging of two different sports to different uh team sports into one. I think it is exciting and the role of government into this. Um I think they've done quite interesting things already by forcing patients access to their own data in the US at least. I think that's a very, very important piece of the equation for us. Um I don't know if we need a lot of uh new regulations, What I do, what I would like to see is more engagement from the government agencies to build the solutions with us right? To join the Avenir network and to be part of the solution instead of just waiting around and generating regulations. I think that would be that would be very interesting to be really an actor into the solution. What do you think it would take to for for that to actually be made possible either of you? I mean, it's sort of, I think the question we wanted to close on is sort of here from the two of you now, you're building these things, these things exist. Like what do you want to say to the room and I guess we can include government regulators in in that like well so I can go first so for the next time you are you are you are being asked the question, do you know Blockchain in one sentence, I hope you're gonna raise your hand because we give you some definitions that's asked number one as number to engage uh, and and learn about this technology because today we have cloud, we have artificial intelligence, we have amazing analytics platforms. Now we have Blockchain, you have no excuse not to engage and not to build the next generation of platforms for us. No excuse. So that's that there is no technology excuse. And we talked about that many times. So now we have a responsibility all of us to build those solutions and make an impact exactly like with a warrior to change the way patients, members, citizens, individuals engage with their own health data and get better themselves because they have the empowerment of having access to this information. Thank you any final words in our final moment Yes, I would say change is difficult and when we go through change, it's not the most pleasant experience. Even if you see at the end of the tunnel you see that light and the vision of uh Blockchain driven community in healthcare that resolves all the issues is is beautiful but it will depend on the leaders of the healthcare organizations of the startups and the companies that are building solutions as to how they can lead through that period of change and how they can believe and adopt this community based approach and be part of the game, come together so that we can do something different in this country for health care. And we can streamline and optimize and and focus on the individuals at the end of the day. That's what we want to. Thank you so very much. Both of you. Thank you.