jeremy martin
September 26, 2024, Dartmouth Health and Dartmouth's Geisel School of Medicine, in partnership with Dartmouth's Magnuson Center for Entrepreneurship, Thayer School of Engineering, and Tuck School of Business, will host the first Medical and Health at Hanover Inn Organized the Care Innovation Summit. Held in Hanover, New Hampshire, this groundbreaking event brings together leaders from healthcare, technology, and academia to discuss cutting-edge advances in cancer treatment, digital health, and healthcare delivery, and how they impact patient care and education. We explored the potential impact.
Keynote speech: Philanthropy meets venture capital
The summit was a powerful collaboration between Reed Jobs, founder of venture fund Yosemite, and Eric Anderson (D '00 TH '06 TU '07), CEO and founder of Alloy Therapeutics. It started with a keynote speech. The two were introduced by Dr. Steve Leach, director of Dartmouth Cancer Center. During the conversation, Jobs emphasized his organization's mission to use a unique combination of philanthropy and venture capital approaches to “ultimately make cancer non-lethal for life.” “Becoming an investor has made me a better philanthropist,” he says, explaining how important both are to seeding innovation, driving commercialization, and generating revenue. I explained.
Mr. Jobs and Mr. Anderson were then joined by Neil Smiley (D'82), founder and CEO of Loopback Analytics and chairman of the Charles H. Hood Foundation, and John, chief scientific officer.・Dr. Connolly (GR'01 MED'01) also joined the stage. Parker Cancer Immunotherapy Institute. Together, the group delved into risk-aversion strategies, data-driven improvements to treatment access, and the value that philanthropy brings to accelerating innovation. This discussion set the tone for a day exploring innovation and its role in shaping the future of healthcare.
New themes in healthcare innovation
A salient theme emerged throughout the summit. One was the critical role of multidisciplinary collaboration in driving innovation, and the other was the challenge of moving scientific research from academic laboratories to clinical practice. For example, in the session “Technology as a Driving Force for Cancer Prediction and Prevention,” digital health pioneer Dr. Nick Jacobson and epidemiologist Dr. Brock Christensen (both from the Geisel School of Medicine) We shared how we are accelerating our efforts. Number of innovations impacting healthcare delivery in their respective fields.
This sentiment was underscored by Dartmouth College's Dr. Xian Li Beilock, who spoke to summit attendees about why Dartmouth's environment fosters cross-disciplinary collaboration. And Jamie Coughlin, executive director of Dartmouth's Magnuson Center for Entrepreneurship, reiterated throughout the day the importance of Dartmouth's unique “ecosystem” in fostering innovation and driving business development initiatives, and said that He emphasized its important role in bringing innovation to market. .
“The main goal of this ecosystem is to improve outcomes,” Coughlin told summit attendees. “Our community is deeply connected, from academia to entrepreneurship, and we want you to know what we are building at Dartmouth and help inform industry and the health system. I am very happy.”
Storytelling as a catalyst for change
The power of storytelling in successful entrepreneurship was another key focus of the event, and equally essential to turning promising discoveries into tangible benefits for patients and healthcare systems.
This fact became clear when plenary speaker and philanthropist Dr. Richard Levy (D'60) shared his experience caring for his late wife, Susan, after she became ill. Ta. Levy said being her primary caregiver inspired her to explore new ways to improve the quality and delivery of health care. In particular, this led to continued support for the Susan and Richard Levy Healthcare Delivery Incubator, a joint venture between Dartmouth Institute and Dartmouth Health that funds innovative healthcare delivery solutions. Since its launch in 2019, the incubator has enabled researchers to think creatively, recognizing that even seemingly small changes can have a big impact. This experience also revealed to him the important role of social services and the need for innovative solutions to reduce costs and navigate a complex healthcare system.
Liya Shuster-Bier (D'10), founder and CEO of Maia Oncology, is equally poignant as she describes her own battle with cancer and how, while undergoing treatment, she is “an advocate for cancer patients and patients.” He told us how he launched what he calls “the first virtual integrated primary care clinic for… Survivors of this country. ” Her leap from patient to innovator demonstrated the transformative potential of personal experience in driving medical progress.
Changes in medical awareness
During the summit, many speakers asserted that a major shift in medical awareness is occurring. As doctors increasingly rely on AI and other new technologies, they are beginning to think of health not just as the absence of disease, but as a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being.
In an afternoon panel discussion focused on health care delivery to young patients, Dr. Matt Hand, a pediatric nephrologist and integrative medicine specialist at Dartmouth Health Children's, spoke about access to and delivery of health care. To do so, he said, there needs to be a fundamental shift in the way we look at health, particularly in the delivery of health care to patients. young patients. Hand said that his own recovery from arthritis helped him recognize “the need to bring more integrative techniques into my practice, such as nutrition, exercise, and stress reduction,” adding that “everyone who comes to Dartmouth “This is to ensure that patients receive better medical care at an early stage.” Years of their lives. Hand's holistic approach was echoed by fellow panelist Lynn Fierin, MD, professor of biomedical data science at Geisel University, who discussed the importance of preventive care and early intervention for adolescents. This approach was recently featured in the Boston Globe a few days before the summit.
Dartmouth's unique position in shaping the future of health care
The summit also featured a discussion on the future of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare, with experts from Dartmouth and beyond exploring the potential applications and ethical considerations of AI in medical diagnosis and treatment. Dr. Lisa Marsh, director of Dartmouth's Center for Technology and Behavioral Health, shared her excitement about the future of digital behavioral health treatments and AI-driven technologies to advance access to mental health resources and psychiatric treatment.
The summit ended with several calls to action. Discussions between summit participants, Coughlin, Marsh, Leach, and Dartmouth Chief Health and Human Services Officer Esteban Garcia, MD, MPA, explore how to bring research, entrepreneurship, and venture capital closer together. The focus was on what can be done to ensure the best ideas become reality. supported and brought to market.
And in his closing remarks, Geisel Dean Dr. Duane Compton echoed Mr. Coughlin's opening words about Dartmouth's unique ability to drive innovation. “This summit will bring together some of the brightest minds in medicine and technology and will undoubtedly foster collaborations that will shape the future of medicine, improve patient care, and advance medical research,” he said. ” he said.
