A Brave New Medicaid World
One in four Americans relies on Medicaid, yet the program faces billions in federal funding cuts.
In this episode, we speak with Dr. Rajaie Batniji, co-founder and CEO of Waymark, about delivering tech-enabled community care to Medicaid patients.
The Real Reason the Teladoc-Livongo Merger Went Sideways
In 2020, telemedicine company Teladoc acquired remote patient monitoring company Livongo for a record $18.5 billion, creating a $38 billion entity. Today, the combined company is worth less than a tenth of that.
YC Wants Your Hard Tech Solutions
Startup accelerator and venture capital firm Y Combinator has a long history of backing early-stage healthcare startups, with a particular focus on technical founders tackling difficult problems. In this episode, YC partners Jared Friedman and Ankit Gupta share their insights on healthcare investing, the potential of AI in our industry, and why they believe young, tactical founders can play a role in reshaping healthcare.
Lessons from an $11B Healthcare Exit
From law school to leading one of healthcare's most successful value-based care companies, Oak Street Health co-founder Mike Pykos shares the story of building, scaling, and ultimately selling his company to CVS for $11 billion.
He reveals the challenges of scaling a new care model, the importance of focusing on outcomes over financials, and what it takes to transform American healthcare.
The Low Down on Full-Body MRIs
Full-body MRIs are a controversial and expensive screening tool that some believe could revolutionize early cancer detection, while others worry they create unnecessary anxiety and waste medical resources.
In this episode, we dive deep into this debate with Emi Gal, founder & CEO of Ezra, who is using AI to make full-body MRI screening faster, more accessible, and more accurate.
Can We Make Companies Care About Your Health?
In this episode about corporate responsibility and public health, the former WIRED editor explains why changing company behavior may be easier than changing consumer habits – and how a new health accountability index could help transform America.
The Shkreli Awards
From selling deceased patients' body parts to denying cancer treatment over upfront payments, the Lown Institute's annual Shkreli Awards spotlight the most egregious examples of profiteering and dysfunction in American healthcare. Dr. Vikas Saini, President of the Lown Institute, walks us through 2024's "winners" and what they reveal about the state of our healthcare system.
What's Ahead for Healthcare Innovation in 2025
In this special episode, Bessemer Venture Partners’ Healthcare and Life Sciences team shares the top industry developments they anticipate in the year to come, covering:
⚖️ The future of Obamacare exchanges under Trump
💊 Novel drug modalities
📊 Improved GLP-1 payment models
🏥 Caregiver workforce shifts
🤖 Multimodal clinical AI in practice
🔮 And more!
Is Medicine an Art or a Science?
Join us for many mic-drop moments with recording artist-turned-healthcare-investor D.A. Wallach.
2025 Digial Health Predictions
Five-time Midas List investor Annie Lamont has seen every healthcare cycle since the genomics revolution. Now, as co-founder of Oak HC/FT and early investor in category-defining companies like One Medical, Athena Health, and Devoted Health, she believes 2025 could mark the return of animal spirits to healthcare investing. In this forward-looking conversation, Annie shares why AI might finally deliver on technology's promise to transform American healthcare, even as she warns entrepreneurs to watch out for the "revenge of the incumbents."
2024 Digital Health Year in Review
From the return of "historic norms" in funding to the rise of AI and strategic pharma partnerships, 2024 was quite the year for digital health. Rock Health Advisory CEO Megan Zweig joins us on this episode to unpack a year defined by resilience, consolidation, and the 'revenge of the Goliaths.' We look at the funding data, reveal how the industry's unicorns survived their valuation hangovers, and share why 2024 might be remembered as healthcare's boiling point.
Breaking Dunbar's Number in Home Care
After building and selling Meebo, Seth Sternberg wanted his next venture to transform lives at scale. A decade later, Honor has become the world's largest in-home senior care network, delivering care to 35,000 US homes daily. In this candid conversation, Sternberg reveals how AI saved the company from near collapse in 2015 and why treating caregivers like true professionals creates better outcomes for everyone.
The Big Healthcare Reset
"There's been a degree of toxic positivity in US healthcare," says Dr. Sachin Jain, CEO of SCAN Health Plan. In this candid conversation about healthcare's need for radical change, Dr. Jain challenges industry orthodoxy and calls for a leadership revolution. From Medicare Advantage turbulence to the failures of healthcare consolidation, he offers an insider's view of what needs to change.
The Southwest Airlines Theory of Healthcare Transformation
Twenty years before value-based care became a healthcare buzzword, Rushika Fernandopulle was told he had to choose: be a doctor or join "the dark side" of business. Instead, he chose both – building Iora Health from a bootstrapped startup into a billion-dollar healthcare company. In this candid conversation, Fernandopulle reveals the unconventional journey that helped transform American healthcare, from midnight meetings in Las Vegas speakeasies to breaking every rule in the traditional medical playbook.
AI Meets Genomics
Technology is transforming genetic testing and bringing hope to families facing rare diseases. GeneDx (Nasdaq: WGS) CEO Katherine Stueland sits down with Steve Kraus to share how AI is being used to crack life's most complex code and speed up diagnosis from years to days.
Heartbeats in the Digital Age
In this episode, we dive into all things heart health with Dr. Jeff Wessler, a Cardiologist and the Founder and CEO at Heartbeat Health, the nation's largest virtual-first cardiovascular company.
What a Trump Presidency Means for Healthcare
Make America Healthy Again?
It's official— Trump was elected as our 47th president and plans to use his second term to "go wild on health." For this special episode, Aneesh Chopra, former U.S. Chief Technology Officer and author of “Innovative State: How New Technologies can Transform Government," joins Steve to talk about what we can expect in Trump's second term.
The Youth Mental Health Crisis
Approximately one in five American children have a mental health condition, with many more at risk for developing one. In this episode, Halle Tecco and Michael Esquivel dive deep into the youth mental health crisis with Naomi Allen, co-founder and CEO of Brightline.