Last week I had the opportunity to attend a small piece of the new HLTH conference in Las Vegas. My time at the event was cut extremely short as I had to head to Science Camp with 80 5th graders (including my daughter), but I was able to hear the opening keynotes on Sunday. I was most interested in hearing from Vinod Khosla who I don’t always agree with, but he often causes me to look at something a little different or to see the future in a new way. As usual, that’s what he delivered on stage (Between pitches for his companies of course). Here’s a look at some of the pictures and tweets I shared from Vinod’s talk at HLTH.
The opening general sessions at #HLTH2018 Seen a lot of good friends in the hall. And a lot of young kids doing startups. pic.twitter.com/OpZ8Rq3sev
— John Lynn (@techguy) May 7, 2018
Needless to say, HLTH was a big event. When you pour $5 million into an event, it better be big. Not to mention the marketing they did for the event. I’m glad to not see HLTH ads on every website I visit now. The turnout for the event seemed good. I saw a lot of social media people there that I know. I was surprised by how many young people were at the conference. Maybe the CEOs they reference in their marketing were a lot of startup CEOs.
We won't have symptom based medicine. @vkhosla #HLTH2018
— John Lynn (@techguy) May 7, 2018
This was an extremely powerful and thought provoking statement for me. His assertion is that instead of treating people based on their symptoms, the devices and sensors we use to monitor and measure our health will be so good that these health measurements will drive medicine and not the symptoms we experience. Chew on that concept for a while and you’ll see how it’s not that far fetched even if it is still a ways away.
Fascinating comment from @vkhosla about testing, diagnosis, etc changing by the time someone finishes medical school. Where medical school should go is a fascinating question. #HLTH2018
— John Lynn (@techguy) May 7, 2018
I’m no expert on medical education, but this does bring up some challenging questions for medical schools. In many ways, it’s similar to what I feel about elementary school for my kids. Sure, there’s a baseline of knowledge that is helpful to understand. However, when it comes to diagnosis, treatment, etc, we’re going to have to seriously consider how we train future doctors. New skills are going to be required to effectively treat a patient. I can’t imagine most medical schools are going to be ready to adapt to this change.
Seems like @vkhosla has similar feelings about testing in Healthcare as @mcuban #HLTH2018
— John Lynn (@techguy) May 7, 2018
I tweeted this after Vinod talked about all the various tests, labs, etc he’s getting. He sees it as research and suggests that it’s not something that other people should be doing. Vinod seems to have a similar view of health testing as Mark Cuban. Mark Cuban controversial suggested that those who can afford it should do regular blood tests. Opponents argue that it drives unnecessary procedures, unnecessary health fears, and plenty of other issues from over testing. I’ve always felt like there was a balance and it was important for Vinod and Mark to understand these possibilities as they test regularly. However, having this baseline of information could be extremely valuable in discovering what really influences our health.
Some pretty interesting things to think about. Is it very practical for a health IT professional? Probably not and that’s probably why I didn’t see any health IT professionals, CIOs, or other people like that at the HLTH conference. That’s not the goal of the conference really. It seems like there will be another HLTH in 2019. Will be interesting to see what vendors return and who doesn’t.
Of course, some people got distracted at HLTH by the wedding chapel:
Interesting that @jessdamassa was debating between the wedding chapel or the #hlth2018 event. I wonder who the lucky man will be that wins Jess. pic.twitter.com/y5EwjcQ4Mk
— John Lynn (@techguy) May 7, 2018
Then again, maybe a HLTH Wedding might be a great outcome for some people.
It has taken medical schools years to embrace teaching about EMRs. Drs. are required to have continuing education to keep up their certifications and fellowships. Maybe those have to change with the times.
Baseline blood tests as a teenager as well as baseline cardiogram, and other tests has been a sore spot amongst insurers who don’t want to pay for medical care. It’s never about medical care, it’s about $$$. Make the tests profitable to the insurers and they will fall over themselves getting you in the door.