Modernizing Medicine: Prescription for success
By Nancy Dahlberg, The Miami Herald | |
McClatchy-Tribune Information Services |
The serial entrepreneur, who previously co-founded the education-tech company Blackboard, met his next co-founder in the doctor's office.
After the appointment, over lunch, he and Dr.
Strong traction and financial performance aside, what Cane and Sherling say they are most excited about is the company's recent partnership with IBM Watson, that supercomputer that won Jeopardy! a few years ago, and where it could lead. Modernizing Medicine was one of the first companies worldwide chosen to partner with Watson to bring its cognitive computing intelligence to healthcare. It's part of
"Modernizing Medicine is not just about the productivity application that saves doctors a ton of time, it's about the fact we are using data and technologies like Watson to improve patient outcomes," said Cane, 37, Modernizing Medicine's CEO.
Modernizing Medicine has been developing a Watson-powered app, called schEMA, designed to help dermatologists offer optimal treatment options. As an enhancement to EMA, schEMA will combine the best of EMA's big-data processing with Watson's cognitive ability to help doctors by answering medical questions at the point of care.
Utilizing cognitive computing and natural-language processing, Watson uses published healthcare information, such as peer-reviewed medical journals, to quickly answer physicians' questions about conditions, treatments and outcomes, Cane said. The goal is to strengthen physician's recommendations and enable them to efficiently practice evidence-based medicine. Cane plans to have schEMA on the market by the end of the year.
In a demonstration for the
Next they revealed the prototype of schEMA, asking Watson, "What treatment of psoriasis is more effective, methotrexate or cyclosporin?" Watson provided the answer, along with the sources of information. Next question: What does the
"Doctors aren't looking for answers, they are looking for insights -- they want to see supporting evidence. They can take their own professional experience and meld it with technology," said
As Modernizing Medicine rolls out its Watson-powered app for dermatology, it will also be expanding Watson's capabilities to work with its other medical specialties. "Watson isn't programmed, it is taught, so when you move into a new specialty you have to train Watson," Gold said. "We need to get this product out to many."
Cane and Sherling believe the opportunity is immense, and Modernizing Medicine also has been starting to partner with academic institutions to publish findings and show a more comprehensive picture of healthcare outcomes through the de-identified data on hundreds or thousands of patients.
"The much more exciting story is big data on the macro level," said Cane. "When you have 25 percent of the dermatology market [or approximately 3,400 providers] using the same cloud platform that is based on structured data and algorithms, you can start to show what works and what doesn't."
In reality, added Sherling, "physicians are doing research every day. But because the tool was wrong, we couldn't collect the data. .. With this system, everyone can do clinical research, and not just for the well-funded diseases...We can share our findings, in the true spirit of science."
Modernizing Medicine has raised nearly
Mark deLaar, managing director of
To be sure, the EHR marketplace is crowded, but "it's a very large market and the market is still growing, and coupled with the management team and its innovative approaches, you feel better about the opportunity," deLaar said. "They are building a better mousetrap."
On a recent Thursday afternoon, Modernizing Medicine's colorful open-style offices, tucked inside a sprawling office park, were buzzing with activity.
"If you are doing cutting-edge technology, you want to have a place people want to be. People are having lunch together, exercising together. And did you see the Zen room?," said Cane, referring to a quiet, darkened meditation room with comfortable furniture, a fountain and aromatherapy. In the center of the office area, dozens of employees were taking advantage of the free catered lunches on Mondays and Thursdays.
About half the employees come from a healthcare background -- doctors, nurses, healthcare sales -- while the other half come from technology, Cane said. In fact, 17 practicing physicians are Modernizing Medicine employees, often coming in in their scrubs, and are an integral part of the development process. "They are in the trenches with the team coding. Every one of our doctors knows basic coding languages," Cane said.
Cane is a trustee at
When Modernizing Medicine won the Launch competition for later-stage companies at the eMerge
Cane started his first company, the education-technology company Blackboard, while an undergraduate at
"I had exited Blackboard and I moved back to
"After my day of checkups, I said, 'Honey I am starting another company.' And she said, 'Of course you are.' I was not designed for retirement," Cane said. "I need to be doing this."
He said both education and healthcare are huge industries that don't move quickly and were in need of massive disruption, but that is where the similarities end. Healthcare is massively regulated -- and the opportunity for making change dwarfs anything he encountered with Blackboard.
"When the healthcare adoption measures came out, we gave away billions of incentive money but the systems are siloed. They don't talk to each other. We need to fix that," said Cane, speaking broadly about the industry. "We need a national patient identification system so we can share information about people. Right now there is no portability of information. Yes, we have advanced, but there is so much we can do."
"I want to be the company that is modernizing medicine by aggregating data ... giving doctors better access to information to make their decisions," said Cane. "We want to disrupt healthcare by shining a giant spotlight on what works and what doesn't, and providing technologies like Watson that bring evidence into the exam room. That is Modernizing Medicine."
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