Justin interviews Sylvan Waller, Founder & CEO of Alii Healthcare @aliihealthcare. Alii Healthcare develops and offers what they refer to as Intelligent Care – services that enable consumers to receive high-quality healthcare by connecting with high-quality physicians. Alii’s telehealth platform, Bond Intelligent Care, is a mobile application that creates a face-to-face connection with an ER doctor the moment you need a problem solved by a doctor.
We sat down with legal expert on healthcare matters, attorney, Sidney Welch, of the Polsinelli law firm on our monthly episode with Medical Association of Georgia. What is it? How is it utilized? And, what are the licensing, regulatory, and legal concerns around it?
Georgia Composite Medical Board (GCMB) has stressed that it is essential for telemedicine patients in the state to receive the same high standard of care they would in a traditional office setting. GCMB adopted a number of telemedicine rules in 2014 that “allow the Composite Board to take disciplinary action against licensed physicians and allied health professionals who practice telemedicine if they do not provide the minimum standard of care.”
Georgia’s rules require physicians and other allied health care professionals who deliver care by way of telemedicine to…
Controlled substances for pain or chronic pain treatment cannot be prescribed through telehealth – but a physician or a nurse practitioner or a physician assistant can order appropriate labs or other diagnostic tests.
The physician who provides the care via telemedicine must make a “diligent” effort to ensure that the patient is seen and examined in person at least once a year by a Georgia-licensed physician or other appropriate health care professional.
Special Guest:
Sidney Welch, JD, of Polsinelli 
This week we sat down with Adrian Davis, CEO of MyIdealDoctor, a telehealth company. Adrian shared how he had spent the early years of his career in health technology and equipment sales and distribution. With the passage of the ACA he and several of his associates saw an opportunity to help meet a need for access to medical care, taking advantage of technology.
They launched the company to begin to help patients to be able to speak directly with a physician from wherever they are using phone, smart phone/mobile device, or via a computer connection. Their initial focus has been upon episodic patient needs centered around non-emergent complaints such as respiratory infections, minor cuts, sore throats, etc.
In many cases the physician is able to use the camera on the device, along with interview, to make a diagnosis and prescribe medication to treat the problem. Additionally, if the patient’s complaint is too severe or worrisome to be able to handle the problem remotely, they make recommendations to seek care in a nearby urgent care center or emergency department.
In this way MyIdealDoctor is able to have an impact on the volume of patients being seen in the urgent care and more importantly, in the emergency rooms, allowing them to focus on more acutely-ill patients.
The company has focused their initial service model on corporate health, providing their care model to businesses offering the service as a component of their employee health plans. MyIdealDoctor will be providing their service to the general population soon.
Special Guest:
Adrian Davis, CEO/ Co-founder of MyIdealDoctor 
On this week’s show we hosted experts from the telehealth platform, Alii Healthcare. Dr. Sylvan Waller, Founder/CEO of Alii Healthcare, Dr. Reginald Nesbitt, Christie Sherman, RN, and Alii client, Jennifer Smith joined us to talk about how the technology solution works. They have created a mobile app called, “Bond”, which uses a mobile device’s camera to allow a patient to engage face-to-face with an ER physician to determine best course of action with minor, but time-sensitive complaints.
Sylvan shared how today, the average wait time for patients to be seen by a doctor from time of request for appointment is as much as 18 days. We also talked about the fact that it is not uncommon for less acute complaints such as respiratory infections, minor cuts, sprains, etc, to wait in an ER for 2-4 hours (or more).
Having been an ER physician for a number of years, he saw first hand how these patients can become dissatisfied with their experience due to the fact that they’ve had to wait so long before being seen. He felt there must be a better way.
He and his partners set out to take advantage of telehealth technology to create an application that uses a mobile device’s camera to allow a patient to request to speak with a physician, and within seconds or a few minutes at most, they can “Facetime” with a qualified ER physician. Using the mobile device’s camera, the doctor can view a patient’s throat, swollen ankle, minor cut, etc. From there he/she can make recommendations for medical prescriptions or treatments, or recommend the patient is seen in an urgent care or ER.
The team brought with them, Alii Healthcare client, Jennifer Smith. She talked about her experiences using the Bond app to get diagnosis and prescriptions for minor injuries suffered while running and a respiratory infection.
Jennifer talked about how intuitive the application’s interface is and how quickly she was able to speak directly with a physician without having to leave her home.
Special guests:
Dr. Sylvan Waller, MD, CEO/Founder of Alii Healthcare
Dr. Reginald Nesbitt, MD, President, Bond House
Christie Sherman, RN, Director of Physician Engagement, Alii Healthcare
Jennifer Smith, Alii Healthcare client
This week we sat down with the co-founders of SkyTherapist. Sky Therapist, Inc is a virtual platform for mental health support addressing the major complaints of patients in their course of treatment. They offer integrative solutions for intelligent patient-therapist matching, quick initial assessment, and continuity of care.
CEO, Afshan Ali, and CFO, Keith Jones, shared their story about how they decided there must be a better way to provide patients in need with access to a mental health professional such as a psychologist or psychiatrist.
Keith talked about how as a teenager, he was present when his father died, causing him to experience great anxiety and emotional pain. He was hospitalized for a few weeks but felt he did not receive very effective mental health care while he was there.
Afshan discussed how she developed an interest in neurology and mental health during her years in medical school before changing career paths. The two of them looked at the landscape of how mental health is delivered and felt there was an opportunity to create a new platform that could help people in need find the therapist best suited for them.
As they got to work on building their virtual platform that incorporates telemedicine technology, they felt that a key element that would set them apart was going to be a matching algorithm, paired with carefully-chosen intake questions for the patient-to-be. The purpose of this design is intended to make the process of linking up with a professional that is experientially suited and a fit personality-wise.
We talked about the fact that for persons in crisis, the process of trying to find that personal fit that allows them to be able to be open and get the most of their therapy can be overwhelming. Having to go through talking about what the reason is for seeking help over and over to professional after professional, trying to find a fit can often cause patients in need to give up on finding help.
SkyTherapist is able to quickly provide several professionals for the patient to talk to who are much more likely to be a good fit for the patient. The platform also provides for some communication through correspondence with their provider between sessions. It also has a component that allows provider and patient to agree upon self-care activities such as exercise or others and actually track their compliance.
The company will be focusing much of its early launch (July 2015) on providing services to businesses with Employee Assistance Programs. This will give them ability to scale more quickly while providing their client companies with much more effective and cost-efficient care to employees who need access to a mental health pro.
When you have the chance to hear how/why these experts built this healthcare platform it’s clear they are dedicated to insuring patients in need of professional mental health care, SkyTherapist is clearly providing a promising solution.
Special Guests:
Afshan Ali, CEO/Co-founder of SkyTherapist 
Keith Jones, CFO/Co-founder of SkyTherapist
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This week I sat down with the founder of MedZed, a hybrid telemedicine platform that enables parents with sick children to receive care for their child with an in-home RN who establishes a remote link with a physician. Today, there are a growing number of urgent care centers available, along with after-hours pediatric care centers. These care centers are typically better options than being seen in an emergency room where wait times and exposure to very ill patients are a concern.
However, urgent care centers also frequently come with a long wait and exposure to numerous sick persons in the waiting room as well. Telemedicine is a health care delivery model where patients interface with a provider via phone and/or face-to-face video conferencing platform that allows patient and doctor to see each other. This week’s guests joined us to talk about how they are innovating with this technology to deliver quality health care in a patient’s home.
With the MedZed platform (and soon a mobile app) parents with sick children can request an in-home examination of their children. After a phone triage conversation, a registered nurse or nurse specialist is dispatched to the home to conduct the exam. The in-home clinician links up with the patient’s physician (when that practice is a MedZed participant) or a thoroughly-vetted, experienced pediatrician on the MedZed medical staff (when the patient’s physician office is NOT a MedZed participant).
Once in the home the nurse establishes an internet connection using either the family’s connection if available or by cellular wi-fi if in-home internet is absent or inadequate. Via the communications link, the physician is able to view the results of otoscopic exams, listen to their stethoscope, and see vitals all in real time. This portal also gives the patient and family the ability to also see what is being visualized by the exam, offering educational opportunities and a decreased measure of anxiety.
We talked about the fact that as more diagnostic equipment such as radiographic devices become more mobile, the scope of care that will be able to be delivered in the home will expand dramatically. This will serve to reduce use of ER and urgent care for more acute, complex complaints. The service is offered as fee-for-service—patients pay using credit cards when the care is delivered. In some cases third party insurors will reimburse for part or all of the visit, depending on plan.
Special Guests:
Scott Schnell, CEO, Co-founder of MedZed 
Tiffany Holland, RN at MedZed
Katarina Quinterno, Parent, MedZed client
During this informative session, Dr. Darvin Hege, Psychologist, with Sean Vojtask, Executive Vice President of Operations and Deborah Frazier, HealthCare Executive, both with BlueWave Computing, discuss the importance of Healthcare IT… all brought to you by HealthGate.
Each day amazing new technology tools are being released that can help practices increase revenue, improve proficiencies, reduce costs and improve patient outcomes. For this reason, the dependency on healthcare technology is rapidly changing. With this comes new software tools, mobile devices, telemedicine, connection into HIE’s, new HIPAA/HITECH/OMBNIBUS rules, and reformed payment models – each with a dependency on each other. The foundation to make all of this data secure, and provide reliable access, rests on the network infrastructure itself.
Darvin Hege, M.D., P.C./Psychologist
A trusted psychiatrist in Atlanta, Georgia, and certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, and the American Society of Addiction Medicine, Dr. Darvin Hege is a Emory Hospital residency trained psychiatrist. Dr. Hege maintains over 90 hours of AMA certified education each year to stay informed of advances in psychiatry and addiction, to ensure that his patients receive the best possible care. During his career, he has worked with thousands of patients.
Sean Vojtask, Executive Vice President of Operations/BlueWave Computing
Bringing more than 25 years of Information Technology Experience to BlueWave Computing, Sean Vojtask is responsible for all Service Delivery Operations for one of the fastest growing Managed Service Providers in the country. Prior to joining BlueWave in 2011, Mr. Vojtasko held various senior executive positions with Siemens and was responsible for the Information Technology needs for several multinational companies.
Deborah Frazier, HealthCare Executive/BlueWave Computing
Serving as the healthcare expert on the leadership team of BlueWave Computing, Deborah Frazier is responsible for the strategic direction, marketing, and sales of the healthcare division. Ms. Frazier has provided thought leadership in working with department leaders to package new products and services specifically for the healthcare industry. Most notably she is responsible for the creation of the BlueWave HIPAA Risk Assessment program and the resulting establishment of HIPAA products and services. As the most seasoned sales veteran at BlueWave Computing, she has more than 11 years of experience in consulting healthcare practices on their IT needs.
