An interview series spotlighting global tech influencers, disruptors, visionaries, and of course, innovators.
It's been an exciting year for Diagnostic Robotics ChairWoman & CTO Kira Radinsky, PhD and Diagnostic Robotics CEO Yonathan Amir. Diagnostic Robotics has brought together the leading artificial intelligence researchers in Israel and the United States to create a powerful AI solution trained on data from more than 27 million patient visits and currently in use at more than 75% of HMOs in Israel. The system seeks to seamlessly integrate into the major touch points along the patient journey, providing high-value decision support while slashing administrative burdens, massively reducing the cost of care, and improving patient experiences, and already counts Anthem, Brown University, Salesforce, Deloitte and the Mayo Clinic among its clients and partners.
In October, Diagnostic Robotics and the joint Brown University-Lifespan Center for Digital Health announced a new collaboration to accelerate AI and machine learning use to deliver high-quality healthcare. Together, Diagnostic Robotics and Brown continue to enhance the health system’s ability to transform managed care, improve patient outcomes and reduce the costs of care. The collaboration focuses on overcoming some of the most challenging pain points along the care continuum, including predicting avoidable events, such as hospitalizations and emergency department utilization, and ensuring access to the most appropriate level of care for an individual’s unique needs.
Currently crowdfunding on OurCrowd, in addition to its robust suite of patient triage and navigation tools, the Israeli startup has also recently developed a separate COVID-19 risk assessment and monitoring tool. In partnership with the Rhode Island Department of Health, Diagnostic Robotics has rolled out its platform to all Rhode Island residents, and is working with Salesforce and Deloitte to make the platform available to governments and healthcare systems globally.
I recently caught up with Dr. Radinsky and Amir to learn more about their startup, their career paths, failures and breakthroughs, advice for young women interested in STEM, serving on boards, their shared love for the martial arts and course, AI, data mining and digital health innovation. Our interview follows.
Let’s meet at the intersection of AI, Technology, Public Health, and Data Mining. Please share how and why Diagnostic Robotics innovates for good. Why did you start with emergency rooms and their intake processes and which problems do you plan to solve next?
Yonatan Amir: Since I was young, I trained in martial arts. When I reached the peak of my training as an Olympic-level athlete, I often found myself in the emergency room dealing with various injuries. As often happens, much of my time in the emergency room was spent waiting and I was able to observe how things worked in the ER. I began to see the inefficiencies in the system and understand that there had to be a better way, a way to help the ER staff save time on repetitive administrative tasks, help keep the doctors from burning out, and ensure patients received the best treatment possible when they needed it most.
Kira Radinsky: As we look ahead, we see the challenges in healthcare systems around the world but particularly, in the United States, and we want to help health insurance companies provide their beneficiaries with the most appropriate medical care, saving them money and time and allowing physicians in the system to treat patients who need them most.
EKMH: Diagnostic Robotics recently partnered with Brown University-Lifespan Center for Digital Health to enhance the Providence health system’s ability to transform managed care, improve patient outcomes and reduce the costs of care. What led to and continues to result from this international partnership and multi-sector innovation?
Kira and Yonatan: As a company, we believe in collaboration and working with partners to implement our technologies where they can be most effective. We have been in touch with the team at Brown for quite some time and got to know them better as we worked with the State of Rhode Island’s department of health to integrate our COVID symptom checker into the state’s official pandemic response tool.
We’re honored to be the Lifespan Center’s first private sector partner, and we will continue to work with Brown University to enhance the health system’s ability to match patients with the best interventions for them and in turn improve patient outcomes and reduce the cost of care.
The collaboration will focus on overcoming some of the most challenging pain points in healthcare today and improve preventative treatments for areas such as behavioral health. Our joint work will help the system learn and grow more precise in its predictions, saving healthcare payers millions of dollars annually, reducing hospitalizations, and saving lives.
EKMH: Kira, at a young age you were drawn to math and eventually medical data mining. Please share what led to your career path. What advice do you have for young women entering STEM?
Kira: I always feel a great responsibility when talking to the younger generations about STEM education and my career path. I’ve always had a very mathematical mind and was drawn to numbers so it was always clear to me I would pursue a related career. Predictions and data mining fascinate me as it’s an ever-evolving field and has lots of practical, real-world applications. As far as advice goes, I am often reminded of a quote from Thomas Edison, “I didn’t fail, I just discovered 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Research is about perseverance, I find that it’s 90% hard work and 10% enlightenment. My advice is to focus on the 90% and the 10% will come on its own.
EKMH: Your paths crossed at Technion and together you co-founded Diagnostic Robotics. What draws you both to Artificial Intelligence, Deep Learning, Data Mining and Machine Learning and continues keeping you engaged in your work?
Yonatan: I’ve always had an interest in learning about different subjects, particularly sciences and mathematics-related subjects that evolve and develop. I first began exploring these subjects formally at the Technion and very quickly saw their potential to effect real change in the world. This interest coupled with what I had been observing in emergency rooms led me to the natural conclusion that data science and artificial intelligence could lead to a seismic change in the healthcare sector. What keeps me passionate and engaged in our work is seeing the big picture and understanding how data science leads to practical applications that are saving lives. From a business perspective, we see how autonomous processes are easing burdens on physicians and making the entire healthcare process more precise and efficient which in turn saves our clients millions of dollars annually. But we are in the healthcare market not only because it’s good business; I passionately believe in the real-world applications of the technologies we are developing - the lives saved by accurate medical care, the physicians who don’t burn out because they are overloaded with extraneous work, and emergency rooms that don’t collapse from senseless overcrowding. Data science and artificial intelligence truly have the potential to give great value to the world and we are looking forward to continuing to play our part in addressing the myriad of challenges facing the global healthcare sector in the future.
Kira: I am an immigrant, when I was young we immigrated to Israel from the former USSR. Before we came to Israel, my mother had to decide when the best time to immigrate would be. She considered many factors, the Gulf War was looming on the horizon and it was clear the war would play a role in her decision. After considering everything, my mother predicted the best time to leave the USSR and decided we would come in November, and by then, it would be two weeks after the war. It ended up that her prediction was flawed and we arrived in Israel two weeks before the start of the war. My vision in life is to improve predictions and harness artificial intelligence capabilities to improve humanity.
EKMH: Most incredible failure(s)? Most significant breakthrough(s)?
Kira and Yonatan: When we first started Diagnostic Robotics we had grand plans to create a combined hardware-software product, a robot that would traverse emergency rooms and interact with doctors, patients, and administrative staff (hence the name of the company). We quickly realized that the physical component of the robot was unnecessarily complex and that we could deliver our technology and products through existing devices (phones, tablets, etc.). As a company, we learned a huge lesson from this failure, one of the main ones being to focus on the algorithms and the software elements of our vision. Ironically, this failure also led us to our biggest breakthrough: we were thinking too small. We initially saw emergency rooms of major hospitals as our customer base, but when we put all our focus on our algorithms, we realized that we had a much larger potential client base. After some refinements and shifts, we began developing products for insurance payers, government entities, and employers, new directions that give us room to grow to new heights and explore fascinating new sub-sectors in the healthcare space.
EKMH: What lessons have you learned by leading and serving on Boards?
Kira and Yonatan: Serving on boards teaches many lessons, but the most important would be that passion and collaboration are key elements to success. The most successful boards are like orchestras - a group of talented, passionate individuals who rely on a strong conductor to lead and move everyone forward in harmony. The conductor alone makes no sound and no impact, it's about the combination and the collaboration.
EKMH: One can never underestimate the importance of establishing a work/life balance, especially during the endless waves of the pandemic. Yonatan, a former Olympic-level martial arts athlete, and Kira, also a high-level Karate athlete, how have martial arts helped you at both home and at work?
Kira and Yonatan: Martial arts have shaped us both individually and have brought us together as a team. In martial arts, a certain discipline is required as well as a combination of physical and mental dedication in order to succeed, much like entrepreneurship. We take the lessons of dedication and discipline to our work at Diagnostic Robotics and this also helps us maintain balance in our personal lives. Our families also provide a welcome break from work and help us focus on “turning off” when at home.
EKMH: Travel restrictions lifted and direct flights reinstalled, where will you fly for your next vacation? Which books will you bring with you?
Kira: I have been wanting to go to Norway for years to see the fjords and travel in the incredible nature there. As for books, I travel with my husband who is a walking book! He is such a fountain of knowledge that I get everything I need from him.
Yonatan: When the pandemic is over, my first trip will be to Spain to visit my sister and family who live there and whom I have not seen since early last year. Vacation is one of the few times I have a chance to dive into books so I gather recommendations before I go. Currently, I am looking forward to diving into Principles: Life & Work by Ray Dalio. I believe that a successful manager needs to constantly be learning and I find that books such as these enrich my toolbox and help inspire me with new ideas for our company and culture.
*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this series are those of the interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of any entities they represent.
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