2020 Archived Content

View Keynote Session for Precision Health

View Keynote Sessions for Digital Health

View Keynote Sessions for Bio-IT World WEST

Plenary Keynote Presentation & Keynote Sessions

Plenary Keynote Presentation

Monday, March 2

4:35 – 6:00 pm

4:35 Welcome Remarks

Cindy Crowninshield, RDN, LDN, HHC, Executive Event Director, Cambridge Healthtech Institute

4:45 PLENARY KEYNOTE INTRODUCTION

Thomas Westerling-Bui, PhD, Senior Scientist, Regional Business Development, Aiforia

5:00 PLENARY KEYNOTE PRESENTATION: High-Performance Medicine

Eric Topol, MD, Founder and Director, Scripps Research Translational Institute (SRTI); Author, Deep Medicine: How Artificial Intelligence Can Make Healthcare Human Again

The use of artificial intelligence, and the deep-learning subtype, in particular, has been enabled by the use of labeled big data, along with markedly enhanced computing power and cloud storage, across all sectors. In medicine, this is beginning to have an impact at three levels: for clinicians, predominantly via rapid, accurate image interpretation; for health systems, by improving workflow and the potential for reducing medical errors; and for patients, by enabling them to process their own data to promote health. The current limitations, including bias, privacy and security, and lack of transparency, along with the future directions of these applications will be discussed in this article. Over time, marked improvements in accuracy, productivity, and workflow will likely be actualized, but whether that will be used to improve the patient–doctor relationship or facilitate its erosion remains to be seen.

6:00 Grand Opening Reception in the Exhibit Hall with Poster Viewing, Speed Networking, and Book Signing*

*Book Signing with Eric Topol, Author, Deep Medicine: How Artificial Intelligence Can Make Healthcare Human Again. Book will be available for purchase onsite.

Keynote Session for Precision Health & Bio-IT World West

Tuesday, March 3

3:15 – 4:50 pm

3:15 Organizer’s Remarks

Christina Lingham, Executive Director, Conferences and Fellow, Cambridge Healthtech Institute

3:20 Keynote Introduction

Mallory_Allison Allison Mallory, PhD, Director, R&D Molecular Biology, Stilla Technologies

3:35 What Does the New Era of Genomic Medicine Look Like? Effects on Patient Care, Therapeutics, and Diagnostics

20 years after the completion of the first draft of the Human Genome Project, there is compelling evidence of genomics delivering the rich promise of precision medicine. There have been major advances in the throughput and affordability of genome sequencing, enhanced tools for genome analysis and interpretation, new paradigms for therapeutics and strong signs of clinical benefit using genome editing. But major challenges remain. In this special plenary roundtable, three established pioneers of genomic medicine – David Haussler, Stephen Kingsmore, and Liz Worthey – offer their insights on the extraordinary advances in genomic medicine over the past 1-2 decades and share their hopes and concerns for the future of our field.

Moderator:

Kevin Davies, PhD, Executive Editor, The CRISPR Journal, Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.

Panelists:

Stephen Kingsmore, MD, DSc, President/CEO, Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine

David Haussler, PhD, Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute; Distinguished Professor, Biomolecular Engineering, University of California, Santa Cruz; Scientific Director, UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute; Scientific Co-Director, California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3)

Elizabeth Worthey, PhD, Director, Genomic Medicine, University of Alabama, Birmingham School of Medicine

4:50 Spring Fling Celebration in the Exhibit Hall with Poster Viewing, Speed Networking, and Meetup Group

Keynote Sessions for Digital Health

Monday, March 2

11:45 am – 2:05 pm

DIGITAL HEALTH AT “BIG TECH”

11:45 Organizer’s Opening Remarks

Julia Boguslavsky, Executive Director, Conferences, Cambridge Healthtech Institute

11:50 Chairperson’s Remarks

Thomas Kluz, MS, General Partner, dRx Capital; Head, Healthcare Investing, Qualcomm Ventures

11:55 How Is Wearable-Driven Digital Health Shaping Non-Critical Care?

Ravi Kuppuraj, PhD, CEO, Digital Innovator, Connected Sensing, Philips

Consumer wearable devices have already begun to reshape our general experience by putting people in the driver seat and back in charge of their healthcare – and now the healthcare industry has not only begun to see the same potential with clinical wearables, but they are becoming more widely adopted and sought after to address real concerns, like providing increased mobility for patients and decreasing costs for healthcare systems in non-critical care settings.

12:15 pm AI and Its Disruptive Implications for Healthcare

Chris Gough, General Manager, Health & Life Sciences, Intel Corporation

In this talk, we will explore the disruptive potential of AI for the healthcare industry. This will include market insights, real-world examples of deployments and use cases in healthcare from around the world, and practical guidance for how to prepare your organization to take advantage of these capabilities.

12:35 Forging New Paths for the Digital Revolution in Healthcare
Charles Mathews, Principal, ClearView Healthcare Partners
Digital health technology is not only fostering the development and deployment of novel tools that provide innovative clinical information and interventions but it is also raising questions about commercialization, reimbursement, and value creation. In this session, we will discuss the unique ways in which digital health can be leveraged (e.g., prevention, disease management, therapeutic, etc.) and weigh the trade-offs between business models (e.g., payer reimbursed, B2B, etc.). We will also provide insights into strategies that harness the unique nature of digital tools and create a virtuous cycle that fosters innovation.

12:55 PANEL DISCUSSION: How Is “Big Tech” Implementing Digital Health?

Moderator:

Thomas Kluz, MS, General Partner, dRx Capital; Head, Healthcare Investing, Qualcomm Ventures

Panelists:

Chris Gough, General Manager, Health & Life Sciences, Intel Corporation

Ravi Kuppuraj, PhD, CEO, Digital Innovator, Connected Sensing, Philips

Tuesday, March 3

8:00 – 9:40 am

DIGITAL HEALTH AT BIG PHARMA

8:00 Organizer’s Remarks

Julia Boguslavsky, Executive Director, Conferences, Cambridge Healthtech Institute

8:05 Chairperson’s Remarks

Geoff McCleary, Director, Digital Health & Therapeutics, PricewaterhouseCoopers

8:10 Digital Transformation of the Pharmaceutical Industry

Dirk Schapeler, Vice President, Digital, Bayer LLC

Bayer made digital transformation a top priority a few years ago and thus can look back on a number of successes such as being one of the first companies to launch a cloud-connected drug delivery device, doing the first remote patient monitoring trial and engaging with digital therapeutics. At the same time there were also many lessons learned along the way. Dirk, as one of the drivers of innovation in the digital space at Bayer, will share insights into the digital transformation.

8:30 The Experimental Science behind Empowering Teams

Matt Lasmanis, Vice President, Technology, GlaxoSmithKline

How do you make large organizations more agile, customer centric and flexible? There are myriad answers, and GSK is using their science focused approach to guide the way. Matt Lasmanis, Vice President of Pharma US Tech, is leading the transformation of the GSK tech culture, empowering his teams to achieve outcomes with clarity over certainty. In the presentation, Matt will discuss: 1) leading experiment-driven data and product-oriented teams and avoiding non-failure driven culture; 2) empowering teams to make decisions closer to the ground; and 3) shifting mindset of teams to be more agile and business-minded.

8:50 Making Personalized Healthcare a Reality: The Potential of Digital Health Technologies

Malhotra_Mila Mila Malhotra, Digital Health Leader, Ophthalmology, Product Development Medical Affairs Personalized Healthcare and Patient Access, Roche
At Roche, we are working collaboratively to develop Digital Health solutions that aim to improve patient outcomes at each stage of the care continuum. I will discuss how these initiatives can enhance patient care, from early diagnosis to remote monitoring. Digital Health solutions are central to our Personalized Healthcare vision.

9:10 PANEL DISCUSSION: How Is “Big Pharma” Implementing Digital Health?

Moderator:

Geoff McCleary, Director, Digital Health & Therapeutics, PricewaterhouseCoopers

Panelists:

Matt Lasmanis, Vice President, Technology, GlaxoSmithKline

Joris van Dam, PhD, Head, Digital Therapeutics, Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research

Michael Senical, Director, Strategy and Innovation, Astellas

Malhotra_Mila Mila Malhotra, Digital Health Leader, Ophthalmology, Product Development Medical Affairs Personalized Healthcare and Patient Access, Roche

Wednesday, March 4

10:40 am – 1:20 pm

BUILDING DIGITAL HEALTHCARE

10:40 Chairperson’s Remarks

Asif Dhar, Chief Health Informatics Officer, Principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP

10:45 KEYNOTE PRESENTATION: Harmonizing Healthcare Innovation for Better, Faster Transformation

Leigh Anderson, President of Performance Services, Premier, Inc.

Leigh Anderson, Premier’s President of Performance Services, will address the evolving healthcare ecosystem and how technological innovation including the application of artificial intelligence and machine learning must occur using a collaborative framework in order to quickly meet our goals of providing more coordinated, patient centric and high-quality care.

11:05 Smart Health Communities

Asif Dhar, Chief Health Informatics Officer, Principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP

This presentation will cover how digital disruptions are going to completely change the way we live and empower communities to battle disease and create abundant wellness.

11:35 PANEL DISCUSSION: Building Digital Healthcare

Moderator:

Asif Dhar, Chief Health Informatics Officer, Principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP

Panelists:

Leigh Anderson, President of Performance Services, Premier, Inc.

John Mattison, MD, Chief Medical Information Officer, Emeritus, Kaiser Permanente

Claus Jensen, PhD, Chief Digital Officer and Head of Technology, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

Keynote Sessions for Bio-IT World Conference & Expo WEST

Monday, March 2

11:45 am – 2:05 pm

11:45 Organizer’s Opening Remarks

Cindy Crowninshield, RDN, LDN, HHC, Executive Event Director, Cambridge Healthtech Institute

11:50 Chairperson’s Remarks

Allison Proffitt, Editorial Director, Bio-IT World

11:55 Keynote Introduction

Ashoka Rajendra, Head, Product, Registry, Inventory, Benchling

12:10 pm KEYNOTE PRESENTATION: The AI Bubble and the Emerging Thinking Economy

Michelucci Pietro Pietro Michelucci, PhD, Director, Human Computation Institute

This presentation presents a realistic assessment of the “AI bubble” – where there is value, where there is hype, and how human-in-the-loop computing gives us futuristic AI capabilities today that co-evolve with AI technology and even help improve AI.

12:40 PANEL DISCUSSION: Data Quality in Human Computation Systems

Is today’s artificial intelligence fervor based on hype or is it happening? We’ve seen some amazing results from AI-based systems, fueled by increases in processing speed that render traditional applications finally practicable. At the same time, powerful new techniques are emerging including fruitful human/AI partnerships and recent successes based on combining crowdsourcing with machine learning. These new methods dovetail nicely with special challenges posed by precision medicine, often entailing complex interdependencies among data acquisition, analysis, privacy, and ethics. That said, they also introduce a new set of challenges as we navigate issues of transparency, trust, and reliability where automated systems are involved. This panel will discuss recent work in online collective systems that combine human and machine-based information processing in the biomedical space, how these systems could be applied to precision medicine, and how to avoid some of the potential pitfalls associated with these approaches. We also discuss an information processing ecosystem designed to accelerate precision medicine research while mitigating associated complexity and resource needs.

Moderator:

Allison Proffitt, Editorial Director, Bio-IT World

Panelists:

Jennifer Couch, PhD, Chief, Structural Biology and Molecular Applications Branch, Division of Cancer Biology and Citizen Science Coordinator, National Cancer Institute

Krotman_Devin Devin Krotman, Director, IBM Watson AI XPRIZE

Mandavi_Vani Vani Mandava, Director, Data Science Outreach, Microsoft Research

Michelucci_Pietro Pietro Michelucci, PhD, Director, Human Computation Institute

Tsueng_Ginger Ginger Tsueng, PhD, Scientific Outreach Project Manager, Department of Integrative, Structural and Computational Biology, The Scripps Research Institute

Tuesday, March 3

8:00 – 9:40 am

8:00 Organizer’s Remarks

Cindy Crowninshield, RDN, LDN, HHC, Executive Event Director, Cambridge Healthtech Institute

8:05 NEW: Chairperson’s Remarks

Annastasiah Mudiwa Mhaka, PhD, Founder and Principal, Mawambo Lifesciences; Co-Founder, Convenor and Former President, Alliance for AI in Healthcare (AAIH)

8:10 Keynote Sponsor Introduction

Rangadass_Vasu Vasu Rangadass, President, CEO, L7 Informatics, Inc.

8:25 KEYNOTE PRESENTATION: AI and Big Data Strategies in Accelerating Clinical Research for Faster Rare Disease Cures

Rajasimhja Harsha Harsha Rajasimha, MS, PhD, Founder, Jeeva Informatics Solutions, Inc.; Founder and Chairman, IndoUSrare; Co-Director, Rare Diseases Systems Biology Initiative, George Mason University

After losing a child to a rare congenital disease, Dr. Rajasimha became determined to apply his clinical genomics data research experience to develop solutions to help accelerate clinical research leading to faster cures for rare disease. Dr. Rajasimha will discuss his efforts in fostering collaborative bridges between patient advocacy groups and researchers in the USA and their counterparts in India to help accelerate clinical research, trials, and therapy access across borders. The talk will include recent global initiatives to accelerate screening, diagnosis, and treatments of rare and undiagnosed diseases. He will also share work on the development of an AI-driven digital health platform to improve clinical trial operational efficiencies while significantly reducing costs and travel burden on patients.

8:55 PANEL DISCUSSION: Applications of AI Technologies in Pharmaceuticals: Facilitating Development of Therapeutics in Treating Rare Diseases

The complex research framework involving industry, academia, and government to discover and develop new therapeutic products makes drug discovery a laborious process. With rapid strides that life sciences companies are making in the fields of gene and cell therapies, -omics technologies, and smart molecule approaches, an urgent need exists for cost-effective, time-effective, and advanced technologies to analyze large databases of information to help develop novel therapies. Organizations are recognizing the value of AI-based platforms and tools to leverage data to find hidden drug-disease correlations. Also, structured and unstructured data can be derived from multiple sources as never before. This panel brings senior level experts in pharma, AI-based technology, and government to discuss the role of AI platforms and tools to establish a robust pipeline as part of drug discovery portfolio and address new therapeutic areas, including rare diseases.

NEW: Moderator:

Mhaka_Annastasiah Annastasiah Mudiwa Mhaka, PhD, Founder and Principal, Mawambo Lifesciences; Co-Founder, Convenor and Former President, Alliance for AI in Healthcare (AAIH)

Panelists:

Defay Tom Thomas Defay, Senior Director, R&D Strategy and Alliances, SPMD, Strategy, Program Management and Data Sciences, Alexion

Rangadass_Vasu Vasu Rangadass, President, CEO, L7 Informatics, Inc.

Wednesday, March 4

8:00 – 9:40 am

8:00 Organizer’s Remarks

Edel O’Regan, PhD, Vice President, Production, Cambridge Healthtech Institute

8:05 Chairperson’s Remarks

Joseph Ferrara, CEO, Boston Healthcare

8:10 Keynote Introduction

Fred Lee, MD, MPH, Head of Health Care, Life Sciences Business Development, AWS Data Exchange, AWS

8:25 KEYNOTE PRESENTATION: The Value and Application of Informatics in Cancer Care Delivery

Patt Debra Debra Patt, MD, Vice President, Public Policy & Academic Affairs, Medical Oncologist, Texas Oncology Cancer Center & Editor in Chief, Journal of Clinical Oncology-Clinical Cancer Informatic

Dr. Patt will discuss how Clinical Informatics can be used in practice to improve the quality of cancer care. Specifically, how clinical decision support systems embedded in health records can facilitate concordance with evidence-based treatment. She will discuss how predictive analytics can be used in a practice to understand patient risk. She will discuss how the growth of mHealth applications can bridge the gap between patients and providers.

8:55 PANEL DISCUSSION: Pragmatic Use of Informatics in Cancer Care Delivery and Cancer Research: Big Data and AI Take on Cancer

In oncology today, increasingly large amounts of heterogeneous data, created by multiple medical disciplines, is being collected and aggregated and technologies such as machine learning and deep learning are being tested to create knowledge and insight to improve cancer care and inform oncology research and drug discovery. This panel will bring together many of the stakeholders to discuss the challenges and opportunities in using big data and informatics tools to improve cancer care delivery and cancer research. This panel will include practicing oncologists, oncology researchers, machine learning experts, pharmaceutical and translational researchers, and technology solution providers.

Topics to Include:

The value and application of informatics in research and in practical cancer care delivery
Predictive analytics to improve risk stratification in oncology
State of comprehensive genomic profiling in oncology
Aggregation and analysis of genomic and patient reported outcome data
Aggregation and analysis of patient records, population level analysis and building cohorts of patients
Translational research and informatics tools in support of clinical trials
Big data from recurrence and resistance, informing identification of new targets and driving new drug discovery campaigns
Transforming cancer, diagnosis, drug discovery and patient care with big data and AI
Reproducible research, data conformance and semantic modeling

Moderator:

Joseph Ferrara, CEO, Boston Healthcare

Panelists:

Mark Hulse, Chief Digital Officer, City of Hope

Nicholas Schork, PhD, Deputy Director of Quantitative Sciences, Distinguished Professor of Quantitative Medicine, The Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen)

Beaumont_Kristin Kristin Beaumont, PhD, Assistant Professor, Assistant Director of Single Cell Genomics Technology Development Icahn Institute, Dept. of Genetics & Genomic Sciences, Icahn School