Five Good Things with Janae Sharp and Megan Antonelli: A rapid-fire segment highlighting positive developments in digital health. Janae and Megan share insights on recent innovations, successful implementations, and emerging trends that are driving progress in healthcare technology.
Megan Antonelli, Chief Executive Officer, HealthIMPACT
Janae Sharp, Founder, The Sharp Index
Welcome 0:00 Welcome to Digital Health talks. Each week, we meet with the healthcare leaders making an immeasurable difference in equity, access and quality. Hear about what tech is worth investing in and what isn't. As we focus on the innovations that deliver. Join Megan Antonelli, Janae sharp and Shahid Shah for a weekly no BS deep dive on what's really making an impact in healthcare.
Megan Antonelli 0:30 Hi everybody. Welcome to Digital Health talks and health impact live. This is Megan Antonelli, and I'm here with my friend and co host, Janae sharp, Hi Janae, how are you?
Janae Sharp 0:41 I'm great. I'm thrilled to talk about good things today.
Megan Antonelli 0:44 It is. There's been a lot of good things since we last chatted in September. I can't believe we're halfway through October.
Janae Sharp 0:51 Time is a construct, so I'm thrilled. I love October. I love pumpkin spice season. I love all things.
Megan Antonelli 0:58 Yes. Were you impacted by the hurricanes in the last weeks,
Janae Sharp 1:05 some of my people, close to us were, like, 15 minutes away. They didn't have power, still, days later, and we've done some volunteer work cleaning up. And also my kids school collected a bunch of donations and flew him out there. Other than that, like, we just, I was, I was pretty lucky, like, we had a power outage for a while, but no, nothing was destroyed, except, like, a piece of our fence. So we got lucky.
Megan Antonelli 1:33 And how's the weather? Now,
Janae Sharp 1:36 it's nice outside. It's perfect. Now it's leaf season, so nice.
Megan Antonelli 1:41 We don't really have that here. We don't really have leaves.
Janae Sharp 1:45 I must be rough being but the beach is always tough. And I feel for you.
Megan Antonelli 1:49 I know it is hard. It is hard.
Janae Sharp 1:51 I do think a lot about the people, you know, that's really close to us. I have friends out there, and there's just some devastating destruction, you know. So thinking about all those people there and seeing how many people have volunteered to help has been wonderful.
Megan Antonelli 2:06 Yeah, it is crazy to see what's going on in Florida and in North Carolina. I have a friend in Asheville, so I think she actually left for Florida after the hurricane, and then Milton came to Florida, but luckily, she was in the safe spot, so, oh, good. But it is tough. It is hard. But, you know, like with here, it's like, the earthquakes come, they go. You've, you know, luckily, we haven't had a big one, but you get the fires. It's always something. Yeah, climate change is not on our list of good things,
Janae Sharp 2:39 no. And let's not talk about it, just like we're not going to talk about politics today, because that's just a gift we're giving to our listeners. Yeah,
Megan Antonelli 2:52 but no.
Janae Sharp 2:52 is, sometimes you can find things on your feed that aren't about those things,
Megan Antonelli 2:58 yeah, well, at least we should be talking about it probably, but it wouldn't fit into the good things conversation. So maybe another episode we can devote specifically to what we should be all doing in the next couple of weeks. But today is all about good things in digital health. So Janae, why don't you kick us off with the first one you found,
Janae Sharp 3:21 I found something interesting out of the University of Utah, funded by the National Institutes of Health, and they are looking at sensor and metadata for analytics and research in exposure health. So, you know, everybody has something, some kind of device, that's listening to their heart and measuring their sleep and judging them or helping them become a better athlete. The University of Utah has a project smarter. It's called smarter, which is sensors and metadata for analytics and research in exposure health.
Megan Antonelli 3:56 They are really great at acronym development.
Janae Sharp 3:59 I would say they're just about as good at acronym development as they are at logos, but that's a different topic. You know what they are good at looking at large data sets and seeing how they combine. And I think it's an important thing, because there's so many different types of devices, you know, measurement devices, smart devices, like wearables, you know, we got really excited about them. Everybody has a different one, and looking at how those data sets are actually being used to impact health is critical, you know, obviously I'm biased, like, I hope they're not just selling them. So
Megan Antonelli 4:41 is the purpose? Is the purpose to get data about the impact of exposure to sensor data? Or is it to get to get data about the impact of having all of that data and what we then do with it when we are measuring and quantifying? Ourselves.
Janae Sharp 5:02 I think it's a measure of both, because they're looking at the data sets, and it's like a meta analysis of that, but it's also looking at like exposure, like your environmental exposure to contaminants, you know, like, could we tell something? Could we learn something about Flint and the water contamination from your wearables data, like, would we be able to have population level tracking?
Megan Antonelli 5:29 Got it, but it's not about exposure to the sensors themselves.
Janae Sharp 5:33 You know, that's a great point, because, you know what? I know, a lot of people that I have Facebook friends with from high school would be like, well, you know, maybe it's the sensors themselves that are causing that, that you know. And people who are like, don't like, you know, don't ever have your phone by your bed. Like, right?
Megan Antonelli 5:52 This is certain reasons. But no, it's super interesting. And I think anything you know, that's looking at kind of the impact of all this is interesting. We just talked about there was a new and it's
Janae Sharp 6:05 not just like sensors, like for our bodies. It's also like stuff like the bio watch system, stuff like, you know, environmental things that aren't just individual, got
Megan Antonelli 6:15 it, got it. Well, we just saw that the there is a new ring. Now, I'm a I'm an aura ring, yes, full of these, but we were just talking about, there's a new ring called the happy ring that seems to measure most of the same things that the aura ring measures. But maybe it'll come out at a different price. It seems to be FDA approved for something as well. But it seems like we're going to have a lot of choices of devices. And I really liked what you said about, you know, we all need, you know, there's, there's some of us who grew up needing mood range. Yes,
Janae Sharp 6:49 that's right. I feel like the great thing about this, and it's good that they have FDA approval saying that some of the data they're collecting is accurate. And I really think we got carried away. We were there with our Lisa Frank Trapper keepers and our slap bracelets and our mood rings, and here we are, a few years later, with some money, and we're like, you know we should do, let's bring them back, mood rings.
Megan Antonelli 7:14 Are you saying that you did not have a Stevie Nicks Trapper Trapper Keeper, and you had a Lisa Frank
Janae Sharp 7:22 I did, yeah, I was, like, I was just that generation.
I still actually have some Lisa Frank stickers that I feel passionate about, that I got at Costco. So we won't go down the Lisa Frank rabbit hole. But people got, you know this, the people who loved mood rings and would go buy them for $5 with their best friend necklaces. These are the people who are now wearing aura rings or the happy ring. And I'm glad that they're very concerned that the data they're collecting is accurate. Yes, you know, and that that market where, you know, you get real time feedback about your about your data, that's helped some people. It saved lives. You know, it's also helped some people increase their anxiety and become more neurotic than ever,
Megan Antonelli 8:14 right? Right? Well, I do. I, while it does all of those things for me, for sure, I don't trust it from an accuracy standpoint as much as I trust it from a baseline, right? So it's like I don't know if the baseline is correct or not, but at least if there's a large variation, I feel like I do detect it so but that being said, Certainly having the goal of accuracy and having the FDA give it a stamp, right?
Janae Sharp 8:41 And let's talk about, let's talk more about money, speaking of people having money now. Great segue, yeah,
Megan Antonelli 8:49 so the Peterson Health Institute released a survey, I think, just this week, maybe earlier last week, about the state of digital health purchasing, and it sounds like there is a upswing and an increase in in that which is exciting to see. I suppose that you know the proof will be in the pudding is the evidence there are the outcomes going to be positive, but both out of I guess it was something like 60% of health plans have have cited cost savings, and therefore, and 49% of health systems and 34% of employers agreed around the cost savings as their motivators for adoption, right?
Janae Sharp 9:34 And I think some of that is when we're talking to healthcare leaders, they're saying we have goals for our people to attain the best health possible. And if we partner with, you know, with other companies, with digital experts, it allows our force to go faster, and it's a way for them to accelerate their digital health maturity, and most of their. Or health you know what's what's available for their people. And I loved that vision that a lot of people have where, where they're building something together. And it's great news for innovators in this space. It's also great news for patients and for health systems, because they're going to be able to do more with with those outside teams for less money than they would be able to do if everybody was doing it in house. Speaking of investment, 2024 has been a massive year for investment in autoimmune disease, and
Megan Antonelli 10:40 remarkable. We have so many friends working in that space, right? Development and remission, right?
Janae Sharp 10:47 And it's also so important, especially because of the state of COVID has has altered some of those things, and we don't really understand everything that's going to happen there. And this investment that would help people understand this market. It's I don't think people realize it. They've had a $1.7 billion invested already in 2024 it's set to be twice what it has been in previous years, the highest year ever. And some of those things mean we're gonna have better things available in terms of drug development. And it's also part of that red hot like that. The article says it's a red hot market, so I kind of like that from the obesity market for medications. Yeah, people are more excited,
Megan Antonelli 11:38 right? And I think we were going to save this for later, but I think it's a natural thing to talk about. There was a CDC study about, sort of, have we hit peak obesity? Because obesity is going down. So when you have, obviously, there's been a huge amount of investment into GLP ones, right? But at some point that's got to cap out. And, you know, autoimmune disease and obesity and chronic disease are all tied together in a complex and, you know, interlocked web that you know, very rarely do you have, you know, not have comorbidities in that, in those spaces. So, you know, it is interesting to see both that money is going into autoimmune disease and obesity, but that we are seeing numbers finally come down, right? I mean, I think on the obesity side of you know, with the CDC, that the rate is no longer growing, right, right? Something we've seen in adults, I'm sad to say, it doesn't say that it's not growing with PD with kids, so it probably still is. But who knows? Um, you know, to see that those numbers have stabilized. And, you know, yeah,
Janae Sharp 12:52 the CDC has come out and said, like, this is an epidemic, and the idea that what we're doing is working is kind of revolutionary. And I know in other in other areas, it's not improving. And you know, there are concerns people have had about the heavy costs of some of the medication for like GLP ones, right? Yeah, insurers don't want to pay for them, right, but, but the idea that as a population, those rates might be going down, that's going to mean a healthier group of people, we're going to pay less over time,
Megan Antonelli 13:35 you know, right? And, of course, we just heard from Dr groves. I mean, GLP ones aren't the only tool to to manage obesity. There are other, you know, various health coaches and just other trends that are happening. And I think even, you know, he mentioned, you know, just the food, you know, system in and of itself that some you know that they're gearing and leading towards healthier choices and trying to fix it. I mean, it's very easy to find areas where they're not, but there are some, some good movements, and certainly the food is medicine movement and where things, you know, some of these programs in the schools are taking hold, yeah, which is great, right? There's hope, you know? I mean, and while GLP ones do provide hope and are one one more, you know, tool in the toolkit, the you know, it is always going to be the need for both behavioral change and, you know, healthier choices and accessibility to healthy food across, you know, all socio economic levels, right? And I
Janae Sharp 14:41 think some of that is, is the, the, the crux of it, you know, we had these tools where you could get a coach who would help you with your health and all this other stuff. But were they accessible to everyone? So it's kind of nice to see insurance companies be more you. Uh, progressive about what they want to help with,
Megan Antonelli 15:04 and that's what, you know, he was saying. Actually, the, um, the tool that they have for diabetes and management, you know, is free. You know, it is free to a banner member. So some of these, and I actually think that this is a live health coaching tool. But certainly, a lot of the health coaches that do involve AI and you know, agents, which we've heard a lot of discussion about lately, will be more accessible and less expensive, and hopefully, you know, as effective when combined with some of these other tools that are becoming available, yes,
Janae Sharp 15:42 and having them be more accessible is great and improving people's health, you know. And
Megan Antonelli 15:48 speaking of money and female founders and all of the things that we Oh, we love. We love all of those things. Maven clinic announced this month that they completed their $125 million Series F round. So that is great to see a lot of success. We complain often on our show about lack of funding going
Janae Sharp 16:12 I just think we're excited about women like,
Megan Antonelli 16:15 yes, well, going to female fund, female founders and women's health, and of course, Mavin is both with Caroline rider and being a clinic for women. So it's great to see that that is coming through and that, I think a lot of that funding is going to for the expansion of their fertility and Family Program, family building program. We won't use that as a segue to politics. We'll let it we'll let it go.
Janae Sharp 16:44 We will not we're going to talk about how women and families are going to have more options than ever before. Yeah, and globally, globally, Women's Health is an issue, and especially, you know, family building fertility issues, right, which
Megan Antonelli 17:04 are also important. So it's great to see. I think that round was led by the stepstone group. And speaking
Janae Sharp 17:11 of women's health, let's talk about one of our other favorite talk books, menopause,
Megan Antonelli 17:17 my very favorite, not in menopause, but
Janae Sharp 17:21 based on the people around me, I feel like I
Megan Antonelli 17:25 have heard a lot about it not contagious today.
Janae Sharp 17:28 It's not contagious. But the complaining is, is that a good thing? I don't know,
Megan Antonelli 17:33 but the good news in menopause is the m factor documentary, which is coming out today. Today, you will be able to watch it on PBS, october 17, for anyone who tunes in and doesn't listen to us live. And I'm sure we will be your friends and then available. Which the interesting thing about this is that it is a CME accredited film documentary. So that's one of the first which I love to see, because, of course, I was worked on the CME accreditation of, you know, web web programs a long, long time ago to see movies come through, or documentaries, but also on this topic, which is a favorite of mine, you know. And I think it's meant to both educate, you know, the general population, but obviously clinicians, you know, who are often not not aware of of all the the topics, or all the sadly,
Janae Sharp 18:31 medicine has typically been a little bit behind in research and an understanding of women's health, yes, and That's like, the nicest way to say it,
Megan Antonelli 18:41 right, indeed. But just producers are Tamsen, fadal, Denise pines and Joanna Lamarca Matheson. So you know, a great group of really amazing women who have brought together some some really good perspectives. So definitely tune in to that. We're excited to see it. I will give a shout out also to my friend Melissa, Ashley and her event that's coming up women in work, which is really about, about this very topic, and and how employers can, can, you know, make that a more you know, give, provide the benefits, provide the support that's needed. And of course, we talked a bit about that today with Lindsay Spark as well, in terms of, you know, employers and what they're looking to do for their right employees.
Janae Sharp 19:32 So right, and I like that they're talking about empowering women to seek proper healthcare and to talk about, you know, midlife, a lot of times women, after a certain age, they disappear. And when you're talking about costs, you know, the Deloitte analysis showed that they're paying 20% more out of pocket, even with insurance. So, oh, um. And excluding maternity care, it's 18% more. So, you know, right, frankly, it's nice to see something where it's becoming a focus and just, well, it's
Megan Antonelli 20:10 just, you know, I mean, it's all it's been so long overlooked, and the reality of life as a woman and as I know this, as my kids are now, you know, between 20 and 13, you know, those were really hard times to work full time. As they get older, it's actually easier to work full time. So if you know, if, if the being able to take care of your health in that time and being welcomed into the workforce in that time, you know, should be a high priority, and it is literally the opposite, right now, right? I mean, you see women exiting the workforce more than than otherwise, so, right? This will change things a bit.
Janae Sharp 20:55 We're losing a lot of people in the workforce. Speaking of the healthcare workforce, let's talk about one of my favorite things, talking about how much I still like yoga, even though people and well being don't and I love mindfulness
Megan Antonelli 21:11 yoga. Yoga does get a bad rap, but it's
Janae Sharp 21:14 so weird i don't understand they don't get mad at you for, like, whatever. I won't go crazy about that, and that's another good thing from today. We won't go I
Megan Antonelli 21:24
think the bad rap comes from the idea. And this goes back to the topic from before that there's band aids, right? And it doesn't treat the systemic problem. However,
Janae Sharp 21:39 what does Yeah, why are you picking on the world's best band aid and also, like, there are two problems here, you know, and people news. The news is just because we love mindfulness. Megan, you know, has 800 Pilates neighbors, so you love it. But mindfulness meditation can be similar to an antidepressant for reducing anxiety symptoms. I did send this to my kids. I sent this to everyone I know. You know mindfulness meditation regularly, it can be just as effective as an antidepressant. And yeah, it was Georgetown University Medical Centers, Elizabeth Hogue, MD, who
Megan Antonelli 22:27 led the study. So it wasn't the Department of Scientology, it was actual doctors.
Janae Sharp 22:32 Yeah, I would love to see what the Department of Scientology says about it, because wouldn't that be weird,
Megan Antonelli 22:41 interesting. They just don't typically, like, you know, medication, treatment or anything for mental health, right?
Janae Sharp 22:48 I don't know. Oh, well, that's the whole, I'm sure they love mindfulness. Or do they?
Megan Antonelli 22:56 Yeah, maybe we should talk about politics instead.
Janae Sharp 22:58 Like, I'm like, I don't know enough about them,
Megan Antonelli 23:00 you should move to LA and then you will,
Janae Sharp 23:03 I would, yeah, if I lived there,
Megan Antonelli 23:06 we could have another podcast about what, what religions Janae knows about, and what, what religions Megan knows about. Yeah, I feel like you wouldn't necessarily lying. Yeah, no, and then we can talk about politics too, yes,
Janae Sharp 23:18 and we wouldn't call it five good things, so I'll tell you that for sure. No, but let's talk about about this. Like, I like that they did this and show kind of a different perspective. You know that the effectiveness of of something with, like Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction versus, in this case, it was Lexapro, escitalopram in a randomized clinical trial. That's significant. It also shows, you know, personalization for what people need. I think some of those, it's somewhat simplified, right? Because I think about, I have a kid with eosinophilic esophagitis, and we tried to figure out his food triggers for months, and it didn't work, and the medications working right? So the choices that we have are more like your your lifestyle, your personal preferences, but just seeing that we have more tools available to us is great news, you know, and
Megan Antonelli 24:21 it's, you know, there's a complexity to all of this, certainly depression and anxiety, and it does look like they used a number of different scales to measure that. And, you know, it was a randomized clinical trial. And so to see a medication go up against mindfulness meditation, and, you know, have have mindfulness meditation. Actually do fine. You know, do fine. It is great,
Janae Sharp 24:50 right? The monks, they had something going for them. It reminds me of the books my kids and I have been listening to these books in the way, in the car, on the way. School, we listen on Audible and one of them was about the chapter today was about reducing anxiety, and they brought in some of these, these issues. And I thought it was amazing, both that I have to spend a million hours in the car and that my kids will listen to this stuff at 6am when I'm driving them to school, right,
Megan Antonelli 25:22 when they have no choice. So they're a captive audience. You can, yeah, make them listen to whatever you want.
Janae Sharp 25:28 Maybe we should do mindfulness meditation. They could all the way, you know, yes,
Megan Antonelli 25:33 yes. Well, I've just recently got back to yoga, and I, you know, I had, I had, really, I was, I've never been like someone who goes regularly, regularly, but I did go often before the pandemic, but once COVID happened, I just couldn't quite mentally get myself back in the studio, you know, like it was just a little too crowded, a little too many people. And so I finally got my vaccine this time and started go and went back. And I'm really happy about it. Other than this, like twinge of pain in my hip, I'm great. It's great.
Janae Sharp 26:11 Yeah, you just need to go into where is the digital health app that insurance is paying for that gets us regular massages from someone that will come to our house. That's all we're asking for in the next month, when you can join us for five good things again, I I bet it'll happen.
Megan Antonelli 26:30 Maybe, maybe not, we
Janae Sharp 26:33 can get there. I feel like on the scale, I always view this like, on the scale of like, where we're at to like Star Trek or Gattaca, you know how much data they're looking at, how much you know they're judging our health and we're getting closer?
Megan Antonelli 26:46 Yes, well, the the needle is moving. I had a great conversation with Toby Edelman at avatar today about how much progress we've seen in the last 15 years. So it's been amazing. It has been amazing. And certainly the combination of virtual health, and AI has has made you know what, what's possible seem even even feasible, because things are getting less expensive. We did, and he even brought up the challenges of infrastructure and capacity and actual energy that we will have to deal with actually,
Janae Sharp 27:24 you mean, because we're running so many AI programs that we might be destroying the world we live in, that's not a good thing. So we're not going to talk about that. Toby brought it up. You can go back to earlier and today to listen to that. Find it on health impact live.com, you'll be able to find a lot of great resources, and those
Megan Antonelli 27:43 are the challenges. But what's possible is, is the the change and what's coming and and the changes we've seen, so that that's all good. And he had lots of great things to say. So I thank him all for joining us, and thank you audience for listening to another segment of five good things. Yes, as
Janae Sharp 28:02 always, we want to, we want to hear your good things, so make sure to tag us, share them with us, and we hope we can move together to create good things as well. Yeah, and
Megan Antonelli 28:15 that's Megan Antonelli and Janae sharp. Signing off.
Thank you 28:20 Thank you for joining us for this week's health impacts digital health talk. Don't miss another podcast. Subscribe at Digital Health talks.com and to join us at our next face to face event. Visit health impacts live.com you.