The Imagineer: Chuck Rinker, CEO
- Craig Clawson
- Feb 26, 2024
- 3 min read
The CE experience for this Podcast is powered by CMEfy - click here to reflect and earn credits: https://earnc.me/pt73hR.
Chuck Rinker is the founder of PRSONAS, one of the earliest digital human and AI Avatars companies, where he currently serves as its Chief Executive Officer. As an innovative tech leader, Chuck is deeply committed to transforming businesses through cutting-edge technologies.
MD Coaches, LLC provides leadership and executive coaching for physicians by physicians to overcome burnout, transition throughout your career, develop as a leader or meet your individual goals. Remember, you are not in this alone. Reach out to us today!
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Beyond his accomplishments in the tech industry, Chuck is a late-stage colon cancer survivor, which has instilled in him an unwavering determination to make a meaningful impact in everything he does. Alongside his tech pursuits, he is also an experienced aviation pilot, finding solace and inspiration in the skies.
With a diverse background that includes serving as the Director of the Madden NFL and NCAA Football Franchises for EA Sports, Chuck has had the incredible opportunity to shape immersive and groundbreaking customer experiences. This unique journey has honed his skills in human engagement, customer success, and strategic planning, solidifying his dedication to delivering top-notch solutions that leave a lasting impact.
Throughout his career, Chuck has been privileged to collaborate with esteemed clients, including Fortune 100 International Brands such as Disney, Wrangler, and Microsoft. These experiences have not only enriched his understanding of diverse market needs but also empowered him to push boundaries, devise innovative strategies, and create impactful campaigns that resonate globally. His approach revolves around the belief that true success lies in forging meaningful connections, leveraging cutting-edge technologies, and fostering collaboration to bridge the gap between creativity and tangible results.
As an avid explorer of the ever-evolving technology landscape, Chuck's unwavering curiosity keeps him at the forefront of industry innovation. Always anticipating and meeting the changing demands of businesses in the digital age, he firmly believes that the best ideas are often found outside the confines of four walls. Beyond his work, Chuck finds creative inspiration in the great outdoors and the freedom of flight, fueling his spirit through adventurous exploration.
Mr. Rinker’s Prescription for Success:
Number 1: Embrace change.
Number 2: Pay Attention.
Number 3: As Walt Disney said, 'Winning and Losing is basically just not giving up.'
Connect with Mr. Rinker:
Notable quotes from Mr. Rinker’s interview:
This is real stuff that says, okay, instead of trying to tackle those big problems that require human capital, let's focus on the stuff that just relieves the burden of the repetitive and mundane in an empathetic, approachable, trusting way.
All these things aren't as black magic as people make AI out to be. It's at the end of the day, there's still algorithms, but I appreciate the sentiment and the recognition of that because our goal really is what can we do to improve the quality of patient lives?
If the ideal is good and has merit, it's not about, oh, I need an ROI today. It's about, well, look 10 years down the road, look five years down the road, look 20 years down the road, and what's going to make this a game-changer for the world.
winning and losing is basically just not giving up. Keep tweaking it, change it, tweak it, do what you can because you know the solution is there. And eventually, you'll get the right formula.
Access the Show Transcript Here
178: The Imagineer: Chuck Rinker, CEO
Chuck Rinker, CEO of Personas, advocates for human AI and avatars in healthcare to enhance patient care and empower providers on the Prescription for Success podcast. He underscores patient-centric tech and collaborative innovation for improved outcomes.
2024, Dr. Randy CookRx for Success Podcast
Produced by Clawson Solutions Group (www.csolgroup.com)
Generated Shownotes
Chapters
0:00:00 Introduction to the Impact of Technology on Healthcare Environment
0:01:58 Diving into Chuck Rinker's Origin Story
0:16:23 Virtual Caregiver Conference Resource Announcement
0:18:18 Spotlight on Physician Outlook Magazine
0:19:28 Addressing Healthcare Worker's Burden with Automation
0:20:26 Enhancing Patient Care through Automation
0:23:49 Tackling New Experiences in Healthcare Population
0:27:01 Starting a Conversation
0:27:10 Entry into the Healthcare System
0:32:49 Clinical Trials and AI Concierge
0:36:05 Operation and Expansion Plans
0:40:58 Electronic Medical Record Advocacy
0:45:59 Embracing Change and Persistence
0:47:59 Walt Disney's Prescriptions
0:48:09 Contact Information and Company Details
Long Summary
In a compelling interview on the Prescription for Success podcast, Chuck Rinker, the CEO of Personas, shared his remarkable journey from a cattle farmer in Virginia to a healthcare technology developer. Chuck's background in programming and simulation, including work on military projects, equipped him to create human AI to aid patients in navigating healthcare systems effectively. He emphasized the importance of merging technical expertise with creative engagement to deliver healthcare information in a trustworthy and accessible manner. By utilizing avatars and human AI, Chuck aimed to ease the burden on healthcare providers, enabling them to focus on patient care and outcomes, ultimately enhancing the patient journey and returning lost productivity to healthcare professionals.
Chuck delved into the intersection of technology and human connection, drawing parallels between gaming experiences and healthcare innovation. He emphasized the role of avatars in building trust and effectively delivering information to patients, showcasing the potential for enhancing patient experiences and optimizing healthcare processes through a blend of technical and creative skills.
The conversation highlighted Chuck's vision of AI empowering healthcare providers rather than replacing them, emphasizing tools to enhance patient care. The episode encouraged a shift in perspective on AI's role in healthcare, showcasing the integration of technology and human-centric approaches in modern healthcare practices.
Chuck returned the focus to the burden of paperwork and administrative tasks on healthcare providers, emphasizing the importance of automating routine processes to allow for more meaningful patient interactions and quality care. Reflecting on personal experiences with the healthcare system, Chuck underscored the need for streamlined processes and enhanced patient support services, driving their focus at MD Coaches towards developing empathetic AI solutions to alleviate operational pressures and enhance patient care experiences.
In the interview's conclusion, Chuck discussed innovative healthcare solutions, the evolution of digital patient advocacy platforms, and the importance of fostering brand loyalty in healthcare interactions through AI-driven solutions. He emphasized the need for a paradigm shift in patient engagement and clinical trial recruitment, promoting the adoption of new technologies prioritizing patient satisfaction. Chuck's personal prescriptions for success centered on change, persistence, and customer-centricity, inviting collaboration with like-minded organizations to transform healthcare through technology and human-centered design.
Brief Summary
Chuck Rinker, CEO of Personas, discusses his journey to healthcare technology development on the Prescription for Success podcast. He emphasizes using human AI and avatars to enhance patient care, streamline processes, and empower healthcare providers. Chuck highlights the importance of patient-centric technology and collaborative innovation in transforming healthcare outcomes.
Tags
Chuck Rinker, CEO, Personas, healthcare technology, development, Prescription for Success podcast, human AI, avatars, patient care, streamline processes, empower healthcare providers, patient-centric technology, collaborative innovation, healthcare outcomes
Transcript
Introduction to the Impact of Technology on Healthcare Environment
[0:00] This is real stuff that says, okay, instead of trying to tackle those big problems that require that human capital, that require those decades of experience, let's focus on the stuff that just relieves the burden of the repetitive and mundane and do that in an empathetic, approachable, trusting way.
[0:20] Music.
[0:25] Paging Dr. Cook. Paging Dr. Cook.
Dr. Cook, you're wanted in the OR. Dr. Cook, you're wanted in the OR.
[0:32] Music.
[0:43] Welcome to the Prescription for Success podcast with your host, Dr. Randy Cook.
Hello everyone and welcome to Prescription for Success.
I'm Dr. Randy Cook, your host for the podcast, which is a production of MD Coaches, providing leadership and executive coaching for physicians by physicians.
To overcome burnout, transition your career, develop as a leader or or whatever your goal might be, visit MDCoaches on the web at MyMDCoaches.com because you're not in this alone.
And don't forget that CME credit is available when you listen with us.
Just look for CMFI in the show notes to learn how.
My guest today is not a physician, but he is the developer of a technology system that's already having a significant impact on the environment that physicians inhabit.
So, let's hear my conversation with Personas CEO, Chuck Rinker.
[1:53] Music.
Diving into Chuck Rinker's Origin Story
[1:58] So, our program today is a little bit different. As our regular listeners are aware, we almost Most always we're speaking with physicians on Rx for Success, but today we have the pleasure of speaking with a non-physician, Chuck Rinker, who is involved with a company that is having a significant impact on the healthcare delivery space, and I can't wait to get into the conversation.
So Chuck Rinker, thank you so much for being here, and welcome to Prescriptions for Success. Yes, sir. I appreciate you having me.
[2:36] Well, Chuck, as we always do, I want to begin at the beginning, and that means with your origin story.
I know that you are a Southerner by birth, as am I, so I'm looking forward to hearing about this. Sure.
Tell us about your beginnings. Where did life start for you?
Yeah, that's a great place to start, I guess. And yes, I've got the accent, as your listeners can probably hear.
We call it the mountain accent as much as the southern accent.
But I grew up in the mountains of Virginia as a cattle farmer, spent the first 18 years of life, probably 20 years of life in a small rural area up in Virginia as a cattle farmer.
And shortly after that, I showed an aptitude in math.
And at that time, AI didn't exist. disc computers were barely out of the cassette tape age.
And I was lucky enough that my father was working outside. We were about two hours outside of DC.
[3:29] I run his own hair business down there and cut the hair of a lot of the, as we call them, beltway bandits of the world.
And basically, without getting too teary-eyed on it, because I think about it back then, he went to one of the C-suites that he was cutting hair of and said, hey, my son's too smart to be a farmer.
I want I want you to find something for them to do. So I started programming at the ripe young age of 16. Did you really?
Oh, yeah. Yeah, it was all because my dad wanted to see me excel at that aptitude that I had shown as a young adult.
So I'm one of these guys that my first job, and I'm going to test the age of your audience here, Randy.
My first job was punch cards and ticker tapes for taking programming code.
People might not realize that our programming code used to be on open, real pieces of paper, and the zeros and ones of the world were just holes that were punched into these old paper tapes and paper cards.
I can't speak for the majority of our audience, but I actually learned how to program in a language called Fortran on a keyboard machine back in the 1960s.
Absolutely. So you know. So the reality of it is, with that background you and I share there, it's really someone who's spent basically their entire career.
[4:50] Uh learning and loving the innovations of technology and and where we're at now in the world as you've seen it's almost uh it keeps accelerating exponentially and we're at this uh crossroads where everybody now understands ai or at least is exposed to it and but that's been around you know ai is not anything as new as people think it is so so in any sense to round out that quick story went from cattle farmer got into some of the beltway bandit work doing a lot lot of military block ops work based on my father's push into that, which led me into simulation and gaming.
And through my years of simulation and gaming and ultimately directing the NCAA Madden football franchises for EA Sports, that was kind of the epitome of the height of what I'll call a human engagement.
We were engaging millions of game players.
[5:38] It came to the realization after I was doing that, that as much as I still love and believe in gaming, as a good way to stimulate the nerve endings in our gray matter upstairs.
I mean, I really do believe in the problem-solving benefits of gaming-type approaches in human engagement.
But it really came to fathom that there was something that we could do that was a little more impactful.
That's interesting that you would find the, we might say, higher value in that.
And I want to talk about that in some more detail. tale.
But before we get to that, it certainly sounds like you, as they said in the Greek myths, sprung from Zeus's head in full armor and ready to go.
But surely, you had to have had some formal education somewhere.
Can you tell us a little bit about that? Yeah, yeah. I'm one of these chronic learners. I started out as a.
[6:31] Electrical engineer doing digital work at the university of miami uh spent a year wow that's a long way from virginia oh yeah well i had a scholarship and i was a remember i was a little cattle farmer mountain boy when i thought about hot weather and palm trees on the beach it was a it was you know might as well been moved to some exotic place in the world but but no miami was my my career choice there and then i went to um virginia tech to round out my computer science science degree.
And because I was in DC, actually, I started originally at Shenandoah University because our local, there were no programming courses and all for my pregraduate education.
[7:10] And they had acquired some of these old PDP 1134s, these old mainframe computers that were, you know, half the size of most people's living rooms now and have the power of your Apple Watch type things.
And then I ended up finishing my CS degree and then started doing postgraduate work at George Washington University because I loved multimedia technologies.
It was a way to stimulate both sides of the brain, the left and the right, and then continued on and actually ended up with a 3D animation degree of all things because I really do believe in that whole mentality I was telling you about.
I really do believe in left and right side, the problem solving of gamers.
Gamers have engineering and creative minds.
[7:49] And I just rolled that into my personal business.
And I think you'd find it, most people find it interesting Interesting that like my chief technology officer doesn't just have a CS degree.
You know, he's got a three animation.
Matter of fact, I met him at animation college and my CIO, my chief information officer has a user experience design background.
And my chief creative officer, who is the guy in charge of all my branding has a computer science background.
So, so we really do have the whole left, right brain or mentality here, which I find are the bigger, the problem solvers. So the gamers, I'm a big fan of duality of the brain and the capability people have.
And you stimulate that with technologies and innovations that really play on the expertise of both sides.
That's really fascinating to me. And I think so many people, and I admit to having made this mistake myself from time to time, but so many times we think about...
[8:44] Techie segment of the population of being sort of disconnected from what human life is all about.
But that's not really true, is it? And you're kind of a living example of that.
[8:56] It's definitely not true. And I won't go as far as to say, and that's the offensive statements I hear all the time, but that is a commonality you tend to get.
[9:07] Especially coming from engineering colleges and engineering backgrounds is people just automatically assume that the social skills aren't there or the creative skills aren't there.
But you'll find there's a lot of commonality between math and art is kind of the way I put it. I'm a musician.
I play seven instruments. I've got an animation degree.
I got computer science, got engineering. I'm not boasting about my background.
I'm boasting about the fact that if people would really just embrace that, I think you'll find that the human capacity to span both creative and technical is not as hard as people make it out to be.
So if they break down that paradox and just kind of try it, I think you'd find a lot of them just not get off too much of a tangent.
But I used to really play into the C-suiters and, you know, who are the leaders.
And there's some interesting stats you'll find, like 70% to 80% of C-suiters are either social gamers or at least play a couple hours a week of games.
You'll find that a higher percentage of directors and C-suiters are actually musicians that play a lot of instruments and stuff.
So, I really believe in the power of the creative stimulating the brain.
And it's all about, you know, your brain's a big old muscle.
Let's exercise it. So, the more you exercise it, the more you get out of it.
Yeah, I think you're absolutely dead right about that. And in fact, most of the physicians and surgeons that I have known throughout my.
[10:34] Career have been quite remarkable because of that right brain, left brain thing.
And many of them are visual artists or musicians or engaged in other things that seem far, far away from the practice of medicine.
And you have explained that very well.
I have to say I'm a little curious and would like to hear some more about your history.
We don't have to go too far into this because I I don't want to get you arrested or killed or anything, but this business of the black arts and the spy technology and things like that with the military, can you give us some good stories about that?
All kinds of fun stories. I can tease you a little and say if I tell you, I'd have to kill you type thing.
But the reality was I really was working on some pretty, I'll call it confidential pieces.
I had the full SSBI top secret plus background because a lot of what I was working on was some of our nuclear arsenal and chemical and biological warfare targeting algorithms.
And as a young adult being, you know, 19 years old and being thrown into that world because of my aptitude, I had a totally different perspective than what I have now.
And that's probably part of the reason I started out as this, you know, black ops military top secret weaponry guy and ended up now I'm using, you know, developing human AI to help patients navigate and feel more comfortable with the.
[12:00] Healthcare system and to alleviate some of the burden of our HCPs.
I've got a lot of family members who are either GI specialists or help manage cancer centers.
And my mom was a nurse and pieces like that. So, there's a burden I see.
So, it kind of rolls back to that statement saying, you know, yeah, there's a place for that.
But at the end of the day, what do you do with that knowledge and that technology that can make a more positive impact, if I can put it that way?
[12:30] So, yeah, so the Black Ops world really got me into gaming, which pretty much just in a nutshell taught me not how to engage people, but the power of human engagement.
And in the gaming world, we have something we call the suspension of disbelief.
And I equate it to this way. And people go, well, why do I need to have an avatar give me directions to the hospital?
Or why do I need to have this cartoony character, this Disney-esque character you create, talk to patient recruitment for clinical trial recruitment and retention?
You know, why is it important to have eyes and ears and a nose?
And you'll find that avatars create a certain amount of trust.
That suspension of disbelief is you believe in a personality, not in a photorealistic. We'll get into that later.
We'll remind me to talk about Uncanny Valley there later.
And I learned that straight from the top where I met with the vice president of Disney Imaginary and asked him the same question. But in any sense, we'll get to that later.
That's another fun story. But the point of the story there is that there is a certain amount of human engagement that brings a power, a belief.
[13:36] A trust to that information that's being disseminated to it.
And as you know, in the healthcare world, doctors are not infinitely scalable.
They're overtaxed, overburdened, everything from physicians to PAs to nurses to just, to be honest, the frontline receptionist workers at a hospital.
And they don't have that much bandwidth and resource to engage every patient at an individual level.
So what we've been really keen on and really focused probably, how do you scale a human experience, not a human, but a human experience so that we can return 20 to 30% of that lost productivity back to the HCPs?
Because as much as I tout the wonders of AI, like everybody in these days, I really don't. I'm quite the opposite.
I say, let's walk before we we run? What can we do using human engagement that'll take patients in a trusted, empathetic, approachable manner and provide them some of that information that is the redundant, repetitive.
[14:44] Call it the FAQs of the world for the healthcare industry that don't necessarily have to be delivered with high value human capital.
And if we can do that and pull 20 to 30% off the plate of our HCPs, then what would that do for the patient experience?
It's not just that I'm talking to this cool avatar that I trust instead of using the touchscreen on my mobile phone.
But the real value is now I've given Dr. Randy Cook 10 hours back a week. What could Dr.
Cook do with his patients and the improvement of the outcomes and his research and whatever the case is?
And so, the power is not in just how do we make patients more comfortable.
The power is what does that do when you can transfer.
[15:28] Some of the burden and the staffing issues. And we do a lot of work in the UK as well, and they have it almost, I hate to say it, worse than we do, but their burden for staffing is tremendous across the pond.
So, what would you do with that additional human capital?
And that's the real value of where we see we're able to improve patient outcomes, the patient journey, the patient healthcare, patient digital journey, as you can call it.
And that's what we kind of I hope people eventually will get out of the paradigm shift to really think about AI and productivity in a different manner.
We're not trying to replace doctors. We're not trying to replace nurtures.
We're not trying to replace HCPs.
We're trying to improve patient experiences and letting those people like you that have decades and decades of experience and expertise that you can bring to bear.
What can we do so that that time can be more leveraged?
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[16:59] You don't have to go home feeling frustrated and helpless because you couldn't connect your patients with the best services.
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[17:16] Hi, I'm Rhonda Crowe, founder and CEO for MD Coaches.
Here on Rx for Success, we interview a lot of great medical professionals on how they grew their careers, how they overcame challenges, and how they handle day-to-day work.
I really hope you're getting a lot of great information.
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Get the support you need today.
Visit us at mymdcoaches.com to schedule your complimentary consultation. consultation.
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Spotlight on Physician Outlook Magazine
[18:18] We'll get back to our interview in just a moment. But right now, I want to tell you a little bit about Physician Outlook.
If you haven't discovered this remarkable magazine, please do so very soon.
It was created by physicians for physicians to showcase the intersection between clinical and non-clinical interests, whether it's writing, painting, cooking, politics, and dozens of other topics.
Physician Outlook gives a physician perspective. It's available online and in print.
It's really unique among physician lifestyle magazines.
And like the Prescription for Success podcast, Physician Outlook amplifies the voice of any physician who has something to say. It also engages patients who still believe in physician-led, team-based care.
And Prescription for Success listeners can get three months free when you enter our promo code RX4SUCCESS and select the monthly option at checkout.
That's a really great deal on this stunning publication.
And now let's get back to today's interview. you.
[19:24] Music.
Addressing Healthcare Worker's Burden with Automation
[19:28] You know, I think one of the commonest refrains that I hear, not only from physicians, but just about anybody who is making their living somewhere in the healthcare delivery space, is I'm spending way too much time doing paperwork, doing busy work, doing repetitive tasks, tasks that I don't really have time to be there for the patient.
And we hear the same thing from the patients.
The doctor didn't spend enough time answering my questions.
The nurse didn't spend enough time telling me what was going to happen next, these sorts of things.
And what I hear you saying is that there's a lot of stuff out there that could be automated and give healthcare care workers the capacity and the time to do exactly those things that they love, and that is sit and look the patient in the eye and have a conversation.
Enhancing Patient Care through Automation
[20:26] Is that where we're trying to hit with this?
[20:29] That's exactly where we're trying to hit with it. You keyed in on the burden of the HCPs for the documenting and, you know, the amount of time and effort you have to spend, of course, even with, and I won't profess to be an HCP, but, you know, I do enough work in there that, you know, things like just Risk mitigation, legal mitigation, the burden you have to document and track an entire patient case and to have that case go through any kind of EHR system and be accurate as it flows through the plethora of EHRs we have floating around the US and all.
That's a discipline that I still believe as much as I'm supposedly an AI guru around here.
I still believe that's a tremendous amount of burden to expect our AI to have that level of accuracy and repeatability without the checks and balances.
So for someone who's gone through a slightly different perspective on what you were referring to there on the patient side, the patient side, side, as you know, from there, you were talking about not having time.
My wife's a two-time breast cancer survivor. I'm a late stage colon cancer survivor.
And when you're diagnosed with, you know, a stage three C Dukes, and you're wondering, you're sitting there pondering your even life expectancy, to be honest, you spend nights staying up reading the amount of information that's out there.
And every time I'd go talk to my oncologist, it was like, well, you're not giving me enough of time. I got way too many questions.
I got way too many questions.
[21:56] So, the burden there is on what do we do now that would give a patient a resource that wouldn't necessarily be a direct, hey, I'm going to take this direct load right off of Dr.
Smith and do his patient case documentation for him, but more about, okay, what can we do so that Dr. Randy Cook now, can better serve the patient population he's tasked with, he's served with.
We did a trial with University of North Carolina.
We've been involved in a fair amount of clinical trial work.
[22:30] And it was really about them. Dr. Tate was a clinical psychiatrist.
He's an associate professor, was at UNC.
And part of their studies were, how do we expand the capacity of these clinical psychologists with weight gain prevention and weight loss programs that would improve the outcomes?
And part of what we did, and this was even pre all this chat GPTI stuff, this was probably 12 years ago, maybe longer, 15 years ago.
But it was more about analyzing the metrics that we were gathering on these patients and taking that burden. OK, well, you know what? This is a simple case.
[23:04] You're not moving enough and you're taking in too many calories.
So then formulate these responses so that when a patient's metrics were going outside of a norm and it required an intervention, then it could go out and burden the clinical psychologist or the physician or whoever the study was going to be done for at that time.
How do you increase the capacity by taking some of that repetitive, okay, you're just eating too much and not running enough.
You know, you don't need to have an hour-long session with every patient that is over-consuming and under-exercising.
But when there's a outlier case, then you want to be notified of that.
So that's the type of scalability that we see ultimately coming.
What we're trying to tackle as a company right now is even more fundamental than that.
Tackling New Experiences in Healthcare Population
[23:50] This is such a new experience for human population in general, unless you're a hardcore gamer, but especially a patient population and an aging patient population.
So we're doing things even as simple as, hey, how do we improve clinical recruitment?
All the way up through our current offerings for hospitals, which is how do we give an AI concierge service to a hospital frontline?
A lot of times they depend on volunteer staff or paid staff, and you got a lot of large hospitals or hospitals.
Having hundreds of thousands to millions of patients, over a million patients a year come through.
[24:23] And patients are often, I think the numbers like 70% of patients are late for their appointments.
Or I think it was something goofy, like 35% of the patients show up at the hospital.
My numbers might be wrong.
I'll have to get those from my marketing director. But she throws out these numbers, like a third of patients aren't even sure where they're going when they show up in front of the hospital.
And that becomes a tremendous burden where they were saying that that that results in about a 20-hour-a-month burden on every employee of the hospital, not just the receptionist out front.
We're talking about the surgeons that are on their way to a surgery, or we're talking about a physician that's going up, or a radiologist that's going up to the imaging lab, and they're getting stopped in the hallway going, hey, how do I get to the cafeteria?
Hey, I'm looking for blah, blah, blah. And that adds up very quickly.
And that was 20 hours a year per employee.
So, you got to, you know, if you have a hospital with 500 employees, you're now talking just thousands of hours that are being burdened on our HCPs.
That can be answered by an AI avatar sitting up front going, hey, welcome to MD Anderson.
What are you looking for? Well, I've got an MR scan at two o'clock.
Oh, you know what? The imaging lab is upstairs, seven, four, tower C.
Here's directions to get there. Go scan here, and it takes you there.
[25:37] Nobody's been burdened. Those are the types of patient experience things that we see, if we can nibble away on those hour here, hour there, two hours there, on something that's not life-critical, it's not trying to make a diagnosis, it's not AI and imaging diagnostics, imaging, it's not AI and documenting patient case histories that require the subtleties of the knowledge of the HC of the physicians that are tracking that documentation.
This is real stuff that says, okay, instead of trying to tackle those big problems that require that human capital, model that require those decades of experience, let's focus on the stuff that just relieves the burden of the repetitive and mundane and do that in an empathetic approachable, trusting way. And that's really our focus.
I'm astounded that somebody is actually finally talking about this.
And I think it's because somebody has finally actually figured out exactly what they should be looking at, because you're dead right about this.
The difficulty for the patient comes long before they become face-to-face with the physician.
Many times their first struggle is, where am I going to park my my car.
[26:50] And when I do, how am I going to find the door that I'm supposed to go through and those kinds of things?
I'm astounded that somebody is actually starting a conversation about this.
Starting a Conversation
[27:02] And was this like a light bulb that suddenly flashed for you?
Well, in fact, let's go ahead and talk about your patient experience, both you and your wife.
Entry into the Healthcare System
[27:11] If you don't mind, tell us about your entry into the healthcare system.
Not at all. As a matter of fact, I welcome it because Because it was an eye-opener.
We had been doing a fair amount of work, and we do some sales engagement platform for some pharmaceuticals as well.
And we were doing some work back there and automation there.
And then we did some of these clinical trial pieces where we were, from an outside standpoint, just kind of rudimentary delving into some of that.
So, we had a little bit of background in medical with the company we called New Media before.
We spawned out the name Personas for digital personalities. personalities.
[27:47] So we had been exposed to it, but never at the impact of, okay, well, what's this really do?
So we were building these digital personalities and we were trying to use them for trade shows, product specialists.
We'd send a trade show out instead of the booth ambassadors.
And these AIs could answer, you know, 30,000 questions or whatever you programmed it for and could speak, you know, multiple languages and all.
So we were really focusing on, you know, retail and marketing, just looking at the real commercial.
And then probably it's been probably probably six years ago, maybe, you know, a little over six years, six, six years clean this November for me. And then my wife was clean twice.
So the point is, is when I was first, my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer and we were just kind of thrown into this world of, You know, you've probably heard it a million times. You know, I never thought it happened to me. And I was trying to be supportive of my wife.
And she was going through her radiation treatments and stuff and all.
So, she comes to me and she says, honey, when I'm done with this, you need to promise to get a colonoscopy.
I was 51 and hadn't had my colonoscopy.
[28:49] So, I said, well, you get through your radiation treatment first.
And then when you're done, we'll worry about me.
So, we're doing all the research and all. And it's just taking, you've heard it. Patients who are not healthcare professionals, you know, we're surfing the internet.
We're probably getting 80% inaccurate information.
We're kind of predicting our own life expectancy and all those things that tell you not to do, but you do anyway.
So we were kind of thrown into there. Why do we go? We're going to go down to here.
We're going to do this. We're going to do this scanning. We got to worry about this radiation treatment. Here's the drugs. Here's what treatment plan do I want?
So it was just this overwhelming amount of information and the vetted sources that you you find traversing the internet and what your oncologist is telling you to do and what your surgeon is telling you to do. So, it was just overwhelming.
And it was typically greeted with, hey, I'll give you what time I can and I'm not dissing the HCPs at all.
They were wonderful, but they obviously had time limits.
So, at the end of that, okay, I've just spent 40 minutes with you.
I've got another patient I need to speak with, or I've spent X number of time with you. I got other patients.
[29:51] It was typically go look here, read this pamphlet, do this, and then call call somebody or, you know, get your, so we ran into that with her.
So the day she finished her radiation treatment, I had scheduled to have my cancer on my colon screening the next day.
So we got our home, got everything settled and go, okay, we've got, we're done.
Your treatments are done. We'll go to post-cancer treatment follow-up.
So I show up at the colonoscopist and he comes out and says, okay, Mr.
Ranker, you're, you're already regionally metastasized and you're out of the colon.
I can't make a prediction, but here, here's your scans and So then I got thrown into this world a second time, literally within 24 hours of her.
And then, of course, she's still dealing with her.
[30:31] Post follow-up and I'm dealing with my late stage colon cancer going, shit, you know, I'm making plans for who's going to run the company.
What am I going to do for, you know, am I trust in place? You know, what, what is what, you know, I was truly a metastasized colon cancer guy and I'm going, oh shit.
So I was scheduled to go down to MD Anderson and I was doing work at UNC at the same time and doing a, doing triple blah, blah. My sisters were in the business base.
So my point of this whole story and I'll accelerate is that that happened.
And then as I went through my third year, probably fourth year of being clean, while we were at MD Anderson getting my fourth year clean slate, my wife was diagnosed with a second bout of breast cancer.
Different cancer, different breast, totally different cancer. Different cell type.
Different cell type. Totally different cell type. Yeah, we went the double mastectomy route.
But in any sense, the point is, is within this five-year period, we were just astronomically overwhelmed.
And it dawned on us that I'm sitting here trying to take all this, you know, millions of dollars of AI research, a partnership with Microsoft and all this, and using it to try to sell more retail product for them with a commercial return.
And not saying I'm, you know, born again or whatever, but the point is, is I want, you know what, if everybody that goes through that journey, and you never see it until you're the one going through that journey.
[31:58] If everybody was as overwhelmed, and you know, I lost 82 pounds in 90 days.
[32:04] And you've seen the story. You're going through heavy chemo.
I went the K-pox route. I'm curled up on the floor and spending half my days.
I said, if everybody is going through this, and they're telling me that we have 50,000 cancer patients a year, my God, we should be able to do something better with this, with patients.
And that's just cancer. You know how many patients there are much better than I do.
So I'm going, there's just, you hate to say it, but we kind of coined the term personas with a purpose.
So we took our personas logo. ago, we changed the color to the healthcare blue, and then we put a little heart in the center and said, you know what, let's take this digital personality and give it a better purpose than just selling more retail product.
So, that's what spawned iHealth Assist and these patient experience pieces and these clinical trial pieces.
We're working with RTI on probably three or four clinical trials.
Clinical Trials and AI Concierge
[32:50] We're doing an opioid addiction trial with them.
We're doing the NHS Trust Princess Alexandria Hospital for the patient Wayfinder AI concierge service.
So, we're really basically saying, what if you had a digital personality, but you gave it a better purpose?
And that's what we call our eye health assist. So that's kind of the little bit of a, I won't even call it dramatized. You know the drill.
[33:12] Going through chemo and radiation treatment is not a dramatized effect.
It really is an eye opener.
Yeah. And you struggle to find the words to describe what that might be like.
Like, certainly, no matter what your perspective, if you're the physician, you feel so helpless so many times if you're the patient that anxiety is unquestionably amplified exponentially.
[33:39] And the things that you're talking about are the human controllable things that we have overlooked for so, so many years.
And I almost don't know what to say, but the irony that this solution came because somebody with the brilliance to do something about it with AI had to walk the walk.
And you have clearly done that, it seems. Would you agree?
[34:08] I appreciate it. Yes, I'd like to think there is a, I'm not sure I'd use the word brilliance, but let's say experience, you know, being a game developer by trade and all these things aren't as black magic as people make AI out to be.
It's at the end of the day, there's still algorithms, but I appreciate the sentiment and I appreciate the recognition of that because our goal really is what can we do to improve the quality of patient lives?
And that, as you know, goes well beyond the physiology of the body, and it goes beyond the emotional trauma it takes on a person and the mental trauma it takes on a person.
So from our standpoint, if you can create that scalable.
[34:45] Trusting, empathetic patient advocate, for lack of a better word, a digital patient advocate, that's really going to address a lot more than I think.
And I shouldn't say your audience, it's condescending because a lot of the audience I speak to are not healthcare professionals.
[35:03] But we talk about, like my sister always tells me that she was in charge of an oncology award up in Northern Virginia and says, you know, when I have a patient diagnosed with cancer, or you can talk with them and you can see their face and you can look at the color on their skin and you can talk to them and get their mental attitude.
And she goes, you hate to admit it, but you can almost deduce how they're going to respond to treatment, what their survival rate is based on their mental state and their attitude towards the state.
And you hate to do that. But I guess my point of here is the believability that by improving patient satisfaction, by by improving the patient experience, by improving the mental state of our patients, I personally believe it will be a tangible and measurable positive impact on the outcomes itself, not just the physiology of the disease treatment.
Well, I can tell you that one of the things that, people who hear this podcast are going to want to know is when will this movie be coming to a theater near me?
Operation and Expansion Plans
[36:06] Well, first of all, let's talk about where it's in operation right now and what is the plan to spread it around?
That's actually, I appreciate sincerely you asking that question because we're early.
As much as we've been around since 2000, I'm sorry, 1999.
And we started Digital Personalities in 2013.
[36:27] It's really only been recently that we've spent significant amount of money.
I won't disclose the amount, but let's just say more than I ever thought I'd spend out of our profits building out this Digital Personality for the healthcare.
So it's brand new. It literally was only announced about six months ago.
So we do have a couple of trials that we've done with RTI. We have three or four trials there.
The most recent is a trial for the recruitment and digital, the e-consent process for opioid addicted babies, our babies that are born to opioid addicted mothers.
We do have a launch customer out. And as I mentioned, NHS Trust, we've done one or two hospitals.
People, our early prototypes actually were deployed at Celebration Health down in the Disney Hospital way back in probably 2015. 2015, actually 2000.
No, that was 2008, 2009. That was part of the reason we went to that first place.
So there's been some early pieces, but the AI wasn't there.
So the short answer is we've probably delivered several hundred of these, but only probably less than a handful to 12, maybe a half a dozen to a dozen have been deployed specifically within healthcare organizations.
[37:44] Now, I'm going to ask you a question, Randy, if you don't mind, because we've had good success and I think we do something that's, as I mentioned, has very tangible value.
From the human capital standpoint. But I've found, at least in my personal experience, and this is where the question comes in, not being an HCP or someone in that industry on a day-to-day basis, there seems to be a very conservative approach to change.
And we're obviously an innovation that is, without touting it too much, is pretty much a paradigm shift in how you deal with patient engagement and clinical trial recruitment, clinical trial consent, just patient advocacy, just that overall thing.
And there seems to be a conservative stance on trying new things.
Am I just hitting the wrong people, or is that a challenge in the healthcare industry overall?
[38:42] No, you're dead right about that. And many times it comes down to the money.
You know, it's all about the money.
And I'll give you an example. You know, I get a little embarrassed sometimes about going to personal experience.
[38:58] But in the health care system where I worked, I was beating the drum as hard as I could in the early 1990s for the electronic medical record.
I thought it was something that really needed to be implemented for so many reasons.
And then, unfortunately, what happened was, despite his good intentions, the Obama administration came in and mandated that all hospitals must be in compliance with an interconnected medical record system by a particular date.
Mm-hmm.
And it's a great opportunity to disseminate something that really has value.
[40:13] Whereas when we went through the development of the electronic medical record, which is still kind of terrible, I might add, but you've got something that I think everybody can agree on that is wanted and needed and will actually make the healthcare experience better from all sides, the patient, the provider, and on and on.
On and you're actually doing it the right way as opposed to what we experienced with the, with the electronic medical records.
So I'm, I am inclined to be optimistic.
I don't know if I answered your question or not.
[40:50] No, actually you answered it exactly as I didn't hope, but expected if I can say it that way.
Electronic Medical Record Advocacy
[40:59] I was, I was hoping that, you know, someone's going to come along and says, Hey, you just need a better Salesforce. force.
But the reality is that there does seem to be the, you know, we did work for Vans brand, we did work for Wrangler, we did the Seattle Mariners.
You know, when you're in big commercial like that, the only thing they want to do is do something different. You know what I mean?
It's just a totally different industry to me. And we had success in the retail.
Now, my heartfelt passion is to use this for, you know, the betterment of our healthcare system internationally.
I mean, poor NHS is almost on their knees with some of their staffing issues over there.
[41:35] So, we have this firm belief, but there's just, it's a different mentality.
I mean, it's amazing how many times when we showed this to our retail customers, Pfizer used it for one of their product drug launches, which was kind of fun and helpful.
But the point is, is they're like, ah, I've seen that before. I don't want it.
If it's new, they want it. And now we're out there trying to prove the value.
And it's more like, well, if I give you, what's the ROI here?
And I'm I'm like, well, the IRI might end up being as tangible as you think.
It might be more about patient satisfaction, which does, you know, leads to patient retention and patient referrals and stuff like that.
But at the end of the day, it's just, I don't want this because it's different.
That's just hard for me to swallow.
Well, Chuck, I have really enjoyed this conversation and I really could go on and on and on, but we do have questions.
Time limits, be they self-imposed or imposed from elsewhere.
But what I want to do at this point is what we really came here to do, and that is to hear from you on your own.
So I'm going to close my mic for just a few minutes, and Chuck Rinker is going to share his personal prescriptions for success.
I guess some of the pieces we talk about for success, and it depends on how you measure success.
[42:52] I believe I'm successful with the combination of more of the, what am I doing to impact people around me than it is about the largest bank account around there.
But that being said, I do believe in a few pieces that as a kid growing up and listening to the magic of Walt Disney, people that know me know that I put him on a pretty high pedestal because Walt was one of of those individuals that really thought on both sides of his brain.
People don't realize most of his Academy Awards and all were for technologies, not for creative.
So I always look at Disney as being one of the original masters of human engagement.
His philosophies that he put in place really have created the number one brand loyalty in the world.
And brand loyalty sounds like a retail term, but if you think about it in terms of what we're trying to do, people want to go to Disney's characters.
They want to have that Disney experience. Not saying we're trying to make healthcare fund, but you're definitely trying to make that human engagement piece there.
And if we can get people as addicted, and I hate to use that word in a healthcare setting, but I always do, as addicted to their own health and their own personal patient journeys as companies like Disney have done for the brand experience and the brand loyalty.
[44:07] I actually think we would make a measurable impact overall on how people view personal health care and their own personal health journey.
And that's why I always put Disney up there on my most inspirational person to follow.
I used to open up my company meetings with the Disney quote of the day, which was always kind of fun in my eyes.
I'm not convinced all my employees got the value out of it, but it did kind of help frame up and give a referenceable statement on some of the things that I always kind of try to promote and tout within our organization, which kind of leads me to that question.
I think that was on your briefing that, you know, what are the three things you would tell yourself from 10 years ago, I would probably almost open that up and say, not just tell myself, but tell people that I work with.
[44:49] And probably more like 20 years ago is that Disney always made the statement that progress is impossible without change.
So referencing my, I won't call it frustration, but belief that if we'd be a little more open to a paradigm shift, you can't change healthcare.
You can't make progress in healthcare if we don't make that change. So Disney always said progress is impossible if you don't change.
So embracing that change and all is something that Disney did on a daily basis.
And that's why he's constantly involved in. That's why the Disney brand lives well beyond his mortal years and why Disney is in a constant state of flux, but why they've become one of the most loved and loyal brands in the world.
Kind of goes along with that one I always talk about. You said, hey, you're the the first person to combine those, that gaming engagement experience with healthcare.
And we've needed that. And I go, well, that's, it sounds innovative.
And I love the fact that you use the word brilliance, but I'll just say it's from a gamer and from someone who's spent his entire career in that engagement side.
[45:48] It wasn't as big a leap as we think. It was just me experiencing from a firsthand, the pains of going through the patient experience with my wife's challenges and my health challenges that just said, oh, wait a second.
Embracing Change and Persistence
[45:59] You know what? We've actually already already got a solution from that we just have to repurpose it a little bit so do do what hasn't been done before is another thing i guess everybody knows the quote it's kind of fun to do the impossible was what disney always said and it's not that it's impossible we only think it's impossible because it hasn't been done yet so so it's part of that embracing that that change embracing looking at things that haven't been done and putting your focus there because that that's when you make a difference and kind of that whole persistence you know i'm pardon the french but But hell-bent on making that impact and bringing these personas characters to the iHealth Assist and the digital personality worlds and Disney.
Another one of the old Disney-isms. You'll learn that I'm a Disney fanatic almost.
That the difference between...
[46:42] Success and losing, or as he said, winning and losing, is basically just not giving up.
Keep tweaking it, dog it, change it, tweak it, do what you can because you know the solution is there. And eventually, you'll get the right formula.
And once you have that formula, then you'll put yourself in the winning bracket.
It's not, oh, you know what? I've already spent X number of thousands of dollars or tens of thousands or hundreds of millions or whatever bracket you're in making this work.
If the ideal is good and has merit, it's not about, oh, I need an ROI today. day.
It's about, well, look 10 years down the road, look five years down the road, look 20 years down the road, and what's going to make this a game changer for the world.
So that's kind of the, in summary, that's kind of the wrap up.
I know I've put a lot into the Disney faith there. I just think people relate to that. I relate to him personally.
Disney was very creative, very technical, even though he was taken away from the world at the young age of 62, too.
You know, he's left a legacy and he really changes the way that people engage with brands.
And at the end of the day, you hate to admit it, but a hospital and a healthcare profession is a profession.
It's patients are customers, customers are patients.
So at the end of the day, I take a lot of lead from how he's been successful in the customer journey and applying that to the patient journey.
Well, I think that says a lot.
Walt Disney's Prescriptions
[48:00] Embrace change and don't give up. Pay attention You mentioned the Walt Disney.
That's a pretty good set of prescriptions right there.
Contact Information and Company Details
[48:09] Before we go, Chuck, I want to give you an opportunity to tell our audience where you can be found and how you can be contacted and how to find your company.
Okay. Well, here's the first time you're going to see me get mean, Randy.
[48:22] I love LinkedIn. I actually do. I get 90% of my contacts there.
And where I say I'm going to tongue-in-cheek, get mean, is because I do a fair number of podcasts, and I love hearing from companies, especially when they go, oh, I heard your podcast, and I think we could do this, this, and this.
But that's like one out of ten. The other nine are… Hey, you know, you want to use offshore programmers or, hey, can I do your marketing for you?
So please look us up, iHealthAssist and Personas on LinkedIn.
You can go to Personas.com, P-R-S-O-N-A-S.com or iHealthAssist.com, just like it sounds, the letter I, HealthAssist.com.
That's probably more relevant to this audience.
But please use those contacts. We're a small company. We, you know, work our tails to the bone. and we don't really need people trying to sell me stuff, but we love, love, love those organizations that really would go, oh, you know what? Chuck, you might be wrong about this industry.
You know, we might not be as, you know what? We need a change in the US and we're an organization that's forward-thinking and we're gonna be the innovators in this space.
And we would like to talk to you about carrying that innovation flag forward.
Those are the people we wanna hear from. Well, Chuck Ranker, CEO of Personas, it has been just a real pleasure speaking with you and I want to thank you for being with us on Prescriptions for Success.
Absolutely, Dr. Cook. I appreciate you letting me speak to your audience and I hope we have a chance to chat again soon.
[49:44] Thank you so much for listening today. If you enjoyed the show, you can help us reach more listeners by leaving a rating and a review, especially on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
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That link is in the show notes. And we hope you'll also follow our companion podcast, Life-Changing Moments with Dr. Dale Waxman.
Special thanks to our producer, Craig Clausen, our promotions manager, Mariana Rodabaugh, and to Ryan Jones, who created and performs our theme music.
And remember, be sure to fill your prescription for success with my next episode.
[50:31] Music.
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