| | | | |  | | By Daniel Payne, Ruth Reader, Carmen Paun and Erin Schumaker | | | | | 
Steven Greene (left) and Phil Markunas | Standard Practice | Health providers are finding ways to use artificial intelligence to help reduce the grunt work that comes with practicing modern medicine. How so? AI may soon move beyond processing paperwork to handling calls with health insurers about what they’ll pay for. Standard Practice, a health AI company, has created a system that can put in calls on behalf of providers — often to confirm insurance coverage details for their patients or care plans with pharmacies. Time suck: Even in the Internet age, phone calls are often still required to keep care moving, Steven Greene, CEO of the company he co-founded with Phil Markunas, told Daniel. Electronic medical records should theoretically simplify the process, he said. “But very often [care decisions] end up having to require a phone call.” The tool could allow small practices to handle administrative work as efficiently as huge health systems with dedicated staff. It could also help combat continued consolidation in the industry and keep the independent physician from extinction, Greene hopes. A look ahead: Greene sees a world in which insurers have their own AI to field calls. In that future, he said, two AI systems — one representing a provider and the other a payer — could communicate over the phone to work through the details of a patient’s coverage and care. Even so: That’s a long way off, Greene expects. “Most health care still runs on the fax machine, and so I think we’re probably still quite a ways away from that,” he said.
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Brooklyn, N.Y. | Erin Schumaker/POLITICO | This is where we explore the ideas and innovators shaping health care. A U.K. patient with melanoma has received among the first personalized mRNA vaccines for the deadly form of skin cancer, BBC reports. The vaccine, which the patient was given during a clinical trial, is meant to help his immune system identify and fight any cancer cells left after having surgery on his scalp last summer. Share any thoughts, news, tips and feedback with Carmen Paun at cpaun@politico.com, Daniel Payne at dpayne@politico.com, Ruth Reader at rreader@politico.com or Erin Schumaker at eschumaker@politico.com. Send tips securely through SecureDrop, Signal, Telegram or WhatsApp.
| | |  The FTC is using a 2009 data breach rule to prevent firms from sharing customer health data without permission. | Francis Chung/POLITICO | The Federal Trade Commission is updating a 2009 data breach rule to clarify that it also restricts firms’ marketing practices when it involves personal health information. The agency has already begun enforcing the rule against companies that share customer data for marketing purposes, prompting other firms to report their past marketing practices to avoid punishment. Sam Levine, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said the update will help the agency keep pace with evolving consumer health technologies. “Protecting consumers’ sensitive health data is a high priority for the FTC,” he said in a statement. Why it matters: The FTC under Chair Lina Khan is keen to secure health data that’s not protected by HIPAA, the federal health privacy law that governs how medical providers handle patient data. But the new interpretation of the rule, which binds health apps, fitness trackers, other wearable devices, as well as online services that collect health care data, is controversial. The Health Innovation Alliance, which represents medical providers and insurers, questioned whether the agency had the authority to proceed with the change and said the rule is vulnerable to legal challenge. But other health care groups support the update, including the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Family Physicians and health technology organization CHIME. Several House Democrats also weighed in, in favor.
| | | | POLITICO IS BACK AT THE 2024 MILKEN GLOBAL CONFERENCE: POLITICO will again be your eyes and ears at the 27th Annual Milken Institute Global Conference in Los Angeles from May 5-8 with exclusive, daily, reporting in our Global Playbook newsletter. Suzanne Lynch will be on the ground covering the biggest moments, behind-the-scenes buzz and on-stage insights from global leaders in health, finance, tech, philanthropy and beyond. Get a front-row seat to where the most interesting minds and top global leaders confront the world’s most pressing and complex challenges — subscribe today. | | | | | | | | |  The WHO wants to renew the fight against vaccine-preventable diseases. | AFP via Getty Images | The World Health Organization and other public health groups are pushing world leaders to fund and promote vaccination. The push comes as Covid-19 disruptions, debt and conflict, climate change and misinformation make it harder for authorities everywhere to immunize people against preventable diseases. The global health body this week launched a new campaign — under the “Humanly Possible” slogan — with UNICEF; Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance; and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It calls on rich countries to fund vaccination globally and on low- and middle-income nations to reach children who have never been vaccinated or have missed shots. Why it matters: Measles claimed the lives of 136,000 children worldwide in 2022, with more than 9 million cases reported, said Dr. Kate O’Brien, the WHO’s director for immunization, vaccines and biologicals. Last year, the number of cases rose by 70 percent, and the WHO is still calculating how many died, she said. Fifty countries had large measles outbreaks in 2023. Pandemic disruptions, misinformation and lack of access to vaccination were behind that resurgence, O’Brien said. What’s next? The Humanly Possible campaign highlights the achievements of the past 50 years of vaccination: an estimated 154 million lives saved, according to a modeling study to be published in The Lancet next week. Measles vaccination had the most significant impact on reducing infant deaths, accounting for 60 percent of all lives saved, according to the study, which noted the vaccine will likely remain the top contributor to preventing deaths in the future. The study covered vaccination against 14 diseases, including diphtheria, measles and polio. Vaccination efforts that started relatively recently, such as against cervical cancer, weren’t included in the modeling, which makes the estimates conservative, according to the WHO. The campaign also looks at what the next 50 years could bring, O’Brien said. “It’s about all the things that are humanly possible: to stamp out vaccine-preventable diseases, develop new vaccines and adapt the vaccine program to the future that we will be facing that is also a climate-adapted future,” she said. That future will also include adult immunization programs, more vaccine manufacturing facilities spread worldwide and primary health care infrastructure that’s strong enough to reach every person with vaccinations, said Ephrem T. Lemango, UNICEF’s associate director for immunization. | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
