On this week’s episode of The Healthcare Plus Podcast, host Quint Studer is joined by special guest Dr. Riya Pulicharam, a pediatrician by training, certified clinical trials investigator, and co-founder of Caret Health. Over her 20+ year career, Dr. Pulicharam has led more than 500 studies and a number of initiatives focused on reducing total healthcare costs for chronic disease management programs. Dr. Pulicharam shares about her experiences in designing clinical care pathways, particularly for high-risk patients with complex chronic conditions, and emphasizes the need for user-friendly platforms and industry-wide innovation.

Dr. Pulicharam also highlights the challenges faced in scaling population health programs to larger organizations and stresses the importance of a centralized approach, advocating for automated data reconciliation and task management. Her ultimate goal is to reduce hospitalizations and emergency room visits while improving patient satisfaction through informed clinical decision-making and by addressing social determinants of health. The discussion underscores the crucial role of data and technology in improving patient care.

To learn more about Dr. Riya Pulicharam’s population health platform, visit www.CaretHealth.com.

About Dr. Riya Pulicharam

Dr. Riya Pulicharam is the co-founder of Caret Health, a clinical execution platform for value-based population health. For more than 20 years, Dr. Pulicharam has served as the National Medical Director for Population Health at Legacy Healthcare Partners (now Optum Care).

A pediatrician by training, Dr. Pulicharam was a research fellow at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Harbor UCLA Medical Center, and later founded the Clinical Research, HEOR, and population health departments for the Legacy Healthcare Partners. Dr. Pulicharam has led more than 500 research studies and is widely recognized as a certified clinical trials investigator.

Dr. Pulicharam's primary focus lies in population health, where she addresses social determinants of health and designs clinical care pathways for high-risk patient populations managed within value-based organizations. Notably, her work has been instrumental in various quality improvement initiatives aimed at reducing total healthcare costs for chronic disease management programs, which have been prominently featured in several publications.

Driven by a commitment to improving healthcare outcomes, Dr. Pulicharam is currently dedicated to reducing hospitalizations and ER visits for high-risk patients. Her work emphasizes the integration of healthcare technology, automation, and machine learning. Notably, Dr. Pulicharam has invented and patented a groundbreaking population health platform (Caret Health), which achieved a remarkable 57% reduction in hospitalizations and ER visits for high-risk elderly patients with multiple comorbid conditions.

On this episode of the Healthcare Plus Podcast, Quint Studer hosts Dr. Stephanie Montgomery, Partner, Build a Brain, Build a Life, Build a Community, an organization committed to equipping every parent with the knowledge and tools needed to maximize their child’s brain capacity from day one. Stephanie’s career began in the classroom, where she developed a zeal for improving educational outcomes and a passion for literacy and learning. She’s now turned her interest toward early brain development and is leveraging her experience to inform, equip, and support parents and caregivers across the U.S.

Their discussion emphasizes the importance of collaborative efforts between healthcare systems and pediatricians to integrate brain-building practices into routine care settings. This includes nurse training videos, scripting assistance, coaching sessions, and partnership calls to inform healthcare providers about effective brain development strategies for young children. The end goal? To ensure consistent support for parents to nurture their child’s cognitive growth and create lasting positive outcomes for families and communities.

To learn more, interested parties can visit BuildABrainNow.com or contact Stephanie Montgomery directly via email.

Additional Resources:
- Video on Childhood Brain Development (5 minutes)
- Website: BuildABrainNow.com
- TMW Newborn Implementation Trial

About Stephanie Montgomery, Ed.D.
Stephanie is a native Georgian with over 24 years of experience in education and community partnerships. Stephanie has served Northwest Georgia as a School Improvement Specialist in literacy and academic achievement. She has worked as an ELA Specialist and liaison to help strengthen relationships between state and local school systems. Through this work, she has developed a unique lens for identifying issues related to readiness skills and achievement gaps. She is skilled at working with teams to bridge the gap between knowledge and research, helping put policy into practice. Stephanie has also served as a classroom teacher, district-level curriculum coordinator, and grant writer.

Stephanie serves students and families in her community through various non-profit organizations. She works with the Get Georgia Reading campaign, Ferst Readers, and library task force committees to bolster access to literacy resources. As a Commission on Children and Youth Executive Board member, she assists in strategic planning and developing educational programming. Committed to sharing her passion for literacy and learning, Stephanie continues to tutor students with academic challenges and learning disabilities in her spare time.

On this episode of The Healthcare Plus Podcast, hosts Quint Studer and Dan Collard are joined by special guests Nick Porter and Tracy Jansen to announce the formation of the Post-Acute Leadership Institute (PALI), a leadership development program designed to help post-acute organizations and leaders succeed.

Tracy and Nick are both founding members and executives of the Post-Acute Executive HR Roundtable, a national network of peers who come together to share best-practices, vendor management solutions, and ideas around leveraging a new digital experience for HR professionals. The Roundtable has joined forces with Healthcare Plus Solutions Group, co-founded by Quint and Dan, to launch this new initiative and bring much needed leader development solutions to both their member organizations and the broader post-acute industry.

In this 30-minute episode, you’ll learn more about:

• Challenges facing post-acute leaders both pre- and post-pandemic and the critical need for specialized leadership development to tackle staffing shortages
• The newly published book, “Rewiring Leadership in Post-Acute Healthcare” authored by Quint Studer and Dan Collard with input from post-acute industry leaders
• The launch of the Post-Acute Leadership Institute (PALI), kicking off July 2024, to help leaders navigate the complexities of the post-acute care environment and achieve improved outcomes

To learn more about the Post-Acute Leadership Institute or order your copy of “Rewiring Leadership in Post-Acute Healthcare”, visit www.thePALI.org or contact info@thePALI.org.

About Tracy Jansen

Tracy Jansen, SPHR is the Chief Executive Officer of GIGCS, LLC, an executive search firm specialized in serving the post-acute industry and the Chief Operating Officer of the Post-Acute Executive HR Roundtable. Over the past 20 years, she served in the industry as Chief Human Resources Officer for Signature HealthCare, Consulate Healthcare and Golden Living. She is a purpose driven, faith forward, solution focused HR and operations executive with an expertise in strategic planning, operations management, mergers and acquisitions, leadership development, talent acquisition and culture building.

Tracy strives to fulfill her purpose by using her business acumen, empathy and influence to continually serve our most vulnerable population and bring executives together to forge new pathways to greater quality of life for all.

About Nick Porter

Nick Porter is the President of Premier Workforce Solutions and has been serving the post-acute industry for more than ten years. After a decade of effectively leading hospitals and long-term care organizations through successful large-scale transformations in the benefits, compensation, and employee total rewards space, Mr. Porter formed Premier Workforce Solutions, LLC. Premier Workforce Solutions is an innovative HR Consulting Firm that delivers customized, affordable, integrated HR solutions specializing in the post-acute industry.

In January 2023, Mr. Porter expanded as CEO and Co-Owner of the Executive Roundtable, LLC. The Roundtable’s mission is to expand Executive HR leadership proficiency and value-add throughout the Post-Acute Care Continuum by providing access to a national network of peers, for exploration of best practices, real-time information sharing, and vendor management.