Lifers with Christina Farr

Mary Varghese Presti, Corporate Vice President and COO, Microsoft Health & Life Sciences, started her career as a pediatric nurse. She joins Christina Farr to talk about why she wants nurses to demand technology the way physicians do, and what AI has to prove before it's trusted on the clinical side. They get into why nurses have nobody to delegate to, Microsoft's work with Stanford on an agentic tumor board aimed at treatment decisions in days rather than weeks, and her pick between GLP-1s and AI at one, five and ten years. —Join Christina for upcoming webinars:10/8 - Why Are Hospitals Hiring Chief AI Officers? https://streamyard.com/watch/VjvVZiDN8ZMH 10/13 - Verifying AI in Medicine: Is Healthcare AI Actually Ready for Deployment? https://streamyard.com/watch/GwsSXwdikhMw 10/28 - Type 2 Diabetes & Cardiometabolic Care: Wearables, AI & GLP-1s https://streamyard.com/watch/uAuwCzUEJTCF 11/3 - Is It Finally the Moment for Alternative Plan Design? https://streamyard.com/watch/ereM3aB58XK4 —LINKS: Microsoft Dragon Copilot: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/health-solutions/clinical-workflow/dragon-copilot Healthcare Agent Orchestrator: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-cloud/blog/healthcare/2025/05/19/developing-next-generation-cancer-care-management-with-multi-agent-orchestration/ "Nursing Is the Surefire New Path to American Prosperity.": https://www.asrn.org/journal-nursing/3467-nursing-is-the-surefire-new-path-to-american-prosperity.html Lifers episode with Peter Lee: https://youtu.be/lxWYV1rNqR4  Chrissy Farr on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LiferswithChristinaFarr Chrissy Farr on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cfarr/ Subscribe to the Second Opinion Newsletter: https://secondopinion.media/ Chrissy’s Book: The Storyteller's Advantage: https://www.chrissyfarr.com/books  —FOLLOW:Mary:https://www.linkedin.com/in/maryvarghese/ https://x.com/MaryVPresti  Chrissy:https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinafarr/ https://x.com/chrissyfarr  Second Opinion Media:https://www.instagram.com/second.opinion.media/ https://x.com/second_op_media  —TIMESTAMPS:(00:00) Lead in(00:32) Intro(02:08) AI in healthcare hits scale(03:40) Why nursing is the next frontier(05:24) The LLM lightbulb moment(07:35) From hype to pragmatism(11:28) Nurses fear and job security(15:02) Admin bloat and incentives(18:24) Burnout and nursing documentation(20:55) Agentic workflows at the bedside(25:42) Caregiving and consumer copilots(30:20) Learning to trust AI answers(34:28) Clinical AI trust and regulation(39:35) AI and expanding disease definitions(44:22) How AI could reshape care teams(51:41) One five ten year predictions(52:45) Wrap  

Christina Farr sits down with Munjal Shah, Co-founder and CEO, Hippocratic AI, to ask whether clinical AI will shrink healthcare's workforce, and who is on the hook when it makes a mistake. Munjal explains his Copilot, Autopilot, and Infinite Pilot framework, and why the use cases that have worked best are ones healthcare never thought to try, like calling 50,000 people during a New York heat wave. He also walks through a lung cancer screening outreach that he says found three cancers for $1,700 in AI costs. Dive into the Granola notes from this episode: https://notes.granola.ai/t/4789bb35-2eae-443a-b661-87336b480365-009c2hma —SPONSOR: Granola If meetings are eating up your day, Granola is a no-brainer. You can try it totally free - just head to https://granola.ai/LIFERS  —Join Christina for upcoming webinars:9/17 - Top Employers Share What Healthcare Startups Need to Know in 2026 - https://www.secondopinion.media/employers-as-healthcare-purchasers-how-startups-can-break-in/ 9/22 - Where are AI Agents Actually Working in Healthcare, and Why? - https://streamyard.com/watch/42HnpJFgxNT4 9/24 - Healthcare AI Has an ROI Problem - https://www.secondopinion.media/ama-with-aaron-miri/ 10/8 - Why Are Hospitals Hiring Chief AI Officers? - https://streamyard.com/watch/VjvVZiDN8ZMH —LINKS: Dr. John Whyte & Zeke Emanuel on Lifers: https://youtu.be/WTnZ6W7qsLQ Hippocratic AI: https://hippocraticai.com/ "Will Autonomous AI Exceed AI-Aided Physicians as the Best Medical Care?" on JAMA: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2852952 Taking doctors out of the AI loop (on Second Opinion): https://www.secondopinion.media/taking-doctors-out-of-the-ai-loop/ Orca paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.02707  Chrissy Farr on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LiferswithChristinaFarr Chrissy Farr on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cfarr/ Subscribe to the Second Opinion Newsletter: https://secondopinion.media/ Chrissy’s Book: The Storyteller's Advantage: https://www.chrissyfarr.com/books  —FOLLOW:Munjal:https://www.linkedin.com/in/munjalshah747/ https://x.com/munjalshah  Chrissy:https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinafarr/ https://x.com/chrissyfarr  Second Opinion Media:https://www.instagram.com/second.opinion.media/ https://x.com/second_op_media  —TIMESTAMPS:(00:00) Lead in(00:42) Intro(01:51) AI extinction panic weekend(04:47) Healthcare as AI risk target(06:56) Hippocratic safety system(09:20) Avoiding the AI doctor trap(12:34) Sponsor: Granola(13:33) Liability and taking responsibility(16:08) Building redundancy and clinical team(18:30) Will AI shrink healthcare jobs(20:38) Infinite Pilot ROI examples(26:41) Business traction and growth metrics(31:53) Simple pricing per minute(34:36) Fixing AI PR with specifics(40:06) Wrap

SHOW NOTES Miriam Paramore, Founder and CEO of RxUtility, joins Christina Farr for a conversation that moves from caregiving for aging parents to the hidden economics of American healthcare. Miriam, who has spent over 40 years in health tech and finance, argues that AI won't fix rural health's transportation and staffing gaps, that hospitals should redeploy billing staff into home care roles instead of cutting them, and that pharmacist gag laws keep patients from ever learning a drug's real cash price (in one case, $2.18 versus a $10 copay for the same generic). Miriam also pushes to get women talking openly about money, deal flow, and investing, the same way men already do. Dive into the Granola notes from this episode: —SPONSOR: Granola If meetings are eating up your day, Granola is a no-brainer. You can try it totally free - just head to https://granola.ai/LIFERS  —Join Christina for upcoming webinars:9/17 - Top Employers Share What Healthcare Startups Need to Know in 2026 - https://www.secondopinion.media/employers-as-healthcare-purchasers-how-startups-can-break-in/ 9/22 - Where are AI Agents Actually Working in Healthcare, and Why? - https://streamyard.com/watch/42HnpJFgxNT4 9/24 - Healthcare AI Has an ROI Problem - https://www.secondopinion.media/ama-with-aaron-miri/ 10/8 - Why Are Hospitals Hiring Chief AI Officers? - https://streamyard.com/watch/VjvVZiDN8ZMH —LINKS: RxUtility: http://rxutility.com/ WBL, Women Business Leaders of the US Health Care Industry: https://www.wbl.org/  Chrissy Farr on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LiferswithChristinaFarr Chrissy Farr on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cfarr/ Subscribe to the Second Opinion Newsletter: https://secondopinion.media/ Chrissy’s Book: The Storyteller's Advantage: https://www.chrissyfarr.com/books  —FOLLOW:Miriam:https://www.linkedin.com/in/miriamparamore/ https://x.com/mparamore  Chrissy:https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinafarr/ https://x.com/chrissyfarr  Second Opinion Media:https://www.instagram.com/second.opinion.media/ https://x.com/second_op_media  —TIMESTAMPS:(00:00) Lead in(00:34) Intro(02:25) Sandwich generation caregiving(03:32) Rural health reality check(07:21) Human care vs AI hype(10:38) Redeploying rev cycle labor(17:37) Value based care skepticism(21:08) Sponsor: Granola(21:54) Cutting admin friction(24:41) Incentives and who loses(28:02) Rise of cash healthcare(30:44) Universal basics and deductibles(32:13) Concierge and telehealth wins(33:26) Opting out with DPC(35:01) Health systems missed UX(35:46) Cash care and HIPAA(37:32) Drug pricing blind spots(39:39) Cash prices and savings(40:41) Who to trust navigating(43:48) Consumerism and AI future(46:01) Women talking money(51:15) Investing in friends(57:25) Mentorship and rejection(58:25) Where to find Miriam(59:03) Wrap  

Christina Farr sits down with Peter Lee, President of Microsoft Science, and Dr. Christopher Longhurst, the new CEO of Seattle Children's, to take stock of where AI in healthcare actually stands versus where the headlines say it is. They get into why ambient scribes still haven't produced a clean financial win, Chris's prediction that within three to five years a physician assistant augmented by AI may practice at the level of the best general pediatrician, and the three Cs he argues will keep humans in the loop: competence, communication, and character. Peter closes on the risk he worries about most, which is people using AI to hide from accountability on consequential decisions. Dive into the Granola notes from this episode: https://notes.granola.ai/t/54b78860-bad6-4057-afa8-0d61fe4750c0-009c2hma —SPONSOR: Granola If meetings are eating up your day, Granola is a no-brainer. You can try it totally free - just head to https://granola.ai/LIFERS  —Join Christina for upcoming webinars:9/17 - Top Employers Share What Healthcare Startups Need to Know in 2026 - https://www.secondopinion.media/employers-as-healthcare-purchasers-how-startups-can-break-in/ 9/22 - Where are AI Agents Actually Working in Healthcare, and Why? - https://streamyard.com/watch/42HnpJFgxNT4 9/24 - Healthcare AI Has an ROI Problem - https://www.secondopinion.media/ama-with-aaron-miri/ —LINKS: Compared with What? Measuring AI against the Health Care We Have: https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMp2404691 Why are humans still in the loop with advancing AI capabilities?: https://bmjdigitalhealth.bmj.com/content/2/1/e000057  Chrissy Farr on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LiferswithChristinaFarr Chrissy Farr on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cfarr/ Subscribe to the Second Opinion Newsletter: https://secondopinion.media/ Chrissy’s Book: The Storyteller's Advantage: https://www.chrissyfarr.com/books  —FOLLOW:Peter:https://www.linkedin.com/in/peterlee4/ https://x.com/peteratmsr  Chris:https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrislonghurst/ https://x.com/CALonghurst  Chrissy:https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinafarr/ https://x.com/chrissyfarr  Second Opinion Media:https://www.instagram.com/second.opinion.media/ https://x.com/second_op_media —TIMESTAMPS:(00:00) Lead in(00:28) Intro(01:23) A massive moment(04:01) Red pill ER reality(06:12) Mission control and upskilling(07:13) Tech leaders as CEOs(09:27) Ambient scribes and costs(13:43) Hierarchy versus efficiency(15:23) Full stack healthcare workforce(18:09) Sponsor: Granola(18:55) Rethinking training and roles(21:36) Bending the back office curve(23:12) Admin jobs and AI skills(27:50) Self driving cars benchmarking(30:11) AI exceptionalism and agents(32:59) Autonomy in clinical care(36:25) Humans in the loop(39:27) Accountability and responsibility(41:37) Frontier models beat specialists(46:35) Workflow interoperability and wrap(47:53) Wrap

Nick Reber, Founder and CEO, Garner Health talks with Chrissy about why the most consequential decision in healthcare, which doctor you actually see, is the one patients have the least information about. After four spine surgeries for a problem that turned out to be in his neck, Nick left Bridgewater, spent time on the leadership team at Oscar Health, and started Garner to put physician performance data and financial incentives in front of employees. They get into the 4x variation in complication rates between the best and worst quartile of doctors inside the same brand-name hospital system, why price in healthcare tracks market share rather than quality, and what happened when he brought that data to large academic medical centers while building provider networks at the health plan. Dive into the Granola notes from this episode: https://notes.granola.ai/t/3487c811-86da-4c10-a79d-27d21625e2c7-009c2hma —SPONSOR: Granola If meetings are eating up your day, Granola is a no-brainer. You can try it totally free - just head to granola.ai/LIFERS —LINKS: Garner Health: https://garnerhealth.com Garner's Series E: https://garnerhealth.com/blog/ai-will-fix-healthcare-but-it-needs-help ProPublica Surgeon Scorecard: https://projects.propublica.org/surgeons/ Nick Reber, Sequoia founder profile: https://sequoiacap.com/founder/nick-reber/  Chrissy Farr on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LiferswithChristinaFarr Chrissy Farr on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cfarr/ Subscribe to the Second Opinion Newsletter: https://secondopinion.media/ Chrissy’s Book: The Storyteller's Advantage: https://www.chrissyfarr.com/books  —FOLLOW:Nick: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nickreber/ https://x.com/nickpreber  Chrissy:https://www.linkedin.com/in/christinafarr/ https://x.com/chrissyfarr  Second Opinion Media:https://www.instagram.com/second.opinion.media/ https://x.com/second_op_media  —TIMESTAMPS:(00:00) Lead in(00:33) Intro(00:54) Meet Nick Reber(01:43) Patient origin story(04:32) Bridgewater lessons(07:30) Startup mindset(09:53) Why healthcare wins(15:28) Sponsor: Granola(16:15) What Garner does(20:45) Doctor quality variation(22:21) Cost versus quality(24:40) Why plans cannot share(27:03) Employer system origins(32:24) Fixing incentives(34:46) Should data be public(37:25) Quiet unicorn growth(39:11) Selling through brokers(42:40) Future plan designs(46:41) AI and team structure(51:06) Wrap