Obesity Managment a Specialized Treatment Beyond the Clinic
A Conversation with Drs. Louis Aronne and Katherine Saunders
In 2017, Dr. Aronne, along with his first clinical fellow, Dr. Katherine Saunders, and her husband Sloan Saunders, an entrepreneur, founded Intellihealth. Their aim was to develop a software solution that could effectively scale this specialized treatment beyond the clinic to meet the magnitude of the epidemic. For the previous decade, Dr. Aronne had been working to digitize his approach and data in the form of an innovative platform called BMIQ, which ultimately would serve as the foundation for Intellihealth. To build on the success of BMIQ, they assembled a world class team of multidisciplinary medical professionals, expert software engineers and healthcare industry veterans to create a platform that could easily integrate into any practice and enable any provider to administer specialized obesity treatment to patients, both remotely and in-person. The result was Evolve, which launched in 2020 and is already being used at several major hospital systems.
Louis Aronne, MD – Executive Chairman and Chief Medical Officer at Intellihealth, Sanford I. Weill Professor of Metabolic Research
Twitter: @Intellihealth1
Twitter: @ljaronne
Katherine Saunders, MD – Co-Founder at Intellihealth and Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College
Twitter: @Intellihealth1
Listen to the Conversation
Episode Takeaways
- Weight management care – expert medical care addressing obesity – has gone digital and Drs. Louis Aronne and Katherine Saunders combine science, patient care and technology to help manage the national public health epidemic.
- Weight management cannot be put off till later. COVID-19 shifted weight from a chronic condition and highlighted that it is a tipping point for acute risk and death.
- Obesity is the highway to diabetes, cancer, heart and respiratory disease, but there are only 100 weight-care medical specialists in the US – the need outstrips expert care. Health tech is part of the care solution.
- Treating obesity is both a life- and money-saver but employers and the health system are ill-equipped to manage the challenge. We have sick-care management in place – not a healthcare system. Wellness is an afterthought.
- Drs. Aronne and Saunders have applied their work at Weil-Cornell Medical Center to launch Intellihealth so that their research and clinical best practices can be available to physicians and patients nationwide
- Overweight people struggle to keep the weight off and often the metabolic risks remain after people trim down. Weight management expertise enables people to remain on track and get healthy.
Hosts
Gil Bashe
Managing Partner, Chair Global Health, FINN Partners
Twitter: @Gil_Bashe
LinkedIn: Gil Bashe
Gregg Masters
Founder & Managing Director, Health Innovation Media
Twitter: @GreggMastersMPH
LinkedIn: Gregg Masters, MPH
About the Show
Join digital health advocate and author Gil Bashe, on Health UnaBASHEd, as he discusses the power of collaboration and innovation in improving care across the health ecosystem. Sharing stories and insights from a global perspective, Gil looks at the companies and people who are making a difference and offers his opinions on how to connect the dots to transform the industry for good.
On the radio weekdays at 10:30 am, 6:30 pm, & 2:30 am ET.
