In this Q&A, Madhu Narasimhan, chief information officer at DaVita, discusses how DaVita integrates innovation with compassionate care, empowering both patients and caregivers.

What do you see as the biggest and most exciting opportunities that advancements in technology are offering in healthcare today?

Technology has radically transformed so much of our world, continuously redefining what is possible. You can find examples everywhere. Not long ago I was watching the Super Bowl, and what I noticed is that even in football, you see just how much has changed thanks to technology.

The core remains the same: the talent, endurance and commitment of the players and coaching staff. But the tools at their disposal have evolved. Advanced analytics, communications capabilities from the sideline to the field, highly sophisticated training programs based on data from each play and every player. It's clear that technology has created a whole new set of opportunities.

This mirrors what’s unfolding in many aspects of our society, including healthcare. Technology isn’t just a tool — it’s a catalyst for change, a force for good that can have a positive impact on millions of lives every day.

It’s one of the reasons I’m here at DaVita and working in healthcare: We have the opportunity to use data in new ways and create solutions to provide more comprehensive, connected kidney care.

People can practice their craft in multiple ways, but when you’re able to practice it in a way that has a mission and purpose of caring for others? There’s nothing more exciting than that.

Interoperability is a major challenge in healthcare today. How is DaVita working to build and improve connected platforms that enable seamless data sharing across the healthcare ecosystem?

Interoperability is the key to delivering a truly seamless care experience. And as we work to unlock new capabilities, we need to think about interoperability in two ways.

For more than 7 years, DaVita has built a set of kidney-specific applications for clinical documentation by our teammates, for care management by physicians and for engagement with our patients. Bringing these tools together — making data and insights available and leveraging it consistently across our platform — means we can deliver the right information at the right time, so the people can find, in real time, the information that matters most to them.

We also know our patients often experience multiple co-morbidities and see several specialists. Thinking externally about interoperability will mean bringing their clinical data together to help improve the t full care experience. It’s a big challenge that we’re working on with our partners, but ultimately, if we succeed it helps interdisciplinary teams deliver comprehensive, patient-centric care.

How do you see the integration of advanced health technologies — like AI and machine learning — impacting patients directly, and how will it transform kidney care delivery in the next few years?

There is tremendous potential for how we can support the care experience. Our goal as technologists is to know the art of the possible and bring it to life while staying true to DaVita’s purpose and values.

At DaVita, we put people at the center of everything we do, which drives our pursuit of a healthier tomorrow. Technology becomes an enabler for that: We utilize it to advance equitable access to care, unlock improved experiences for patients, clinicians and teammates. One of the things that comes to mind for me is the sense of control that patients can often feel like they lose when they’re diagnosed with a chronic disease. So, we want to use technology to empower them, and that includes creating the right tools for both patients and caregivers.

With AI, for example, we’ve been exploring how teammates review medical records, and opportunities to use the technology to create the best possible view of our patients’ unique needs, which could help clinicians decide next steps in care plans. We also see the potential to leverage AI to better engage our patients through modality and treatment education as well as nutrition guidance, giving them additional ways to actively take part in their care.

What’s important is to start with understanding how people use tools, also known as Human-Centered Design. For example, we know that 80% of the time someone opens a mobile healthcare app, they check their lab results first. It’s why they log in. So, we make sure that their labs are accessible and easy to find. We build the experience out from there, but we start with the benefit we know we can provide now, based on what our patients most want and need. Using the Human-Centered Design approach for teammates and physicians, we want to move the needle on experience in a differentiated way.

Transformation in health technology has often been considered slower than anticipated — potentially as a tension point between the concepts of “move fast and break things” and “do no harm.” How do you think about the drive to innovate while considering safety?

From my perspective, we want to be — and we can be — fast and safe. It’s a false choice to consider whether we’re going to innovate OR we’re going to be safe.

In healthcare, it has to be both.

Patient safety, IT security and data privacy are all top priorities, and they guide how we think about the pace of innovation. These principles have helped us build the proper governance to facilitate innovation, especially in AI.  That way we can test and iterate solutions quickly in a safe and secure way, before we decide what goes into our care platform at scale.

And as we develop new capabilities, we want to create an environment where we can continue to pursue innovation with both speed and safety as complementary rather than competing priorities.

As a leader at the intersection of healthcare and technology, what advice would you offer to emerging leaders looking to make in impact in the health tech space?

I’m excited to see new possibilities the next generation of leaders will help bring to life. They are digital natives, and the way they think about technology is different than anything we’ve seen before.

I encourage leaders to always be curious; be aware and engaged and learning.

The pace of technology change is exponential. It is important to embrace adaptability and a mindset of continuous learning.

It’s also crucial to surround yourself with people — internal and external to your organization — who offer diverse perspectives on technology as well as your business needs. Collaboration across disciplines will help make the innovations we drive successful.

And lastly, always be bound by the purpose of providing patients with empowerment and choice as well as supporting the entire care team. It’s an incredible privilege to have an opportunity to impact lives the way we do in healthcare.