With so many metrics and mandates shaping healthcare’s current movement toward reform, it’s sometimes easy for those on the front lines of shaping that evolution from the business and technology perspective to focus on trends and solutions – sometimes relegating individual patients to something of an abstraction.
Not so for HX360’s CEO Roy Smythe, who in addition to serving as the Chief Medical Officer of AVIA, a technology-enabled innovation accelerator, writes frequently on the impact of healthcare’s changing landscape on patients, families and communities.
Trained in general, oncologic and cardiothoracic surgery at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received several research and teaching awards, Roy then spent time as a faculty member at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, and Scott & White Healthcare and the Texas A&M College of Medicine. He rose to the rank of tenured professor at both institutions, and eventually department chair and health system innovation leader at the latter.
If you’ve ever wondered how great doctors thrive from an internal sense of caring for others, here is a special treat. Read Roy’s story of the deep impact his earliest experiences with the health care system had on his development as a physician here: https://willandreason.wordpress.com/2013/06/29/trephines-and-circles/
Daddy always told me not to put my hand out of the window of the car when it was moving… He told me that another little boy had his “cut clean off at the elbow” once when his mother drove too close to a fencepost. I glanced over at him to see if he was looking, saw that he wasn’t, and eased my right hand out and over the partially rolled-down thick safety glass.
I opened my fingers out wide, and let the wind whistle through them… then, I put them together, and let the force of the wind push my partially cupped hand backward until my forearm bumped into the door frame… open – forward.., closed – back.., open – forward.., closed – back… I looked at my palm, and that made me think about my baseball glove… that in turn made me think about the baseball game that I wouldn’t be able to play on my little league team that evening. I frowned. Continue reading…
Meet HX360 CEO Roy Smythe at HX360's Inaugural event in Chicago, IL at McCormick Place West, co-located with HIMSS Annual Conference: http://www.hx360.org/content/registration