Healthcare Pioneers

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W four WN Radio. This is
Beyond Confidence with your host w Park.

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Do you want to live a more
fulfilling life? Do you want to live

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your legacy and achieve your personal,
professional, and financial goals? Well?

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Coming up on voparks Beyond Confidence,
you will hear real stories of leaders,

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entrepreneurs, and achievers who have stepped
into discomfort, shattered their status quo,

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and are living the life they want. You will learn how relationships are the

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key to achieving your aspirations and financial
goals. Moving your career business forward does

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not have to happen at the expense
of your personal or family life, or

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vice versa. Learn more at wwdas
you don't divpork dot com and you can

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connect with div ant contact at divpark
dot com. This is beyond confidence and

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now here's your host, div Park. Good morning. So thrilled to be

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here with y'all. It is just
amazing and fascinating because it's Tuesday. So

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I want to share a wonderful story
that happened very recently. So I was

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doing a workshop and the workshop was
around the challenge of change. And what

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was interesting was as we were going
through that, what is change? And

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one thing that we drove home as
I was working with my cohote of leaders

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that change is certain. Nothing else
is certain. And what was interesting was

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that there were few people in there
who wanted to leave a little bit earlier

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so that they would avoid hitting traffic. And then all of a sudden,

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what happened was because we went through
certain principles in there, one of them

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being appreciative inquiry, and they thought, you know what, there are other

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people who are driving longer, so
if you change times, it will impact

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others. And what was beautiful was
about that was that right there within that

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one day, you're seeing this caring. I mean, I'm sure these are

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very caring people, but they are
thinking and applying the principles right there and

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then, and that translated into kindness
thinking about others. So it's also important

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for you to take a moment.
I'm not saying that you've got to think

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about others all the time, but
spend that time. It's just an eye

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a month, which is not a
lot, thinking about others with no strings

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attached and see what you can do
for them. Another thing to keep in

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mind is that if you are looking
to enhance your life, if you are

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looking to become the better version of
yourself and elevate yourself, whether in business

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or in leadership, are two books. Expert to Influencer will help you position

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yourself as a leader for impact and
the Entrepreneurs Got In will help you create

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that wonderful harmony between life and work
and your business. Not only that,

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you help us with part of the
proceeds going to keywa dot org where we

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are helping other entrepreneurs. So thank
you again for joining us, and let's

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bring our guests in. Welcome Michael, Good morning, DV. How are

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you doing well? So good to
have you? A should be stought out

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sometime in your childhood or early teens. Is there a moment or a person

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that impacted you positively, and if
you still remember that moment or person to

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this day, you know to still
to this day. Some people may not

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have been exposed. But I wrestled
in high school and I was on the

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wrestling team. And I'm not sure
if you're familiar, but every morning before

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you wrestled in a meet, you'd
have to weigh in, and you'd have

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to weigh in to make sure that
you were at the weight you were wrestling

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at. And so one morning I
came in and I was a quarter of

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a pound overweight, and I thought
to myself as I looked at the coach,

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because that's who is weighing us in. It's just a quarter of a

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pound. And he said to me
that, you know what, do you

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want to win and not have the
credit for doing it because you cheated?

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And at that point I put on
a sweatsuit and wet and ran. But

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I've always remembered the fact that taking
a shortcut isn't ever worth it without putting

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in the effort. And so that's
one of the examples I think that's always

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stuck with me. I've never heard
of that. So let me ask you

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this this begs the next question.
So then you say, the weight doesn't

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have to be exact. So let's
say the wage is two hundred and ten

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or is there a rage, No, you have to weigh two hundred and

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ten or less, and that your
scales are calibrated so that you when you

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come in to weigh in, you
know that the person you're going to wrestle

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that night weighed in also and is
at least two hundred and ten or less.

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And that was the criteria. And
I was a quarter of a pound

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over my way. It was not
two hundred and ten. It was one

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hundred and twenty five. But in
high school and I had to make that

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weight and I knew it coming in, but I might you know, I

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just didn't put in the effort the
night before because I thought I'll be close.

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But his credibility, what he built
right there was what I've always considered

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a character builder because by showing me
that there's no value in cheating, it

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also, which carried on in other
parts of my life in the future,

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just really set the framework and the
groundwork for other things. As you dealt

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with business and you look at things
on what's right and what's wrong. Yeah,

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no, that is powerful because it
is not about doing the right things

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when somebody is watching us. It
is about doing the right things when nobody's

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watching. Because you're always watching.
You know who you are and where you

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stand and that inner strength, and
as you develop that character, that's what

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gives one confidence and the courage to
keep on going after giant leaves, even

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when you're taking baby steps. So
share with us, like you know you

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were in wrestling, and what were
your interest and were what happened in your

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life next? Well, during high
school, I had a instructor. This

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was again back in the sixties early
seventies, and I had an instructor had

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access to the IBM data center at
night, and he took a small group

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of us from class. It would
allow us to go in and be exposed

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to that environment to see what it
really was at that time. And at

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that time, if you can imagine, it was punch cards. So you

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literally over him with punch cards.
But it created a spark in me and

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I became a computer science major in
college. And that's really what kind of

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the experience that drove me. Then
as I continue to wrestle through college and

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with an interest in computer science at
the same time, and then after college

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computer science continued to carry on my
career. And this goes back again to

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exposure. And then people are exposed, and especially the young ones, whether

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it is primary school, you know, elementary school, or middle school or

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high school, and kids are exposed. If they're not exposed, they don't

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know if they like it or not, So all the more reason to get

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exposure to different things to see,
you know, what takes your fancy or

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what catches your passion, so to
speak. So at that time, people

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in tech were not as prevalent as
that now. So as you kind of

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continued your career, when did you
go next? Actually, after college,

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I went to work for AT and
T Corporate and it was about the time

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when Judge Green I still remember the
name, broke up AT and T.

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And you may not remember this.
In nineteen eighty four the government stepped in

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and broke up AT and T because
they considered them having a monopoly. A

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lot of people aren't aware that AT
and T was the largest computer maker in

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the world. The only difference was
the fact that they bought every computer for

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themselves that they made, so even
though they were bigger than IBM, they

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never sold had ever sold one computer. So when Judge Green stepped in broke

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up AT and T Corporate, we
had a meeting and so they were looking

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to start a computer division that would
offer AT and T computers to the commercial

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market. So, having a compside
background, we met in a room and

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they said, who in this room
is interested in getting involved in starting up

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this new company. There's obviously a
risk, but we're going to back you,

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obviously because we were backed by Bell
Labs and AT and T. Funny

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enough, it's always one of the
things watch what you volunteer for. I

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was the only person in the room
that raised his hand, and so at

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that point I found helped to found
in the state of Iowa, AT and

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T Computer Systems, and then started
a six year career introducing the market to

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ATT computers that hadn't never been sold
before. They had their limits, I

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had their strengths, but those that's
how I really got started in the commercial

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side of computer programming. Very interesting, So what was it that made you

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raise your hand? You know,
it was the the interest that I felt,

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like my experience of already through high
school, the small exposure college obviously

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studying it. I was very comfortable
and analytic to where the rest of the

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group was more of a marketing organization
marketing AT and T solutions to business customers.

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So when the topic came up,
I felt like I was maybe uniquely

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qualified to do that, and not
because of deep experience, but at least

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the exposure I'd had to tackle it. And again, sometimes that entrepreneurial spirit

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that you don't define it as that
till after because at the time, you

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just it interest you and you pursue
it. And that's what really started and

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launched my entire career. Actually very
interesting. So as you were growing the

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company, what would you say,
you know, as you mentioned that it

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was the first time AT and D
computers were on the market, what would

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you say were a few hiccups that
you experienced or some lessons Because what has

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happened after pandemic is there are a
lot of millennials and gen z who want

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to start up their own company and
they're out there, but these big dreams.

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So what I want to discuss today
is and I love that, I

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love that that they want to start
their companies, but we want to help

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them position themselves for success rather than
finding that it's just a dream, because

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dreams without a strong foundation can break
very quickly. Yeah, the exposure that

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I had is the fact that actually
the hiccup created and caused me to leave

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the company. So because I was
in the market every day offering to clients

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AT and T solutions, but the
clients were coming back asking for things that

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AT and T couldn't offer, even
though I knew they were available, and

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so, being a very captive company, would not sell that technology to the

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client. But it was available.
So I actually quit AT and T on

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a Friday and stopped into my office
on Monday and made a sales call on

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my boss, and I said,
I know I can design exactly what the

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clients are wanting. I can build
it, and then you'll win because you'll

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be selling AT and T computers.
And so my boss actually became my first

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client the monday after I quit,
and soon after that then I built and

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programmed programs for some of the large
Ladies home journal magazine. If you can

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imagine this, I wrote all the
software to automate the magazine, and until

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I did that, the magazine was
done on typewriters. And so that'll give

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you an idea of the automation of
the time, where it was where I

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was in the market. So it's
actually that hiccup was that frustration that I

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a AT and T knew they had
a solution for the client that they didn't

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wouldn't offer it, but I knew
I could, so I decided to leave.

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And on top of that, I
still remember the evening I came came

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home to tell my wife. She
was six months pregnant, and my mother

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in law happened to be there and
she said, you what is At that

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point, I'd had a very successful
career at AT and T, and so

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I decided that it was time to
do this. It was an opportunity and

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I thought I would grasp it definitely. So what I'm hearing is that you

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saw what the market needed because there
was that gap they were looking for the

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technology. And then that is the
key, because so many times what happens

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is people have an idea, people
think that, yes, this is going

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to be great, let me market
it, and then build a whole company

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without even testing, which is you
know, going fit to market. So

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tell us a little bit more about
that. Well, if you keep in

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mind of what I just said,
Actually, I've been in the market test

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marketing as an AT and T employee, so I already knew what the market

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wanted, and after a few years, had really validated it and had a

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few conversations with clients that if you
could get this from AT and T,

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would you buy it? And then
I would just say I wouldn't offer to

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do it for them, but let
me go to bat for you internally.

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And after hitting some walls there,
I found that the opportunity was real.

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I had validated it. And that's
the thing you really kind of hit on

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something is so many entrepreneurs just jump
in because they think it's a great idea,

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but don't have any firsthand experience or
experience in that space because they think

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it's a great idea. And I
used to consult with the PhD program at

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a college, and it was with
their Center for Advanced Technology Development. Because

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every PhD has a great idea,
but it's not a business. There's more

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great ideas on the shelf than there
are businesses. And so that was the

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idea, is to parse that because
if anybody this is an old, old

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book. It's called Crossing the Chasm
by Jeffrey Moore, and it's a book

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I've used as guidance through my career, and it talks about how there's a

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chasm between an idea developing and going
to mar and then you're the biggest The

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biggest thing you have of failure is
early success because that early success distracts you

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what drove you to start the company, because you're so buried in delivering that

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first product, and then that the
problem is entrepreneurship steps in and you want

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the perfect product. So you continue
to try to build the perfect product,

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which you shouldn't really ever do,
and you hit a chasm where you now

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start to run out of resources,
you run out of money, and then

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can you get across that chasm and
survive with the clients that you have.

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So it's an interesting guidebook, very
old, but it's something that helped a

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lot as I started my career.
Well, here's what I'll say that books

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never get old because especially if the
principles are timeless, right and we know,

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like one of the books that is
classic, right, Think and Grow

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Rich by Napoleon Hill, and it
still stands true to this day. So

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some principles just don't go out of
trend because human nature, regardless of wherever

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we are whether we are an industrial
age, information age or now AI age.

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It's going to change, Yes,
our needs will change, and yet

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the way we approach things, some
of the basic things remain the same.

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So now let's say you know you've
talked about they can go read that book.

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Based on your experience, a young
millennial wants to start their company.

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What are a few things that they
need to keep in mind. Well,

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the biggest concern that even the crossing
the chasm talks about our resources. You

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start having access to resources to be
able to not only reach the market,

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but be able to survive it.
And the key thing is that seems like

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a simple issue, but what it
also does is it validates the idea with

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other people because you and ask friends
and family, maybe angel investors, usually

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early stage or myth you're lucky enough
if your idea is big enough to get

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in front of venture capitalists, and
your idea that'll be vetted as you go

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through and you're going to be asked
questions you hadn't thought of answers for,

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and it'll give you a chance to
continue to vet your idea. Is it

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really viable? Will people buy it? And I had one venture capitalist tell

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me you know, can you prove
to me the dogs will eat the food?

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Will somebody buy this? And so
that's really the thing that I saw

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as a guiding principle is by actually
getting the capital, which you do with

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the idea of well, I just
want to make payroll or pay myself or

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buy some equipment that I need.
But what really the process does of raising

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capital is vets your idea against people
who have a better exposure, a wider

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view of the market, or more
experience, and that gives you then that

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validation. And then obviously if some
of those of your potential customers could be

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those potential investors, that even expands
the opportunity. I really like what you

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hit upon that you're potential customer is
your potential investor, because if they're the

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end user, then they will be
vested in your product. They'll be vested

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in your success. So for example, you know, when you have gone

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through the feed funding, then they
see that if you're making progress, they

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will be more open to give you
a line of credit and help your company

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grow. So going back to you, you know you started this new business

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right when your wife was six months
pregnant, So tell us what was the

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next stop, well, and I
want to expand on what you just said,

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because also having that early client as
a potential partner or investor, it

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also gives you instant feedback on product
improvement because your idea of what the product

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is may not be what the industry
or the market wants, and their feedback

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is invaluable. And I still remember
with early clients then giving me feedback that

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the changes I made were critical in
the success of the product. And so

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but to carry on to your question
from that, I had left, as

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I said, left AT and T. And during this time, unbeknownst to

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me, Creighton University had spent fifty
million dollars building an AI expert system.

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They got done and they didn't know
what to do with it. But AT

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and T was the computer supplier to
Creighton University, so they contacted their AT

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and T rep and they said,
we've got this product. We think it

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should be commercialized, but we don't
know what to do. And so at

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that point the AT and T Rep
says, that's not really what we do.

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But I do know somebody in des
Mouine, Iowa, and I got

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a cold call from Creighton University telling
me this whole story in a lot longer

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form than I just gave it to
you. And so we ended up with

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taking that idea, I said,
and obviously I didn't have the funding to

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outsource, and it's called technology transfer, so I didn't have the funding to

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do a tech transfer deal at that
point. So I took it documented as

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well as I could, and then
went to venture capitalists and laid it out

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to let let them vet the idea. And so I was lucky enough in

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that one of the early venture capitalists
who looked at the idea and did agree

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to fund it actually became a partner
of mine and venture capitalists. I've done

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sixteen rounds of venture capital. He's
participated in every round since I've started.

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We've done two IPOs together, and
he actually just passed last year. But

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by doing that technology transfer, we
then took the rights to that technology integrated

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then expanded the AI and built what
became the first electronic medical record for hospitals

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with integrated AI to ever go public
on NASDAC. And then there was a

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company was later sold to three of
Healthcare. So that was really kind of

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the short path to the leap to
getting into from computer technology into AI.

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Yeah, and This is what is
also telling us about creativity that you may

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not have had and resources at the
time, but you documented it and you

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were able to see that this could
be valuable. So sometimes rather than say

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no to an opportunity, so many
times what happens is that people are risk

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covers, and because they are risk
covers, they will say no to an

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opportunity. So sometimes when there is
lack of experience, youngsters or millennials or

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gen z may be thinking should I
go or should I not go for this

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opportunity. So you saw something in
two opportunities as to what we have talked

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about, what could they like,
you know, how could they process an

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opportunity and vetted in a way that
well, you can never conform anything fully

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because that's what the life is.
You take an opportunity, you go with

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it. But what could they do
so that would give them a certain level

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of comfort before taking that day.
I found that as I've started businesses,

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I drilled down to become as knowledgeable
as I could in that topic, even

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to a point of becoming an expert. And so I knew that, and

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then the second thing is being an
expert in who the potential client is.

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So For example, I just talked
about the Electric Medical Record Company. A

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big issue I heard as I talked
to doctors and hospitals was thirty five percent

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of the time when the doctor came
to the hospital room to visit the patient,

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the patient chart was not there because
the patient was off having an X

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ray, having tests done. And
back in those days with hard paper electric

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hard paper medical records, the chart
went with the patient, so that doctor's

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visit was wasted, and so doctors
were very inefficient. So the idea came

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that what if I electronic version of
that record and keep that way it was

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available whether you were off having a
test or not, because when the doctor

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came to do rounds, he could
read the most recent test, the most

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recent testing that you'd done, or
even blood pressures and pulses, and so

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now all of a sudden, the
doctor became more efficient. So by validating

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that application, that's one example,
but by making sure that you've got firsthand

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experience in the market as opposed to
I'm going to bring a new idea to

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the market, you do need that
partner, that person who will give you

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that insight to say, yeah,
this is an idea that's worth pursuing or

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no it's not. Then you always
know if they're serious, if they're willing

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to fund it or partner with you
to get it done. So they have

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to have confidence in you to be
able to deliver it, and then obviously

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confidence that you know enough to get
it done, and then obviously be able

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to do it. So I had
a venture capitalist again once tell me that

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there's really three things they look for
in an opportunity to invest in a startup

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company with young people. Is the
fact that they need to make sure is

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their management in place to carry out
the plan? Does the plan have a

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national footprint? So they want to
make sure this isn't a regional solution.

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And can you protect it? Can
you make money and protect it? Because

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the last thing they want to do
is invest in a company an idea and

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then you prove the market and then
somebody sweeps in and copies it, and

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there's always somebody smarter or bigger.
So you have to know that it's protected.

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So is it protectable? Is it
an idea that you know you can

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you can with intellectual property or patents
protect Does it have a national presence or

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footprint? So is it applicable to
people across the country, because then that's

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how you can get an ROI on
your investment. And then obviously are you

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the right person to carry this strategy
out? Oh? Very powerful? So

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is it like you know, is
my interpretation or what I'm thinking is that

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you're the one who created the EMRs. Actually it was a collaboration, So

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the university came out and obviously had
built the early the AI. I had

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the idea for the electronic medical record
because of you'll see in my book that

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I just recently published, I talk
about how this impacted several people in different

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ways that I've described, and so
I saw several challenges and opportunities to do

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that. And then as we transferred
the technology, we found that the AI

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needed to be expanded. So I
did another round of technology investment and actually

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went to two universities gave them the
Having a computer science background, I wrote

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the scope of what we were trying
to accomplish, and then had the two

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universities compete to deliver that, which
they did accomplish. We purchased the rights

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to that from the university and then
embedded it into the product before we took

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a public So it's a mix of
having an idea and then expanding on it

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because just that proved was my single
idea was valuable, but I could make

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it invaluable by doing some of those
other things that I talked about. To

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keep in mind, this was AI
Neural Networks Expert Systems and it was nineteen

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ninety two, so it's been around
for quite a while, and well I

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didn't have anybody to model after,
so I truly was having to blaze some

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new trails. Mm hmm definitely.
And as you mentioned about the idea having

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a national footprint, your is in
like every doctor's office now and I don't

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remember like when it was a law
was passed or something like that that they

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were given a grace period, but
all medical offices and hospitals had to transfer

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to EMRs. And that is just
amazing, Like, you know, what

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an amazing journey that you've had.
So you mentioned that you have taken couple

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of your companies to IPO. Now
when you are private, the journey from

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going from private to becoming an IPO
can be brutal. It can be very

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difficult and can be like adventurous to
roller coaster. So can you like share

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what does it take and what could
people look out for well in that case,

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once the business proves itself, and
what they're looking for is those three

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tenants that I just described earlier,
as are you the right management, is

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the idea viable? And can it
have a great return for investors? Because

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keep in mind, at that point, people are going to invest and the

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big thing that they look for really
is revenue, recurring revenue, and revenue

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that can give that investor in a
public market that buys stock in your company

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a return on that investment. Because
there's so many stocks to pick from,

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they could put it, why we
should they put it in your company as

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opposed to the other companies. So
you have to have a story, this

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unique that looks like you're the next
new thing and that you're going to come

356
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in. And at the point when
we went public, there were only two

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electronic medical record companies in the entire
US ourselves in another company called Clinicom,

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but we were the only one to
go public because that gave us the uniqueness

359
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to carve out a segment of the
market. And so during that process,

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then once you realize that you typically
go to New York, go to Wall

361
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Street because that's where the investment bakers
are, and you tell your story,

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and by telling that story, it
catches somebody's attention and hopefully more than one,

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and then they really give you offers
on taking the company public. Here's

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how we'll structure it, here's what
we'll do, here's the pricing. And

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then at that point you hire an
attorney or attorneyes and you build what's called

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a prospectus and the perspectives then is
really that story, but with all of

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the risk factors identified, because you
don't want anybody to come back and say,

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well, I invested in this,
but you didn't tell me this could

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happen, so you have to think
of everything bad that could happen, so

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you've at least made investors aware of
that. And then you write a perspectus

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and you submit it to the Securities
and Exchange Commission for view. They mark

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it up with a red pen,
so it became known as a red herring,

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so you'd get the red back and
then you'd make your edits and respond

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to those questions, and then at
that point, once you pass that hurdle,

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you then would go and the investment
bankers would get the stock registered,

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and then at that point you would
go public you get a phone call the

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morning of the IPO and it's the
banker saying, here's the price we got.

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Now I should step back and talk
about Once you get that done,

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you also do a roadshow, so
you don't just let the stock doesn't just

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go public. Now, this is
old school, it's not today's world.

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So the new your millennial listeners actually
will probably do this virtually or online.

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But we literally did a road show
where we went city to city through the

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US and Canada and presented our story
to potential investment groups. So the bankers

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would put these groups together. We
would walk in for thirty minutes, tell

385
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our story, and then walk out
and go to the next city. And

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we did that for two week straight. And then they build what's called a

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book. And the book is here
a verbal orders that we've gotten that people

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that like this story. And you
always want your book to be twice as

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big as the number of the shares
of stock that you want to sell,

390
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because you know a lot will cancel
the last day. So then at that

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point you go get ready to trade. You have a symbol, and then

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it starts trading and you get a
call from the banker that these people did

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buy in, and then there's an
entire discussion about institutional investors private investors,

394
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and that discussion carries it on to
how do you maintain a stock price?

395
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But that gives you a little bit
of the path as you go public.

396
00:30:37.319 --> 00:30:42.279
Oh, very comprehensive, Michael,
Thank you. And that's what happens is

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that this is the knowledge that you
have, You've experienced it, and the

398
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way you have shed it is very
insightful. So now going back to your

399
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story, as you went through these
IPOs, you mentioned about bringing it into

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the healthcare system, So tell me
what was it that was driving you to

401
00:31:03.119 --> 00:31:07.160
pursue that route and give us more
insight into that. Well in this I

402
00:31:07.240 --> 00:31:11.519
covered this in in one of the
chapters early in my book, and my

403
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book's called The Untold Story of the
Opioid Crisis in American Healthcare. But I

404
00:31:15.759 --> 00:31:18.519
talked about how the fact that when
I was young, I was diagnosed with

405
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cancer, and so I was actually
admitted to the hospital and I went in

406
00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:26.519
and had what was I knew it
was a major surgery, but they didn't

407
00:31:26.559 --> 00:31:30.920
make me aware of what the aftermath
was going to be. That I was

408
00:31:30.960 --> 00:31:33.640
going to be in ICU, I
was going to have tubes coming throughout.

409
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I'm going to be on a ventilator
the entire meeting. But I wasn't really

410
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ready for that. If I would
have known, I could have probably mentally

411
00:31:40.680 --> 00:31:45.200
prepared for that. So when I
came out of surgery, I found myself

412
00:31:45.319 --> 00:31:51.119
panicking on what happened, what went
wrong, And luckily my fiance at the

413
00:31:51.160 --> 00:31:53.640
time, who's not my wife of
forty three years, but my fiance said,

414
00:31:53.680 --> 00:31:56.759
no, you're fine. Everything was
great, and I'm saying, well,

415
00:31:56.759 --> 00:32:00.920
this doesn't look great to me.
And so at that point I decided

416
00:32:00.160 --> 00:32:05.960
what was missing and what was really
the thing that happened, And what happened

417
00:32:06.079 --> 00:32:10.799
was that medical professionals didn't do what's
called patient teaching prepare me for what it's

418
00:32:10.799 --> 00:32:14.920
going to not only be is that
you go into the surgery, what's going

419
00:32:14.960 --> 00:32:19.480
to be like after? And that's
really fine. This was a long time

420
00:32:19.519 --> 00:32:22.400
ago. So at that point I
decided, as I had an opportunity to

421
00:32:22.480 --> 00:32:27.599
invest in this or start the SAI
company, that I needed to build that

422
00:32:27.759 --> 00:32:34.200
into the system because that personal experience
maybe even differentiated us from other systems who

423
00:32:34.200 --> 00:32:37.279
were in the market, because I
had that firsthand experience with what the needs

424
00:32:37.279 --> 00:32:40.559
were for the market, not from
the medical side, but from the patient

425
00:32:40.680 --> 00:32:50.119
side. Well, I'm very glad
that you know you're doing well and that

426
00:32:50.240 --> 00:32:53.160
is a thing of the past.
So when you said that from a patient

427
00:32:53.279 --> 00:32:58.680
side, so when you talk about
from a patient side, so you've talked

428
00:32:58.680 --> 00:33:06.279
about the patient teaching and you have
also touched upon opioid crisis. Can you

429
00:33:06.400 --> 00:33:09.319
tell us what is the current situation? I know the situation is dire,

430
00:33:09.440 --> 00:33:15.079
but how does it get integrated into
a patient So, as you mentioned,

431
00:33:15.119 --> 00:33:20.119
you know there is pain or something
is happening, and how from just kind

432
00:33:20.160 --> 00:33:24.240
of being a medicine that you're taking
you become dependent on. Yeah, I'll

433
00:33:24.279 --> 00:33:28.240
touch a little bit on how I
even came to that, which is just

434
00:33:28.279 --> 00:33:31.480
as we took the company public,
we sold it and almost at the exact

435
00:33:31.480 --> 00:33:37.920
same time, my oldest son and
his best friend got involved with drugs and

436
00:33:37.039 --> 00:33:40.440
the friend passed away, and so
my wife and I felt like we'd been

437
00:33:40.480 --> 00:33:45.599
blessed with time and resources, so
we thought we'd get involved in the local

438
00:33:45.680 --> 00:33:51.160
drug treatment programs or community, but
we found that the results were terrible and

439
00:33:51.200 --> 00:33:53.599
we really didn't want to affiliate because
we just didn't think they were acceptable.

440
00:33:53.759 --> 00:33:57.799
Now they were the national standards.
They felt like they were doing as good

441
00:33:57.839 --> 00:34:00.400
as anybody, but it just wasn't
acceptable in my mind. And so we

442
00:34:00.440 --> 00:34:05.680
started with a white piece of paper
and we said, what are the best

443
00:34:05.720 --> 00:34:08.760
evidence based programs, what's the best
research in the country, and let's build

444
00:34:08.800 --> 00:34:13.039
something around that. We had the
resources, we had the time, and

445
00:34:13.119 --> 00:34:16.000
so we actually started what if you
fast forward twelve years, one of the

446
00:34:16.079 --> 00:34:21.800
largest drug treatment programs in the US. We had three hundred patients in residents

447
00:34:21.920 --> 00:34:24.480
daily on average, and we were
in Des Moines, Iowa, which is

448
00:34:24.519 --> 00:34:30.599
not exactly resort or destination country,
but eighty percent of our patients came from

449
00:34:30.599 --> 00:34:36.519
California, New York, Florida,
Texas because of the uniqueness that we had

450
00:34:36.920 --> 00:34:43.440
broken down the brain chemistry to understand
that addiction was really a big problem was

451
00:34:43.519 --> 00:34:46.400
it was a chemistry problem, not
a character problem. And when we took

452
00:34:46.440 --> 00:34:51.360
that viewpoint, we were able to
have some amazing outcomes. We had eighty

453
00:34:51.400 --> 00:34:57.400
four percent of our opioid patients who
had left the program four years after departing

454
00:34:57.400 --> 00:35:01.880
were still alive and working and so
over, and so that was really where

455
00:35:01.880 --> 00:35:08.000
we got involved in understanding we had
a significant opioid detox center. And as

456
00:35:08.039 --> 00:35:13.360
you may not know, there's only
really two drugs you detox from, opioids

457
00:35:13.760 --> 00:35:17.119
and alcohol. I think those drugs
you can kind of titrate down from,

458
00:35:17.400 --> 00:35:22.880
but opioids and alcohol you should have
medically managed. And so many people don't

459
00:35:22.880 --> 00:35:27.440
go to opioid detox, they go
straight into treatment, and that's why there's

460
00:35:27.480 --> 00:35:30.039
such a high failure rate. Only
about thirty percent of people that don't go

461
00:35:30.119 --> 00:35:36.280
through detox complete opioid treatment. So
and that's an entirely different discussion. And

462
00:35:36.360 --> 00:35:42.800
so from that then we learned that
what was really what was critical, and

463
00:35:42.840 --> 00:35:45.440
so we sold that company to a
venture capital roll up out of Nashville in

464
00:35:45.480 --> 00:35:49.920
twenty nineteen and then obviously, as
we all know, COVID hit. So

465
00:35:49.960 --> 00:35:52.280
I had a year to think and
to say, you know, somebody's got

466
00:35:52.320 --> 00:35:55.320
to be doing this, because I
found myself with hundreds of thousands of opioid

467
00:35:55.400 --> 00:35:59.760
data points. And at the same
time, as you know, as we've

468
00:35:59.760 --> 00:36:02.559
alread, we discussed a passion for
healthcare technology. And that's really how the

469
00:36:02.599 --> 00:36:09.400
company was born because I found that
everybody was applying to try and help the

470
00:36:09.480 --> 00:36:15.079
patient who was addicted nobody was really
viewing it is how can I stop this?

471
00:36:15.119 --> 00:36:19.719
How can I prevent this? Seventy
five percent of every patient who enters

472
00:36:19.880 --> 00:36:24.920
an opioid treatment program started with a
prescription written by their doctor and paid for

473
00:36:25.039 --> 00:36:29.880
by their insurance company. So right
away that gave me an idea that maybe

474
00:36:29.880 --> 00:36:31.719
we're looking at the wrong place.
Maybe if I got on the other side

475
00:36:31.719 --> 00:36:37.360
of the formula and prevented patients from
getting addicted, I wouldn't have to worry

476
00:36:37.360 --> 00:36:43.360
about a success rate in treatment because
my success rate in prevention is one hundred

477
00:36:43.400 --> 00:36:47.400
percent because you never progressed to addiction, where my success rate inside of our

478
00:36:47.400 --> 00:36:51.239
treatment center, as great as it
was, was never going to reach one

479
00:36:51.320 --> 00:37:01.000
hundred percent. Wow, gongratulations.
That is a huge problem, and thank

480
00:37:01.000 --> 00:37:05.519
you. Thank you for tackling it, because it's so important that we do

481
00:37:06.800 --> 00:37:10.360
something beyond ourselves and leave a legacy
and that can make a huge difference.

482
00:37:13.280 --> 00:37:19.719
So tell us more about your book
and how this AI is making a difference

483
00:37:19.760 --> 00:37:25.199
in people's lives, how it is
preventing at the source rather than letting it

484
00:37:25.559 --> 00:37:30.360
mushroom and make it like you know, yes, people can go for the

485
00:37:30.440 --> 00:37:32.079
talk treatment and all that, but
how can it be prevented? So do

486
00:37:32.199 --> 00:37:37.159
share with us? Well, we've
built that company now into I have seventeen

487
00:37:37.239 --> 00:37:42.599
hundred employers in the US who use
our AI software to actually scan their claims

488
00:37:42.639 --> 00:37:49.280
to identify patients who are progressing towards
potentially addiction so that they can intervene and

489
00:37:49.360 --> 00:37:52.519
correct that. But I'll give you
one example. We have a large school

490
00:37:52.519 --> 00:37:59.159
district in central Florida. They actually
we've reduced unnecessary opioid usage in the school

491
00:37:59.159 --> 00:38:05.000
district seven percent, and at the
same time, we have been able to

492
00:38:05.119 --> 00:38:09.400
reduce the expenses for the school district
almost one and a half million dollars because

493
00:38:09.639 --> 00:38:15.679
you may not be aware, but
a patient on opioids uses healthcare three times

494
00:38:15.719 --> 00:38:20.320
more than the employee or the patient
that's not on opioids, and so there's

495
00:38:20.320 --> 00:38:22.800
a big indicator for us. So
it's not only saved lives, but it

496
00:38:22.880 --> 00:38:28.199
saves money. And so that school
district, the unique piece is because of

497
00:38:28.239 --> 00:38:31.679
AI and we're able to do this
in the background. We're in our third

498
00:38:31.760 --> 00:38:36.880
year installed in that school district,
and the teachers still don't know we're there

499
00:38:36.960 --> 00:38:40.119
because they've never been asked, they've
never been identified, or they've never been

500
00:38:40.159 --> 00:38:45.519
intervened on because we only identify the
doctors who are letting this happen, not

501
00:38:45.639 --> 00:38:53.840
the patients that it's happening too.
So this is a great use of AI

502
00:38:53.960 --> 00:39:00.000
because you know a lot of people
are apprehensive of AI and if properly implements

503
00:39:00.360 --> 00:39:06.239
and properly used it and save lives. I was going to add, that's

504
00:39:06.320 --> 00:39:08.920
really funny that you touched on that, because the first two years of the

505
00:39:08.960 --> 00:39:13.920
company we never mentioned AI, even
though it was deeply integrated into the program,

506
00:39:14.000 --> 00:39:16.239
because that was my background, but
we felt like AI had a bad

507
00:39:16.320 --> 00:39:22.360
connotation, and at that point,
it seems like in the last year it

508
00:39:22.360 --> 00:39:25.519
has become more accepted on the positive
sense. Obviously, this is not a

509
00:39:25.639 --> 00:39:30.440
chat GPT kind of program, but
it's a program really used to find indicators

510
00:39:30.440 --> 00:39:34.400
that are buried inside of a medical
record. So, for example, the

511
00:39:34.400 --> 00:39:39.559
indicators were finding until we developed this
program could not be found. They're not

512
00:39:39.719 --> 00:39:45.599
found in any system in the US, and so we've just recently, in

513
00:39:45.639 --> 00:39:49.360
the last year, started to pull
the covers back and let people know that

514
00:39:49.400 --> 00:39:53.480
it's actually AI based because of just
that point you were making. M hm.

515
00:39:54.199 --> 00:39:59.480
So, now let's say from a
patient's perspective. So we have AI

516
00:39:59.559 --> 00:40:07.280
on this side, but what a
patient could do for themselves, they're oh,

517
00:40:07.360 --> 00:40:10.320
go ahead, sorry, yeah,
so they're not reaching that opioid crisis

518
00:40:10.880 --> 00:40:16.039
well in a patients obviously, what
we do is patients, you have to

519
00:40:16.079 --> 00:40:22.119
have a pain diagnosis to be able
to prescribe an opioid. You can actually

520
00:40:22.119 --> 00:40:27.920
become chemically dependent to an opioid within
three to four days. And chemically dependents

521
00:40:28.000 --> 00:40:32.079
mean you're not an addict or you're
not addicted, but if you abruptly discontinue,

522
00:40:32.480 --> 00:40:37.480
you'll actually feel illnesses. And so
that's one of the things that we

523
00:40:37.559 --> 00:40:40.920
use as indicators are the fact that
when you're deprived of an opioid. We

524
00:40:40.920 --> 00:40:45.639
saw this every day in our opioid
detox center because one hundred percent of the

525
00:40:45.679 --> 00:40:50.559
patients who came into an opioid detox
center went through withdrawal. And withdrawal is

526
00:40:51.159 --> 00:40:53.840
a you know, from an aspect, most people would call it craving,

527
00:40:54.159 --> 00:40:59.239
but actually what it is is the
body screaming out that it's being deprived and

528
00:40:59.320 --> 00:41:02.440
opioid because it's become accustomed to it. And the way it screams out is

529
00:41:02.480 --> 00:41:06.920
it makes you sick. I'm going
to make you nauseated until you give me

530
00:41:06.960 --> 00:41:08.880
an opioid. I'm going to not
let you sleep until you give me an

531
00:41:08.920 --> 00:41:13.440
opioid. I'm going to make you
anxious until you give me an opioid.

532
00:41:13.639 --> 00:41:16.960
And then patients find it not only
when they take the opioid the pain alleviates,

533
00:41:17.199 --> 00:41:22.000
but so do those effects and those
symptoms. But those symptoms can actually

534
00:41:22.079 --> 00:41:28.000
be pretty significant medical issues, and
those are the indicators we're looking for inside

535
00:41:28.079 --> 00:41:32.400
using AI to trickle through and segregate
those and then look for the doctors because

536
00:41:32.400 --> 00:41:37.320
we know who the doctors are that
wrote those prescriptions, and that's an indicator

537
00:41:37.360 --> 00:41:43.239
for increased training and necessity for them. So the discussion about patients and opioids

538
00:41:43.719 --> 00:41:49.400
is a deep one, and so
there's several different tax there. With patients

539
00:41:49.400 --> 00:41:52.960
that are on opioids, The bigger
thing starts with the family and not accepting

540
00:41:53.159 --> 00:41:58.480
unreasonable thoughts or actions. That's the
biggest thing, because you don't want to

541
00:41:58.519 --> 00:42:05.320
be somebody who's accomplished or helping them
continue because it will not get better.

542
00:42:05.679 --> 00:42:10.280
Opioid abusers. You don't see many
old opioid abusers. They either die or

543
00:42:10.320 --> 00:42:15.280
they quit, and that's the challenge
with that with that drug different than most

544
00:42:15.360 --> 00:42:21.280
other drugs because the problem is opioids, they don't take them for a euphoric

545
00:42:21.360 --> 00:42:25.079
effect. They take them for to
feel normal, as opposed to other drugs.

546
00:42:25.119 --> 00:42:30.239
You can imagine you're taking from work
effect. And so it gets to

547
00:42:30.239 --> 00:42:35.239
a point where because of those illnesses
I described, when you take they go

548
00:42:35.280 --> 00:42:38.920
away so you feel better. So
what I'm hearing is that it's also very

549
00:42:38.960 --> 00:42:46.480
critical for people to get educated as
far as even the healthcare professionals need to

550
00:42:46.480 --> 00:42:51.960
get educated at different levels. So
Michael, you know, thank you for

551
00:42:52.039 --> 00:42:54.880
doing the work that you are doing. Where can people find you? Where

552
00:42:54.880 --> 00:42:59.719
can they connect with you? Where
can they find your book? You can

553
00:42:59.719 --> 00:43:06.320
find are The company is called Opioid
Clinical Management, So the website is OPIOIDCM

554
00:43:06.400 --> 00:43:10.079
dot com and the book is called
The Untold Story of the Opioid Crisis in

555
00:43:10.159 --> 00:43:15.639
American Healthcare and it's you can go
to my author website which is Michael Dash

556
00:43:15.840 --> 00:43:22.800
and it's best Squez Visa victor asqu
e Z. Well, thank you for

557
00:43:22.920 --> 00:43:30.519
joining us, and I wish you
continued success in your daverse because we want

558
00:43:30.559 --> 00:43:38.880
people to be healthy, happy and
living a meaningful life. So to your

559
00:43:38.880 --> 00:43:45.239
continued success. And thank you listeners
for joining us, because without you,

560
00:43:45.320 --> 00:43:52.519
the show would not be possible.
And if you have anybody in your area

561
00:43:52.639 --> 00:43:57.400
or anybody who may be struggling with
this, do ask them to listen to

562
00:43:57.480 --> 00:44:02.679
it and get educated, you know, get more training and get ahead of

563
00:44:02.719 --> 00:44:10.039
it. So to your continued well
being. I also want to thank one

564
00:44:10.840 --> 00:44:15.840
for making the show technically possible and
be sure to think about others, be

565
00:44:16.000 --> 00:44:21.920
hind and share it out and be
val and take care until next time.

566
00:44:22.679 --> 00:44:25.079
Thank you for being part of Beyond
Confidence. With your host d V Park,

567
00:44:25.360 --> 00:44:29.159
we hope you have learned more about
how to start living the life you

568
00:44:29.239 --> 00:44:32.480
want. Each week on Beyond Confidence, you hear stories of real people who've

569
00:44:32.519 --> 00:44:38.159
experienced growth by overcoming their fears and
building meaningful relationships. During Beyond Confidence,

570
00:44:38.440 --> 00:44:43.159
Vpark shares what happened to her when
she stepped out of her comfort zone to

571
00:44:43.199 --> 00:44:46.280
work directly with people across the globe. She not only coaches people how to

572
00:44:46.360 --> 00:44:52.079
form herd connections, but also transform
relationships to mutually beneficial partnerships as they strive

573
00:44:52.159 --> 00:44:55.360
to live the life they want.
If you are ready to live the life

574
00:44:55.360 --> 00:45:00.320
you want and leverage your strengths.
Learn more at www. Dot v park

575
00:45:00.360 --> 00:45:06.679
dot com, and you can connect
with V at contact at dvpark dot com.

576
00:45:06.719 --> 00:45:07.760
We look forward to you joining us
next week