Vince Albanese, CEO/Founder of Haven Health Solutions at Converge2Xcelerate Conference (Boston, MA)

HIGHLIGHTS

• Haven Health Solutions uses blockchain to add a layer of security and trust between the pharmacies, doctors, and patients
• Haven Health offers the only healthcare digital asset management that shields all parties from risk related to the exchange of sensitive information
• Vince is an innovator and serial entrepreneur whose skills span decades of success and cutting edge innovation

FULL COVERAGE

• Watch complete coverage of the Converge2Xcelerate Conference

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPTS: Vince Albanese, CEO/Founder of Haven Health Solutions

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 00:00

Welcome back. We’re here with Vince Albanese, the CEO, founder of Haven Health Solution. Vince, thank you for your time today. Vince is an innovator and successful serial entrepreneur whose skills span decades of success and cutting edge innovation. Tell us about Haven technologies.

Vince Albanese – CEO/Founder, Haven Health Solutions: 00:19

So we’re working to simplify the complexity out of healthcare. And though that sounds like it’s a big complicated term, it really means letting people know what they should do next in our world and definition, it’s engineering the uncertainty out of the healthcare equation. And that’s simple things. It’s the phone call that’s eliminated. It’s the doctor who understands that they’re going to get paid. It’s the patient who knows when the treatment is going to happen. It’s the insurance company who knows that they’ve got everything that they want.

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 00:47

At every step of the chain there’s uncertainty. And the possibility that it just magnifies the problem. Now you have a very personal story here that has inspired you to build Haven.

Vince Albanese – CEO/Founder, Haven Health Solutions: 01:06

So part of my history is unexpectedly got cancer seven years ago. And so the view from the bed is a lot different than the view from outside the bed watching a process and uncertainty is just rife to that. And when it’s your life or a loved one’s life on the line, you want to know what’s going on. So the manifestation of uncertainty is having a test and then not getting a response back. What does that prompt? It prompts a phone call to an office where there’s no one to answer the phone to a return call to someone who’s not prepared to answer it. So what happens is this is a chaos theory scenario. So what happens is the butterfly flapping its wings, causes costs to ripple through the entire system. And that’s manifest everywhere. It’s the doctor, it’s the insurance company, it’s government. All right? So all right, we want to eliminate, reduce that.

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 01:41

So how can government take a more proactive role in becoming part of the solution instead of aggravating the problem?

Vince Albanese – CEO/Founder, Haven Health Solutions: 02:06

So it’s going to take industry to solve this because it requires cooperation. So government’s primary role is to, is to mandate at a high level what should happen, right. But then you’ve got to stimulate the industry to solve the problem on their own. Otherwise it becomes too much of a carrot stick, which is negative. It takes way too long.

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 02:29

And to that extent you’ve pursued numerous partnerships to further your endeavor.

Vince Albanese – CEO/Founder, Haven Health Solutions: 02:34

So the drive for us has been at the state level. So because we’re at a blockchain conference here, many of the smaller States are taking a very, very proactive role in the adoption of blockchain because it’s a differentiator for them. So work in Delaware, I’ll be in Vermont tomorrow. So those kinds of States and taking a proactive role and saying how can blockchain help around some of these topics think is the initiator. The other thing is that we talk about physician burden a lot and so we’re empowering the doctors to do something about this instead of just suffering or complaining. The mechanism do something about it is to have a voice that can be heard, make an investment in some of this technology that gives them an equal playing on the playing field with the other stakeholders, but at around one table.

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 03:25

So I understand from a regulatory angle how can the FDA or Health Canada or European medicines become more involved or are they more involved currently?

Vince Albanese – CEO/Founder, Haven Health Solutions: 03:39

So they are involved, and this touches on something that’s very important, I believe, to the country and certainly to us. And that is the use of, of industry alliances in order to get something done. So it isn’t a one-on-one good idea because I am solidly against this local optimization thing. So if we’re going to globally optimize, you’ve got to have the government sitting down as a participant with the rest of the stakeholders. So work in Delaware, which we’re proud of, has us with the hospital association, has the medical society, the physicians in the state, the Delaware health information network representing the data in the state government. Right? But the and the payer, largest payers in the state, but all sitting around one table thinking around a common problem. Right. And that we believe is the enabler for real change, sustainable change.

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 04:34

That makes sense. Now from a legislative perspective, you touched on what the States are doing. Is there anything that Congress can be doing should be doing Federal level that could help not just the cause of Haven technologies, but help the cause of reducing uncertainty?

Vince Albanese – CEO/Founder, Haven Health Solutions: 04:40

I think at this stage, frankly it’s doing less yes. So I’m on, I’m all in favor of pushing the private sector to solve the problem and giving them some deadlines, right. Is how I would leave it.

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 05:06

One issue of, of great concern to many of our viewers is the notion of data privacy. It takes on particular significance when you’re talking about people’s healthcare data. Facebook had a relatively infamous issue earlier this year when it was clear that they didn’t have a good handle on, to the extent to which their user’s data, healthcare data was exposed. How do we fix that? Or is that just an ongoing problem that comes part and parcel with the uncertainty of the process.

Vince Albanese – CEO/Founder, Haven Health Solutions: 05:32

So everyone would agree, the more you move something sensitive, the more at risk it is. So Facebook’s problem wasn’t necessarily that they had a problem is that they trusted somebody else with that. So a key element and what the blockchain can do is it isn’t so much a matter of if you give me your data and we put all the world’s healthcare data on a blockchain, we’re moving it from a place where it is at rest and safe. Even that move to a blockchain is a risky move. So what belongs on a blockchain? So in our opinion, what belongs there is just enough to get a transaction done. It’s not all the data, but if you and I are going to interact, it’s a little bit of you and a little bit of me getting causing something to be done and whatever is behind that is no one else’s business. It’s part of what we, the Haven in our terminology is a safe Haven for that data. Don’t move it and we think that’s a key element of Don’t move it. Just use what you need to use for that particular instance.

Ed Kim – Host, Traders Network Show: 6:02
Terrific. Vince Albanese, thank you for your time. CEO and founder of Haven health. Thank you very much.