Naji Gehchan: Hello, leaders of the world. Welcome to “Spread Love in Organizations”, a podcast for purpose-driven healthcare leaders, striving to make life better around the world by leading their teams with genuine care, servant leadership, and love.
I am Naji, your host, joined today by Anthony Dowidowicz a physician executive who has served as a senior physician leader of health systems and health plans. Anthony is an emergency physician by background and is a graduate of the MIT Sloan school of management where he founded and coordinates the MIT Physician Leadership Group. As an engineer and lifelong technology enthusiast, Anthony’s professional interests include physician leadership, health system design, and emerging computing technologies.
Anthony, so good to have you with me today!
Anthony Dowidowicz: Oh, thank you, Naji. I’m excited to be here.
Naji Gehchan: Our very first chat delved immediately into AI, Quantum computing and its impact on medicine but before we go there, I’d love to know more about your personal story and journey. What brought you to medicine and now becoming the leader you are?
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, it’s probably worth noting that when I was much younger, I became fascinated with quantum mechanics and physics. Um, I also went on to be an engineer before medical school, and I sort of put that aside because it seemed so impractical and so futuristic that it really had no application. Um, I then went to medical school.
I trained as an ER doctor. I went into health system leadership and then went to, um, work for health plans. And sure enough, I was, you know, really, uh, excited to learn that quantum computers are now being, uh, developed that’ll be very powerful in healthcare.
Naji Gehchan: So you’re, you’re an ER and engineer. Uh, you know, before we go into, uh, our topic today, uh, you obviously experienced different, uh, different roles.
from being in emergency, leading teams in emergency rooms, uh, also being in healthcare plans, as you said. So can you tell us more about this and really your learning as a leader? If what is the key learning you had as a leader?
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, after my residency, I was in New York City where I practiced emergency medicine as an attending.
But, you know, shortly after that, uh, a few years later, I, I really wanted to You know, advanced my career. So I went into leadership and that culminated with serving as the chief medical officer of a regional health system. That was an enormous experience and led me to go to MIT to expand my skills and to be more effective at being a physician leader.
And, you know, at MIT, I was really inspired to look at technology and how it could be applied to health care. And that’s sort of at the same time when I learned about quantum computing.
Naji Gehchan: And is there something, because you said physician leader, and I have several of those discussions with physicians who lead teams, any specific thing you felt that’s something I was missing as a physician and I learned at MIT to become a better leader or something you were doing well that you amplified?
I’m intrigued what’s the thing you brought from MIT after your, your learnings there into leadership? I’m intrigued.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, physician leadership is crucially important to the ongoing effectiveness and sustainability of health care. And the reason I say that is because it really is up to physicians who have an enormous amount of public trust to advocate for the right ways that technology can be brought into the health care system.
Um, and I think this is a perfect example of ensuring that we implement this in the right way for the right reason. Um, I also think this has an enormous. Um, and I think it’s really important that we use this, uh, potential to really focus on issues which may not be traditionally profitable, like focusing on the social determinants of health care, designing therapies targeted to individuals, including the poor, expanding access by bringing down costs.
The list is endless. I know that other industries like finance and cryptography are also, you know, grasping at quantum computing. Um, and that’s terrific. But I think in health care, we really are poised to make a difference in people’s lives.
Naji Gehchan: I certainly echo what you said, and the role we have as leaders in healthcare to make sure that the technology, as you said, is used for the good is so important.
So let’s talk about the technology you’re passionate about, quantum computing, and specifically in healthcare. Can you first help us understand what does this mean?
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure, well, a very high level explanation of it, and trust me, the mathematics gets very deep. But, uh, quantum computing uses the unique and sometimes bizarre characteristics of quantum mechanics.
I feel this is very difficult to grasp and opens up some interesting philosophic question. But that’s outside of the scope of our talk today. Um, classical computers are based on transistors. They’re basically got little switches that have two states, on or off. These are called bits. We traditionally call them like zeros and ones you may be familiar with.
Now computers process those signals and manipulate them to give you a definite answer using billions and billions of bits. Um, now we’re hitting the physical limit of how many of those we can put into a computer. Um, enter quantum computing. Uh, where you, you take advantage of two unique qualities of quantum physics, one, you, um, there, one, you can cause a bit to be indeterminate.
So rather than a zero or one, it could be any, any value you’d like. And also, you can entangle two bits, meaning that they correlate, uh, so those two simple features, and there are others, uh, but those two features add enormously to the, to the power of quantum computers.
Naji Gehchan: So now that we understand how this is physically done, what are the implications that you see in health care?
How, what, what types of problem do you think this technology can be applied to in health care?
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, let me just start by saying that quantum computing is not and maybe never will replace classical computers. They work just fine for most of the things that touch our lives. However, quantum computers are very useful in solving enormously complex problems, usually involving optimization or things called branching.
Now in healthcare, there are no short of problem. There are no shortage of problems that can benefit from a powerful solution like that. Um, I’ll start with one fact that kind of blew me away in preparing for this. Um, I didn’t realize that one third of the world’s data is related to healthcare. That’s an enormous amount of time and energy spent to collect information, but it’s also so much information that we can’t possibly process it and gain insights from the treasure trove, um, using our, our classic computers.
Um, there, there are many other ways that, uh, quantum can really, you know, enter, uh, enter healthcare, um, and, uh, you know, although the full technology isn’t quite ready for prime time, Um, you know, quantum technologies have been used, um, mostly in something called spectroscopy, which leads to the technology of MRI.
Also during the pandemic, although it was, uh, it was an experiment, uh, it was found that quantum computers could more accurately predict the variance of COVID that were emerging and that could have led to more accurate, quicker and successful vaccine development.
Naji Gehchan: That’s, that’s a great example, uh, with, with practical.
actionable. I tried like developing the vaccines, predicting what’s next. Uh, do you have any other specific examples of relevant are in practical work where this technology has been used in healthcare?
Anthony Dowidowicz: Right? Well, there are a number of areas where it is poised to be applied. Um, I should start by saying that.
This technology is not quite ready for prime time, but it very soon will be in a matter of years. Uh, McKinsey reports that by the year 2030, there should be about 5, 000 quantum computers, you know, actively doing research in the United States. Um, now, how are they going to be used in healthcare? There are a number of ways.
Um, the first is an extension of medical imaging. Um, you know, as I said, it’s already been used in imaging, but with full blown quantum computing, we won’t just be able to see the body, we’ll be able to see the actual level of tissue, and perhaps even down to the molecule. Uh, three research won the Nobel Prize in, uh, 2023 for working on this.
They’re called quantum dots. This same technology has, uh, has potential to be used as a cure for Alzheimer’s by identifying and clearing the debris that accumulates in the brain, causing the disease. Other areas, uh, of useful include, uh, you know, supply chain optimization. During the pandemic, we learned just how fragile and unresilient our healthcare system was, you know, optimizing and understanding the logistics of the supply chain.
We’ll make sure that it’s sustainable and effective and getting what people need. Clinical decision support, uh, is also another big area. Uh, for those who don’t, may not know what that means, clinical decision support are, uh, when a computer sort of, you know, provides a physician with information to suggest possible therapies.
Now, I don’t really foresee that quantum computers are ever going to replace humans in medicine, uh, but it’s extremely promising to offer support for physicians, particularly those who treat complex illnesses like, you know, cancer or autoimmune disease. There’s also been some studies showing how effectively it can be at understanding cardiovascular risk.
One, uh, one of the areas where I think I’m competing can really elevate people’s lives is in work on social determinants. Um, as many of you may know, um, it’s thought that social determinants and social determinants, uh, account for up to 80 percent of chronic illness. So, similar to clinical decision support, we can use the information to understand how to provide resources optimally so that they really go to the people who need them the most.
Again, this is another form of a massive optimization problem. One of the most exciting areas that you’ll hear people talk about and which, you know, I’m excited about is drug development. Um, you know, now traditionally, you know, drug development has been based on compounds that are originally come from nature and manipulated in the create new drugs, basically through a long trial and error period.
Um, after they, before they advanced to a new drug. You know, a long period of clinical trials. Um, so the complexity of assembling hundreds of atoms into an effective cure is practically impossible using the speed of the computers we now have. But with quantum computing, you can draw out what tasks you would like the drug to accomplish and have the computer formulate a sequence of proteins or atoms that will design a drug to do just that thing.
Um, it will, you know, it will accelerate drug development and lightning speed. A related topic is genomic analysis. Now, let’s face it, you know, our genes play a role in every human ailment, uh, but the vast bits of genetic information we have, one genome, uh, contains about 3 billion genetic bits, uh, to tell you basically who you are.
Now, just mapping that data for one individual alone is an enormous task that we’re just slowly doing, but the real power comes in comparing multiple genomes against each other. to see where correlations lie to improve illness. That will become a very, very powerful way to treat illness. Um, this leads to perhaps my favorite area, which is called precision medicine.
Um, this is a very exciting area. It’s also called individualized medicine because it uses an individual specific genomic information To create drugs that are specific to that very person. Um, if you can imagine how important this will be in, in treating cancers and, uh, genetic problems that, you know, are unique to an individual.
Um, you know, when they become, when we gain the capability to do this effectively, I foresee, uh, healthcare to be delivering therapies based directly to you, for you. Um, also, you know, the issue of health equity, that is people getting the, the, the best health possible. I would see precision medicine as being the ultimate form of health equity.
Naji Gehchan: Well, this is really exciting. And thank you so much for giving this overview on the different aspects where, uh, this technology and quantum computing will be able to, uh, help us.
Um, I’d love to hear from you what you’re most excited about in the future, as you said, in 2020, 30, but before that, AI is like the topic these days, everyone’s talking about it and some like, well, anyway, I’m not gonna say what I’m thinking about it immediately. I’d love to hear from you, you know, as you’re talking about those quantum computers coming in.
The impact that they will have on us that probably we’re not grasping as much as we should and AI being like the hot topic and everyone talking about a generative AI, all the things that I will be doing. So how do you think about these two aspects and the future of AI? of medicine.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, I’ll start with explaining AI, which often isn’t as I as we’d like it to be.
I don’t really view it as intelligence. I see it more as the classic dynamic optimization problem, um, which as I said, quantum computers are excellent at doing. So I agree with you that everyone wants to say AI. And similarly, they want to talk about the word quantum, but very few people really understand how to get under the hood and connect the technology with the need.
Now, in the case of AI, the way I would look at it is that quantum computing is the really exciting breakthrough, which may make AI more AI, but quantum computing is really the breakthrough. Um, artificial intelligence is an ultimate consequence of, you know, the exploding IT revolution.
Naji Gehchan: Great. And when you think of these two and how they will evolve and making the bet as you’re making that actually the computer itself and quantum computing will maximize and amplify what AI brings.
What are you most excited about the future? Of those that in health care.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, take it together. Um, I, I think that all of this will Korea has the potential to create a better health care system that possesses far more health equity, which is far more resilient and which can bring down the cost of care and by and remove financial barriers to getting care, which is shamefully one of the biggest problems in the U.
S. Right now, as I see it, Anthony,
Naji Gehchan: I want to now give you a word. And I would love your reaction to it. First thing that comes to mind. My first word is leadership.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, when I think of leadership, I think of, I don’t necessarily, I don’t always think of people reporting to me. I think there are great ways to be leaders, uh, a leader without really, without having, can we do that one again?
Naji Gehchan: So the first word is leadership.
Anthony Dowidowicz: When I think of leadership, I think of the ability to influence. I don’t think so much of power. In the case of physician leadership, I think those skills are particularly important as large corporations become increasingly prevalent in their influence on healthcare. I think it’s very important for physician leaders to push back against that and ensure that technologic advance is applied the right way.
Naji Gehchan: Health equity.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Well, health equity is, uh, is a simple concept to understand, but it’s a little bit challenging to explain. People are tempted to use the word health equality, but that’s a bit, uh, slightly misleading because it would imply that we all have equal health. Health equity is a bit different though.
It’s the notion that an individual can achieve the best health possible for them. For example, if someone’s paralyzed but from the waist down, they may not have health equality, but hopefully we have a system that accommodates them and let them live their best life.
Naji Gehchan: So I think I want to double click on this.
Um, I totally agree that sometimes we misunderstand equality versus equity in health. And you said the, one of the breakthrough that, uh, quantum computing will be bringing is improving this through personalized medicine, uh, precision medicine. But I can’t but think about the costs related to those and how would it be supported when we know unfortunately it’s an issue in the U.
S.? And across the globe, if we want to think health equity globally, so I’m intrigued as you’re thinking about those technologies. How are you thinking about actually getting to patients hands and helping them take out those financial barrier that they might have?
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. Well, I view health equity as closely related to social determinants.
And I think of the social determinants as very related to drug development. And by that, I mean, searching for patterns of illness. based on what non medical resources an individual may have. Things, for example, like education, health literacy, even things like air conditioning for those with chronic illness, nutritional support, transportation.
All of these things are really outside the realm of medicine, but as I said, they account for 80 percent of illness in some way.
Naji Gehchan: The third word is innovation.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Innovation may also be one of the most overused words. Um, I, I don’t like to use the word innovation so much as ingenuity. I think innovation is something that all of us make every our everyday lives to solve problems. Ingenuity, on the other hand, is a bit more personal and requires, you know, you know, sharp insight and real thinking to come up with solutions to answer the challenges.
Naji Gehchan: I love it. The last one is spread love and organizations.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Uh, yeah, at first I thought that the title of your podcast was a little bit, uh, you know, unexpected. However, you know, in thinking about and preparing for this, I’ve really come to understand how the healthcare system by its nature exists to facilitate spreading love and creating a better world.
Naji Gehchan: It certainly does. Any final word of wisdom, Anthony, for healthcare leaders around the world? I’m sorry, say again? Any final word of wisdom for healthcare leaders around the world? Can I find a word? No, um, let me just make sure this.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sorry.
Naji Gehchan: No, no worries. I’m just, any final word of wisdom for healthcare leaders?
Anthony Dowidowicz: Sure. I would really urge them to look at the big picture and recognize how important leadership is in healthcare. There are times when you face very difficult decisions between doing what’s expedient and profitable versus doing what is right on the long term. What I urge healthcare leaders, particularly physicians who care for patients, to do is to understand that You know, health care doesn’t follow quarterly reports or balance sheets.
It has its own nature and its own very complex basis. So I would really urge leaders to advocate for their patients and not try to make profit, uh, immediately or, or view health care in that way.
You know, the corporate, I’m sorry. No, go ahead. I was going to say that the corporate practice of medicine is, you know, properly, largely illegal. However, the influence of large corporations does have a considerable effect on the way patients are treated. And that’s not always for the better.
Naji Gehchan: Most certainly.
And keeping in mind the greater good and making sure that we’re striving towards Uh, the purpose, as you said, of healthcare organizations all across, which is making sure we’re making life better for patients, uh, across all the world. It’s super important.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Another piece of advice I would give healthcare leaders would be to start thinking about the problems that they wish they could have solved in healthcare, because I would bet in the majority quantum computing probably has a way to provide the answer.
Naji Gehchan: Thank you so much, Anthony, for this great discussion and enlightening thoughts around a great technology that will be coming in very soon, as you said, and we will be seeing it in practice. So thank you for joining me and helping us understand better this.
Anthony Dowidowicz: Well, thanks for having me, Naji. And thank you also for having these podcasts.
I think it’s a great topic done in a great way. And it’s really nice to be and refreshing to see someone be focusing on virtuous leadership. So thanks.
Naji Gehchan: Thank you all for listening to SpreadLove in Organizations podcast. Drop us a review on your preferred podcast platform
Follow us on LinkedIn and connect with us on spreadloveio.com. We’re eager to hear your thoughts and feedback. Most importantly, spread love in your organizations and spread the word around you to inspire others and amplify this movement, our world so desperately needs