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Ask HN: Is anyone interested in trying to save healthcare?

2 points by dogtorwoof ↗ HN
I've worked the last few years as a doctor in a sinking system. I'm trying to learn code in my spare time to build the apps needed to help change the course of things. I don't think it's something I can do on my own. Is anyone interested in helping?

8 comments

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taylodl
I don't know what country you're talking about but in the United States, which is where I live, our biggest obstacle to healthcare is the fact that patients have to utilize insurance companies to receive healthcare and the insurance companies are incentivized to deny that healthcare so they can increase their profits. That's not a problem building some apps is going to solve.
tocs3
I agree. I think the Affordable Care Act mostly just redefined "health care" as "health insurance". Now if you have health insurance you, by definition, have health care. It has helped millions get health insurance (and done some good) but done little to improve the actual care.
dogtorwoof
CA/USA.

There are some startups in the health insurance space. What they seem to do is just make it easier to buy/cancel health insurance, all within an app. Some have been quite successful. Some are also trying to bundle in their own health care provision inside the app (like telehealth, virtual mental health, etc), so in a sense getting more people access to care.

It depends on what you think the goal of an app could be. If we can build an app that 1) makes people healthier or 2) actually replaces nurses/doctors/pharmacists, I do think you'll be better off with a better healthcare system.

tocs3
Maybe you could add a little detail about what you have planned. It seams a little optimistic that some apps will solve many healthcare problems.

I would like to see some more work along the lines of independent patient advocacy. It is tough, as a lay person, to know what treatments are available and effective (and other pros and cons). Also, navigating insurance, medicare, and other general healthcare related bureaucracy. Also, someone to answer simple health related questions would be nice.

dogtorwoof
I think there's many problems that could be solved with apps. Administrative burden is absolutely one that is amenable to huge changes now with LLMs. It's already started, quite a few startups in the medical scribe space, but no one has figured it out fully yet.

I've been working on just that, a medical scribe. It sort of works, but there's quite a few things I still need to learn even before this could be an MVP. Namely privacy and encryption.

I love the idea of a 'patient navigator' – someone or something that explains things to the patient. PocketHealth is doing something when it comes to medical images, but it's not nearly enough!

bag_boy
What are you trying to build?

You can look for a technical cofounder through y Combinator’s cofounder matching platform.

Learning how to code might not be the best use of your time if you want to build useful products.

dogtorwoof
Thanks, I saw the matching platform but haven't spoken to anyone who has used it, so wasn't sure how helpful it could be. I'll give it a shot though.

I have broad categories of problems I want to tackle, but the first thing I want to work on is administrative burden for providers. LLMs can make a huge difference when it comes to writing notes/helping providers save time on things – quite a few startups working on it right now but no one has figured it out quite yet.