I’m Back. Notes On AI and Healthcare.
The last two months have been a whirlwind.
Between prepping for the New York City Marathon, Taking a much-needed vacation with my wife, and dealing with some personal losses, I simply have not had time to sit down and write my weekly newsletter.
Even with all these circumstances, I treat this aa unacceptable. Too many of you pay for my newsletter and the valuable info that I strive to share, and it’s my duty as a writer to be consistent and a wellspring of new ideas.
That said, welcome new subscribers and thank you for joining High Performance Health. Here’s what you can expect for the next few months:
A return to my twice (and sometimes thrice) Weekly cadence of posts
More conversations with Olivia, my functional nutrition specialist, friend and colleague
More book recommendations from my reads these past months
What’s been on my mind as of late
The current global healthcare system is a bit of a mess and a meme all in one.
In America, primary care is decades behind where it should be, and specialist appointments take months to schedule. This can spell bad news for people who want to get specific issues treated.
If you DO happen to see the right doctor and get treatment, it usually bankrupts you.
In Canada and the UK, the problem varies. Canada’s speed of care is great and more affordable, but quality suffers. The UK’s quality is great with decent costs, but wait times are insufferable, making the single-payer healthcare argument seem less attractive, leading to memes like this:
A lot of the concerns about AI are warranted, but in my view, one of the major opportunities AI has in healthcare is to cut the costs of care (or at the very least, assessments of conditions) and reduce the wait time to see a practitioner.
It’s clear to me that what the entrepreneurs of the longevity craze have missed since the dawn of Bryan Johnson is having the capacity to get more patients into clinics — which is why many are creating their own clinics.
Here is a list of companies I’ve looked into who have already received funding and are bridging that gap.
10 AI-Driven Startups Expanding Access to Quality Healthcare
Qure.ai – AI that reads X-rays and CT scans to help clinicians detect conditions faster, especially in low-resource settings.
Kheiron Medical – AI for breast cancer screening that improves early detection and broadens access to reliable diagnostics.
Athelas – Remote patient monitoring powered by AI, enabling continuous at-home care for chronic conditions.
K Health – Virtual primary care platform that uses AI to triage symptoms and connect users to affordable clinicians.
Buoy Health – Conversational AI that helps patients self-assess symptoms and navigate to the right care.
Abridge – Generative AI that automatically documents medical conversations, freeing clinicians to focus on patients.
Suki – Voice-enabled AI assistant that handles clinical note-taking and admin tasks, improving provider efficiency.
Notable Health – AI automation for repetitive healthcare workflows, allowing staff to spend more time on patient care.
Lunit – AI imaging solutions for cancer detection that make high-quality diagnostics more consistent and accessible.
Heidi Health – AI-powered clinical documentation tools that streamline visits and reduce administrative load.
Why am I talking about this?
I booked my annual physical two months ago. Two.
It’s coming up in two weeks.
Me, the hypochondriac who needs to know what’s going on with his body now waited two months to see a new practitioner I am hoping to be comfortable with.
Sure, part of this wait involves 1. having the trust of the physician (along with her proximity, being in Queens) and preferring her knowing she’s treated my wife and 2. understanding that this particular physician’s practice is probably booked and busy.
But all the quality doctors I could have gone to?
Equally long wait times, boroughs away from me, and no guarantee they’d be as collaborative with me on my health as I’d like.
Also, after another set of scary incidents where my wife had panic attacks, unexplained tremors and dangerously low blood pressure, I’m still floored at how long it’s taken not only for her to be seen by an endocrinologist, but for her to receive her lab work back (it’s been >4 weeks) and get in for a follow up.
Thankfully we had a two week vacation where we were able to forget, even briefly, about medical issues.
But not everyone has that luxury, and America is in no rush to address that, clearly.
One or more of the companies I listed above could be a major player in fixing this problem.
Whatever hesitancies you have around AI — think for a second:
If someone close to you has a health scare you want answers to, would you want to wait 4-5 months to see someone (who may not have a conclusive answer) or would you chance it on an algorithm that learns light years faster than humans can?
See you all later this week.