On this sunny Fall day full of beauty and promise (if one ignored covid and the elections), our Rotary Club was called to order by President Emily Matthews on time signaling not only the welcome arrival of decency and order, but also of that certain elan that exudes from her very presence. We properly pledged at the leadership of Jennifer Pence (all looking at the zoom image of the giant American Flag hanging on the front of Joe and Helen Galligan’s home on Easton). And we invoked, under the thoughtful and well-prepared hand of Cheryl Fama (more from her below!).
Guests for the day included a group of one, our speaker Michael Maylahn, who ended up holding the whole club in thrall for an
unheard of 15 minutes overtime—wow!
Announcements included note of continued shameless pandering for business by our international flocking and fun division. Also, a plea to vote for [name deleted for security purposes]. Also, our club’s Happy Hour will Friday at 5pm (no surprises there), and we heard of a Foster City Health & Aging Education Day upcoming.
Bob Doerr and Jennifer Pence spiced things up with an incredibly creative scavenger hunt, in which we were encouraged to find some object within 60 seconds wherever we were, that fit the undefined criteria of being a candidate for the perfect gift for President Emily to give to her husband Tim at Valentine’s Day. Presuming that she is not a member of one of those sects that does not celebrate holidays or other things that might be fun, the Rotarians scampered all over whatever wing of their houses they were in to find something. Objects brought for consideration, which passed Jennifer’s censoring protocols included: mylar red balloon, bobblehead dolls, heart-shaped dog food bowl, Kermit the frog camera, frozen steaks and champagne, a US Open coffee mug, Godiva chocolates, a greeting card, and the winner of it all was … (pause for effect) -- a commemorative Axe from the Big Game 100th anniversary, featuring both Stanford and Cal insignia.
Yet another breathtaking, innovative and fun scavenger hunt is promised for next week, at the very same meeting as the “day-after-voting-but-perhaps-not-the-end-of-the-election-drama” event. President Em is no doubt learning new techniques for using the mute button, for giving people sparring gloves to go into corners to settle their differing opinions, and maybe some group-wide doses of headache pills, so it will be one meeting not to be missed!
Then it was time for our program, with the speaker being introduced by Bobba Venkatadri, who set the stage well and with a ton of personal knowledge about the world of venture capital for biotech research and breakthrough in the realm of healthcare.
Our speaker, Michael Maylahn, is not only a biomedical engineer and a venture capital guy, but he also has wrapped his head around the incredible changes coming fast upon us as delivery of medical care moves into virtual care as being the standard for most people and remote patient treatment becoming not only more efficient but also more popular than the familiar face to face.
Frankly, he left this reporter’s head spinning, and I am confident I cannot do justice to his thoughtful and coherent arguments for telemedicine being but the first of several steps leading to remote patient monitoring and to chronic care management. He noted how there will be a plethora of new medical devices that will be used or worn by patients so that quality data can steadily flow to the medical team involved in management of various conditions and illnesses, allowing virtual intervention in many of the scenarios that currently call for an ambulance, emergency room visit, hospital testing, possible hospital admission, then stepped care, etc.
The net gain of the remote patient monitoring and the virtual care is that doctors and others will be able to have far greater impact because of seeing more patients, patients will spend less time waiting for different steps of the processes they need to fall into place, and there will be an equalization of treatment (a democratizing) so that there will not be as much a split level treatment plan for a society of haves and have nots. Probably the single thing slowing all the change up right now is figuring out how to reimburse the different caregivers at rates that are fair and make for effective medical care, as well as once we figure out what that might look like, how to get from here (pay for procedure) to there (pay for diagnosis and incentive to live healthy lives).
Whew—it is bracing and exciting: how to bring together the payers (insurers) and the practitioners (docs, etc.) and the facilities (hospitals, etc.) so they don’t compete and focus on what $ they can get for their piece of the pie but how all three work together for the patient’s best and most cost effective good.
Okay – at 1:47, the questions had finally subsided enough for Emily to declare the meeting over.
And on a personal note—God be with each Rotarian in this history making week coming up as we seek to be the stable, decent, constructive force in our community that we are geared up to be! See you on Wednesday, 12:15.
