Salli: You're listening to the business leadership podcast with Edwin Frondoso.

Eunice: We specialize in creating an AI algorithm specifically for pharmacology use cases.

And on top of this algorithm that we've built in house, we built up various tools or agents as we call them.

The reason why I believe pharmacists can step into the role of a family physician or a walk in clinic is because we do have that education component in schools now for the past 5 or 6 years.

Move forward with it in order to get that momentum and traction Edwin: Good morning.

Good afternoon.

And good evening biz leader.

Welcome to another episode of the business leadership podcast.

I'm your host, Edwin Frondozo.

And today we are featuring a special episode from our future narrative mini series recorded live at the collision conference in Toronto Canada.

In this mini series, we explore the future of leadership, innovation, and storytelling with visionary leaders who are not just designing products.

But our creating entire new worlds and markets.

Joining me is Dr.

Paul Newton and together we'll be speaking with Eunice Wu.

She is the founder and CEO of a Asepha.

And she brings a unique blend of expertise in both the design and healthcare industries.

In our conversation.

Eunice we'll discuss the critical health care worker shortfall and the regulatory changes increasing the workload on pharmacists.

She'll introduce a service AI clinical tools designed to handle manual tasks, allowing pharmacists to focus more on patient care.

She will also highlight the transformation pharmacies are undergoing with pharmacists taking on roles.

Similar to family physician, aided by AI tools that automate documentation and identify drug therapy problems.

So without further ado, here we go.

We're now speaking with Eunice Wu, founder and CEO of Asepha.

Eunice, how are you doing today?

Eunice: I'm great.

How about yourself?

Edwin: Doing great.

Really excited to jump in.

And just to get started, Eunice, can you just share what problem is Asepha solving for pharmacies?

Eunice: Right now there's a 15 million shortfall of healthcare workers in the world.

On top of that, there's recent regulation changes allowing pharmacists to prescribe.

And this is adding more work onto their daily operations without any alleviation for the previous manual task.

Pharmacists are moving more into a clinical role.

And we don't really have a lot of supports to do so a lot of pharmacists are overwhelmed, overburdened.

A lot of them don't even have time for lunch or break.

And this is really difficult because there are so many patients to serve That have to travel up to 4 hours to senior nearest practitioner, or every town that only has 1 pharmacy, or they have to travel to next door pharmacy.

So what we're really enabling is for these pharmacists to do more with their time.

When I was in practice, I spent around 80 percent of my time on manual work, and this is all work that could be done by anyone without a clinical degree where only 20 percent of my time was being used on actual clinical services.

So what Assefa does is we create these AI clinical tools that help with manual tasks such as researching, documentation, and we allow these pharmacists to then get closer to that 100 percent patient facing care.

Edwin: That's super interesting.

From from my understanding where the pharmacists and pharmacies are able to prescribe prescriptions now, and I'm not sure if I'm over simplifying this, and this is where the problem is, is it's because the medical industry or the doctors, they don't have enough time to see everyone.

So they're saying, Oh, you know what?

Go to the pharmacist to do that.

Is that sort of right?

Eunice: Kind of I would say it's well known that pharmacists are the most accessible health care professional where you don't need an appointment to go visit your pharmacist and get a medical opinion.

Why we are now doing prescribing is because actually in training they changed the degree from a bachelor to a doctorate, and we're actually being trained in terms of how to do diagnosis for these minor ailments when we're in school.

And this has been going on for years.

Only recently has there been this regulation change in Canada in the US more.

So they've had associated prescribing for quite some time now, where essentially a pharmacist can work with a physician's license and be able to provide.

These medications without having to fax back and forth to get approval.

It is true that we are able to prescribe now and that is a great use of our education, our clinical abilities, especially with that shortfall of physicians.

I I genuinely see pharmacists becoming the new family physician and family physicians moving into a more specialty practice in order to bridge that gap of Edwin: Perfect.

Thanks for sharing.

I mean, it's it's it's super interesting.

for being here.

Being on that side of like, just seeing how this all changes and also changes the way we interact with the health care professional.

So definitely appreciate the work you're, you're, you're doing there to help everyone.

I'm curious from your point of view, and perhaps this is what a set is solving, but how is specifically, how is the automation and that personalization helping or revolutionizing the way the pharmacies work?

Eunice: Yep, for sure.

So we specialize in creating an AI algorithm specifically for pharmacology use cases.

And on top of this algorithm that we've built in house, we built up various tools or agents as we call them.

When I explain them to clinicians, I explain them more so as Lego blocks where each one of these agents or Lego blocks performs a different service.

For example in Canada and the U.

S.

there's a service called Medication Reviews.

This is typically performed for someone who has more complex care or a more elderly patient who is on multiple medications.

Essentially, it's going through their complex history and identifying if there's any drug interactions non adherence, any issues with their medications that could be optimized.

process can take up to 30 minutes in Canada and up to 45 minutes in the U.

S.

So this is quite extensive amount of time, and a lot of it is spent on documentation, speaking with a patient and researching and contacting other players, such as physicians or the family, etcetera.

So what we're able to do is that we automate everything except for the patient facing side.

So the conversation that you have With the patient to verify information to better counsel them on information.

We don't touch any of that very much of it.

What instead we do is we actually do the documentation for them.

So anything that is said within the conversation, we can add that into the forms necessary to claim back.

For this service we can also identify in real time the drug therapy problems that are mentioned.

For example, if your grandmother mentioned, oh, I stopped taking this medication because it made me cough, we would then would be able to identify, hey, this patient is missing a medication for their high blood pressure because they stopped taking this.

They could be at risk of X because they stopped taking Y things like this.

Edwin: So what I'm imagining, During our conversation, and if you're the pharmacist, you have a SEPA running and listening to our conversation, and it's giving back feedback on a screen, on the glasses, real time, in terms of what is happening, and filling out the forms, right, and the prescriptions, right?

Is that, is that, is that correct?

Is that how that, that interface works?

Eunice: Yep.

Yeah, that would actually be three of our tools working together.

So this goes back to the agents in the Lego blocks, where that would be three different components.

The one that is transcribing the conversation is the AI scribe.

The one that's doing the documentation and also identifying the drug therapy problems, that's part of our medication review.

Agent, and these are all connecting together.

If there is something that cannot be resolved by a pharmacist and has to be contacted to the physician, we have another agent to do so as well.

And if we just need to give the patient some information to take home, if they ever want to reference it again, we have another agent that is able to help with that service as well.

So we break it down into these particular services, because it's very hard to create a one size fits all solution.

Especially in healthcare, even if you narrow it down into pharmacy specifically, there's so many different types of pharmacy, so many different areas of practice that we don't necessarily do the same task in the same order.

So in order to have a scalable business where you're able to customize, but also be able to create a solution that fits their workflow.

Edwin: That makes sense.

That's amazing.

And I'm excited for that because I think you mentioned the numbers and correct me if I'm wrong.

It was like 80, 20.

And when it comes to all this admin, I wouldn't say, I don't think you call it admin work, but that type of like, those types of tasks that, that, that you could shorten it.

And do you have any like insight now with, with some of your deployments and how much time is saved now?

Eunice: For something like the medication reprocess that I mentioned, us can take 45 minutes.

We can bring it down to around 15 minutes.

There's another process called medication reconciliation.

It can take up to around an hour and a half for long term care patients and we can bring that down to.

I think it was last 15 minutes.

24 or 34.

I Edwin: I assume units.

These numbers are going to get get better as people get more accustomed to these tools and working with it.

And also the machine learning on the back end as well.

Eunice: Yeah.

With AI tools there's something called Moore's law where with any software.

Actually, I think over time, the price of these tools will get cheaper and cheaper.

The computer will get faster.

And I think.

Think in due time, it will actually be abnormal for a health care system not to be using AI tools.

It's actually really interesting because I think as a clinician myself, there will be a point where I'll be unethical not to use AI because with using AI, it's like a second check that is at a fraction of a cost of another clinician that can double check your work and thereby prevent the human error aspect as well.

Edwin: Yeah, and in real time, right?

as as as it's happening when you're interfacing it, that's really cool.

Aside from I guess A.

I.

And some of these changes within the industry are there and I'm not sure there might be none units, but are there any other major disruptions that's happening within the industry?

Eunice: Being in the industry we can be at an event and suddenly my co founder is watching the video for open AI release.

And then immediately we have to go back early to implement something.

So I think it's a very exciting industry in order to keep up with it is very difficult.

And I think that's why with software companies.

You can't be building against these big players when these big players release a new update, it has to be in a way your software has to be in a way where the big updates benefit your software and actually make it better.

If it your software is something that would compete with the big players, then I think it wouldn't be a sustainable business.

And that's a principle that we keep in mind when we're building out a product where, hey, if open AI, or these larger companies release a new update, will this Make our software better.

And at this point, yes, it does.

So we feel quite secure there, but like I mentioned before, updates are always happening, which isn't necessarily a bad thing it's more so good thing.

Cause some industry is constantly moving.

Edwin: That's great.

Um, I guess the upstream of open AI or, large language models like that.

And, I guess distribution, as the CEO founder, like, what are, what are the biggest challenges you're facing today?

Eunice: What we're facing today.

It's not really AI problems, more so a healthcare problem.

We are in the healthcare space.

Healthcare is notoriously known for their long sales cycles and a lot of compliance and security needs.

I will say, being a software product, the sales cycle is shorter than we expected but it is still longer than a typical B to C or a dev tool or consumer tool, of course.

So that is a bit difficult to juggle in terms of location, we're so urban, global.

Global clients, in which case we don't have just the issue of, for example, Canada's PIPA, UK's GDPR, U.

S.

is HIPAA, but we also have the issue of, for example, clinicians prefer different guidelines in different states or different countries, even different states, even different cities.

So how do we accommodate for that type of differentiating information as well?

I'm not just a security and compliance aspect.

Edwin: Yeah.

So what are you doing now?

like, are, really focusing on some people?

Eunice: One way that we've been able to combat that is our IP actually lies within that algorithm that we created.

We're able to process data really well on the farm.

Anything that is healthcare related in healthcare, there's a lot of unstructured information and a lot of companies there, they don't have data readiness.

That can be leveraged in a proper way for A.

I.

Solutions.

So what we're able to do with these like large amounts of data is that we can structure it in a way that is usable and increase the accuracy of any queries that are coming out of that data.

For example, this can range from, we have a client who provided us exact documents that they wanted and excluded all other documents in the medical literature.

That's something that we're able to do where we did a limitation.

There's another client where they provided their own data that they want for a particular use case, in which case that's a more specialty type of document.

And there's another client that might provide a couple million patient interactions that can help improve the algorithm.

And these are different types of data, but we have to be able to process through all of them.

And I think really our iP lies to do that.

Edwin: As we're looking at, you know, a future narrator, a future narrative in terms of yourself and what you're building.

I'd love it if you could share the vision of the future you're building with a SEPA.

Eunice: Yeah, for sure.

I envision every pharmacist actually becoming their own pharmacy and the reason why is right now There's maybe around five pharmacists per pharmacy But it's because there's so many tasks that needs to be performed You need your assistants and technicians to do the filling of prescriptions.

You need others to help at different counters I see a future where each pharmacist becomes their own pharmacy because you no longer need Those that help in order to run your own practice where you can have an automation that helps perform the intake helps triage the patients in terms of where you need to send them.

If they have questions, you'll have a system that can help you and communicate with the patient more easily and directly instead of having come in.

Phone calls, we can have them segregated into, which is a question that you need to provide clinical service for, which is a general question, such as for insurance, et cetera.

And automation for dispensing is already happening as well.

So I see a future where each clinician has a lot more capability to do more and have more control over their practice.

Edwin: great.

So what would the world look like when all pharmacists have their own pharmacy?

Eunice: A lot more accessibility for the patient.

Like I mentioned earlier some towns, they only have one pharmacy and some towns don't even have a pharmacy where they're commuting a couple hours over in order to receive health care or to their newest physician to their nearest doctor.

And that's really a problem, because especially in these rural areas there's a lot of elderly patients, a lot of people who need that care, and some of them may not be able to make that commute over.

Paul: Eunice you had said earlier, like earlier when we were talking that you really saw the pharmacist becoming, stepping into the role of what did you say?

It was like, a family doctor and and then providing more access.

How do you see that?

Changing the the pharmacists patient interaction and the level of care.

Eunice: Yep.

My answer to that is it's already changing where, for example, in, in most of the major provinces in Canada, pharmacists can prescribe up to X amount of minor ailments.

I forgot, depending on which province it is, I think it's between 30 to 50, I believe depending on the area that you're in.

In some states, you can actually already prescribe for any type of condition if you're associated with a different prescriber.

So the role is already changing and you're seeing some pharmacies establish these pharmacy clinics which are essentially like walk in clinics, like a family family physician.

But As more and more pharmacists are stepping into that role of becoming essentially a walk in clinic for these most common conditions, I see there being a specialization where you have a dedicated pharmacist who knows your care, especially for these complex patients.

Just in my experience, it's a lot easier when I know this patient really well, and my colleague doesn't know this patient very well.

They will likely just prefer to refer to me because I know the entire complex history.

So I see that dynamic being present as well.

Paul: It's really interesting how just this access to AI and and having these tools checking and providing you with the insights, how much more access to both to clinical diagnoses, but also that different practitioners now can provide the level of service that was only, expected from a family doctor.

Eunice: Yeah.

I just like to clarify.

We don't actually provide the diagnosis for the pharmacist.

The reason why I believe pharmacists can step into the role of a family physician or a walk in clinic is because we do have that education component in schools now for the past 5 or 6 years.

I believe when we're learning about these medications, we're also learning about the diagnosis.

For these common ailments, not for the most complex ones, of course but the most common ailments we do have quite a bit of background on.

When a stuff helps out these pharmacists it never says decrease a dose, increase a dose, do this.

Instead, it tells them, Hey, patient is on drug X at dose of a hundred.

The literature recommends around 50 and we provide the citation in the original source to that, and they're able to make the decision thereafter.

And that's really important to us.

Because A.

I.

Is not at the level where it can be used autonomously right now, and we want to make sure that the clinician is in the loop for anything that is being sent to the patient.

Paul: I really see how this is improving the level of care in the community.

And there's the possibilities are, it's mind blowing.

And I think, you'll see regulations and things having to adapt to access that's given because of AI.

Eunice: Yeah, definitely.

I think we're really excited about the future of healthcare and I really enables us to more with our time.

Edwin: Um, Eunice, before let you go, I know we're over time now.

Um, But if, if you could share any final thoughts, recommendations, or advice to the fellow founders, CEOs that, uh, that are listening today, Eunice: I think just being a founder myself, I think it's really interesting because when you're in healthcare, everything is very structured.

We work with a lot of clinicians, like we hire a lot of clinicians who come on board as well.

Everything's very structured and formatted but it's really interesting bringing these clinicians into this type of founder and startup environment because you don't really have any rules.

You don't have any guidelines, you have to make a lot of assumptions and decisions and have confidence in them and move forward with it in order to get that momentum and traction.

So I think.

If I have any parting words is just have that confidence because especially as a clinician, it's not something that you're actually taught in school or something that you're used to.

So it's definitely a dramatic shift.

But learning this skill has been really typical to, to the rest of my life as well.

So really grateful for the entrepreneurship experience.

Edwin: that's amazing, Eunice.

It's been an absolute pleasure.

We're wishing you luck to help in the health industry making it accessible for all of us.

So thank you for all your work and thank you for joining us on the business leadership podcast.

That's it.

Biz leaders.

Thanks for joining me on the special episode.

At the business leadership podcast, part of the future narrative mini series recorded at the collision conference in Toronto, Canada.

This was a very enlightening conversation with Eunice Wu exploring the evolving landscape of healthcare.

And the innovative solutions Asepha is bringing to the industry.

So for links to all the resources that we discussed to connect with Eunice and to learn more about the future narrative project, please slide into the show notes within the app that you're listening to right now.

And if you are interested, In reading more about Eunice and all the other business leaders that we profile that collision.

Please do.

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I have a 100 X day