Innovation Roundup (( by Hamid Ghanbari, MD ))
A newsletter about innovation, technology and empathy in medicine (9-7-21)
Hi,
It has been a while since I sent out this newsletter. Life just got a little bit ahead of me and I needed sometime to catch up on everything. I really did miss writing this newsletter and I am excited to get back on my weekly publishing cadence. Going forward you will probably get a little bit more on my main academic reading on machine learning and digital health as well humanities and aesthetics. Please let me know what parts are working and which topics you would like to see more or less of.
Thanks for being patient!
I have had a great fortune of having Brahmajee Nallamothu as my mentor. His talk during the ceremony celebrating his Stevo Julius Professorship is an incredible meditation on life, aspiration, family and time. This was definitely one of the most inspirational events I have ever attended. Highly recommended.
Department of Digital Health
TLDR: They categorized diverse digital phenotypes into four different constructs: behavior, cognition, emotion, and motivation. They used machine learning strategies with digital phenotypes to find an applicable model to predict intervention adherence for the first time. These findings imply that not only users’ physical participation in a specific target behavior (eg, logging food diary and number of steps) and behavior in digital spaces (eg, number of accesses) but also the user’s psychological conditions (eg, emotion and motivation) are relevant to engagement and clinical outcomes.
Deep Neural Networks Learn by Using Human-Selected ECG Features and Novel Features
TLDR: Deep neural networks for ECG signals extract features in a similar manner to human experts and that they also generate additional novel features that help achieve superior performance.
Mobile app validation: a digital health scorecard approach
TLDR: This is interesting framework for evaluation of Apps used in healthcare. Their validation was then by applying a framework, which encompassed evaluation across the following domains: technical, clinical, usability, and cost. In addition, per the framework, end-user requirements were identified and assessed
Department of Reading
Everyone loves her own wisdom. What distinguishes the philosopher is loving the wisdom she doesn’t have.
The right response to noticing one’s own ignorance is to try to escape it by acquiring someone else’s knowledge. But the only way to do that is to explain to them why you aren’t yet able to accept this or that claim of theirs as knowledge—and that is what mapping one’s ignorance amounts to.
High culture remained the superego of a society that still nominally believed in artistic values like genius, originality, beauty, and complexity.
High culture now functions like a counterculture, entailing a conscious act of dissent from the mainstream.
Our discovery was not of that character. It really was very minor. The reasons for telling the story now are less about the discovery itself and more about the tendency of scientists to seek lessons in moral philosophy in the least likely of places—high-school algebra, for example.
Tyler Cowen is the best curator of talent in the world-
Tyler Cowen is an economist that has spotted top talent in fields ranging from biotech to literature, often years before insiders. How does he do it?
Distribution: Tyler promotes the opportunity in such a way that the talent level of the application pool is extraordinarily high and the people who apply are uniquely earnest.
Application: Emergent Ventures’ application is laser focused on the quality of the applicant’s ideas, and boils out the noise of credentials, references, and test scores.
Selection: Tyler has relentlessly trained his taste for decades, the way a world class athlete trains for the olympics.
Inspiration: Tyler personally encourages winners to be bolder, creating an ambition flywheel as they in turn inspire future applicants.
Department of Innovation
How to spin your scientific research out of the university - so good!
Misconception 1. You can start a company while continuing your academic career
Misconception 2. You should find a CEO to run the company
Misconception 3. You need someone with business experience on the founding team
Misconception 4: You should raise money first, then leave the university
How to split equity among cofounders
TLDR: Equity should be split equally because all the work is ahead of you.
Department of Productivity
I am a big fan of Cal Newport and Lex is a world class interviewer. I have been reading Cal Newport for a few years and he has been a big influence on my work philosophy. This is a great conversation about deep work and how to live a meaningful life.
Department of Aesthetics
Oskar Kokoschka - Bride of the Wind (1914)
Thank you again for reading my newsletter.
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Talk Soon,
Hamid