Something New to Accelerate Innovation for Medicaid & Safety Net Populations

Since early this year I’ve had the privilege of working with some exemplary socially conscious leaders and technologists building solutions for the vast, yet underserved, safety net population in the US. I’ve formalized my efforts under the banner of Slayer Consulting.?

The backdrop.

Slayer is the culmination of over a decade-long commitment to focus my skills towards solving hard problems for the most underserved, vulnerable members of our communities. I created Slayer to fill a gap that I experienced as a founder building in the Medicaid space: the lack of cross-functional expertise to use regulation and technology to bring underserved populations the healthcare and social solutions they need to thrive.?

There is an expanding number of fast growing healthcare companies and well established community based organizations that can, and should, have a robust, lucrative Medicaid strategy but do not because they are experiencing this knowledge gap. Meanwhile, the tailwinds in regulation and technology have never been stronger and more aligned with this mission of serving the underserved.?

The problems I’m solving for.

As founders and providers operating in the sphere of the safety net we are acutely aware of the medical, behavioral and social needs amongst the 41 million people living below the Federal Poverty Line (92 million below 200% of the FPL). There are countless organizations, across the spectrum of clinical and non-clinical/social, capable of addressing these localized needs at various degrees of scale but how do they get paid to do so sustainably and profitably??

The circuit of government-funded benefits and programs, both within and outside the periphery of healthcare, is complex and siloed across agencies. This includes everything from SSI/SSDI (Social Security Administration); SNAP & WIC (USDA); OAA, Section 1905, 1915, 1115 (Health & Human Services); down to the various stakeholders and population groups across MCOs, ACOs, FQHCs, CHCs, serving dual eligibles, LTSS, PACE, and countless other carve outs of eligible vulnerable population groups. There is a surging tide of regulatory support unfolding from state to state and at a federal level to expand coverage in terms of eligible members and eligible benefits subsidized with government funds. I created Slayer to help builders and doers to make sense of and execute on opportunities available to do well by doing good for the most vulnerable among us.

What does Slayer do?

Slayer is the domain-expert partner in strategy, commercialization and execution across Medicaid innovation that I never had as a founder. I’m bringing to bear a network that is a decade-in-the-making by partnering with best-in-class executive leaders from across regulatory authorities, managed care plans, community leaders, technology pioneers and investors to bring hands-on strategy, validation and execution to fast growing healthcare companies and trusted community health organizations to unlock the opportunities afforded by a rapidly transforming Medicaid and Medicare Advantage regulatory landscape. I’ll share more on this in a subsequent post.

Why me? Why this?

Meandering into US healthcare.

My journey pivoting from A) financing leveraged buyouts for top tier private equity clients like KKR and Carlyle across Asia to B) ‘do well by doing good’ for the highest need populations in US healthcare has been the adventure of a lifetime. It started in the mountains of the Indian Himalayas with a group of intrepid Singaporean doctors who inspired me. We built an incredible non-profit as volunteers delivering cleft and cataract surgeries to the most remote and under-served communities across the deltas of Myanmar, rainforests of Indonesia and bustling villages of Laos and Cambodia.?

This work inspired me to quit my day job in banking, enroll in a MPH at Harvard and eventually co-found and lead Vincere Health, a venture-backed health technology company for Medicaid and safety net population in the US. We pioneered many approaches to solving for Medicaid member engagement and benefit navigation using RPM and behavioral rewards: setting up MSO-PC structures, entering into value based contracts, delivering digital-native SMS-first member experiences, finally delivering Medicaid engagement and reward experiences via a LLM/Gen AI powered conversational SMS agent. Following an illustrious start to 2023, Optum, our biggest client, took ownership of what we had built. This is an achievement that is testament to the product our team built and the close client relationship we forged over the years, but one peppered with failures and learnings, when dissected with intellectual honesty and integrity, represent a rich well of lessons to draw on for helping founders see risks around corners that are infrequently discussed.

Growing up.

Subsequent to my founder/CEO journey at Vincere I had the good fortune of joining up with friends old and new as an SVP at leading Medicare Advantage supplemental benefits company, NationsBenefits. I joined my previous client and mentor Chelsey Berstler, whom I had been a vendor to while she was a Managed Care leader at UHC, and am ever grateful to Glenn and Michael Parker for the opportunity to join and learn so much from a trailblazing Medicare Advantage perspective across the vast scale and breath of products being delivered to MA populations to address SDOH needs.

This next chapter means a great deal to me as I get back to my roots in Medicaid with the autonomy to work with the best, value-aligned partners. Huge shout out to Chelsey who remains my champion, collaborator, connector and Principal Advisor to Slayer. Without her deep expertise and network Slayer would be a mere shadow of what it represents today.

It’s a great pleasure and privilege for me to live out my innate obsession to solve the seemingly intractable problems experienced by underserved safety net populations and other vulnerable groups, while working with builders and fast moving organizations who have the will and the tools to make tremendous social and financial impact.

Drop me a note or head to www.slayerconsulting.com to chat and learn more.