Talking HealthTech

In this episode of Talking HealthTech, Peter Birch speaks with Bin Rong, CEO, and Bowen Zheng, Head of Engineering at Facere AI.
The discussion explores how Facere AI is tackling administrative inefficiencies in healthcare through AI-powered solutions such as document routing, automated workflows, and AI receptionist technology.
The conversation covers the founding story of Facere AI, which began after the team saw how much time social workers spent on paperwork instead of helping people directly.
Bin and Bowen share why building an AI receptionist demo is simple but making it work in a real clinic is far more difficult, and how the team has worked to balance cost, speed, and intelligence.
They also discuss how their voice agent now responds in under two seconds and completes roughly 70% to 75% of calls, compared with about 20% for many generic AI receptionists.
The episode looks at how automated referral workflows keep admin staff in control, whether patients should always know when they are speaking with AI, and the company's vision for future automation, while emphasising a clear boundary from clinical judgement areas.

Key Takeaways
🤖 AI can relieve admin burdens in healthcare by automating document routing, allocation, and phone reception tasks, enabling staff to focus on patient care.
📞 Building a reliable AI receptionist for real-world clinics is complex, with challenges like accuracy, latency, and cost forming the "impossible triangle" of requirements.
🚦 Facere AI's technology pushes the envelope in speed and understanding, achieving sub-2-second latency and higher call completion rates compared to leading global systems.
📈 The vision is to automate up to 95% of daily non-clinical workflows, increasing efficiency without replacing jobs, but always keeping human staff in decision-making roles.
🩺 Facere AI intentionally avoids automating clinical judgement or high-level professional assessments, focusing solely on non-clinical, manual admin tasks.

Timestamps
00:00 — Episode introduction and guest backgrounds
03:27 — Healthcare admin burdens and company founding story
05:01 — Automating document routing and AI receptionist explained
07:26 — Technical challenges in live AI reception and solutions
12:54 — Demo: Automated referral and appointment workflow
19:48 — Vision for broader healthcare workflow automation
22:06 — What Facere AI will and won’t automate in healthcare

Check out the episode and full show notes on the Talking HealthTech website.
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In this episode of Talking HealthTech, Peter Birch speaks with Violeta Addamo, founder and managing director at WHITECAT, and David Bellamy, vice president for the World Federation of Hospital Sterilisation Services and president of the New South Wales Sterilisation Research and Advisory Council of Australia.
Violeta shares how her path into healthtech began in environmental science before moving through dental and surgical sales, eventually leading to the founding of WHITECAT six years ago, built on CareTag, a Danish RFID system for surgical instrument management. David brings his standing as a recognised industry leader in sterilisation through his role representing the WFHSS on the global stage.
The conversation explores the challenges and advancements in surgical instrument traceability, the implementation of RFID technology in sterilisation departments, compliance with unique device identification (UDI) requirements, and global practices in healthtech for instrument management
The episode also covers how Central Sterile Services Departments (CSSD) manage the cleaning, sterilisation, and tracking of surgical instruments, and the risks that arise when these processes rely on manual systems such as paper logs and barcode scanning.
It also looks at how RFID and real-time location systems are being trialled to improve visibility across the instrument lifecycle, reduce search times, and support faster responses to sterility breaches or recalls.
Further topics include the regulatory landscape shaping instrument management in Australia and abroad, including requirements set by the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the Australian Council on Healthcare Standards, as well as comparisons with practices in Europe and emerging trials across Asia.
The discussion closes with a look at what these advancements mean for the future of surgical safety and hospital efficiency.

Key Takeaways
🛠 The importance of surgical instrument traceability for both patient safety and operational efficiency in healthcare settings
📡 The evolution and adoption of RFID technology for real-time tracking of surgical instruments, including the limitations of traditional data matrix approaches
📝 The introduction of UDI requirements in Australia and the implications for compliance and traceability in sterilisation processes
🔄 How digitisation and technology reduce manual effort, errors, and the time required to handle equipment recalls
🌏 A comparison of global approaches to sterilisation and traceability, highlighting differences in technology adoption between Australia, Europe, and the USA

Timestamps
00:00 - Introductions and guest backgrounds
02:06 - Real-time location tracking and RFID in surgical instruments
05:03 - Traceability challenges and compliance requirements
09:01 - RFID vs data matrix for instrument-level tracking
10:47 - UDI compliance and future standards
15:40 - Manual vs digital recall management
22:51 - Global perspectives and best practices

Check out the episode and full show notes on the Talking HealthTech website.
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In this episode of Talking HealthTech, Peter Birch speaks with Craig Simmonds, CEO & Founder of Propell, about the growth and acceptance of remote patient monitoring devices in Australian healthcare.
Together, they cover the mainstreaming of virtual care, future directions for device technology, and the practical challenges and opportunities in rolling out devices like iHealth across hospital and home care.
They discuss what's driving hospitals to move beyond pilot programmes and treat remote monitoring as a core part of everyday care, including how NSW Health's rollout of iHealth devices is shaping the way patients with chronic disease or post-acute needs are supported at home.
The conversation also covers the shift from episodic, patient-initiated checks toward continuous physiological monitoring, along with the importance of integrating patient data with hospital systems for real-time clinical intervention.
It also looks at how services are working to close the digital divide by providing patients with fully set-up devices and tablets.
Craig shares insights from his experience navigating TGA approval, funding models across different states, and what it takes to keep programmes focused on genuine clinical outcomes rather than technology for its own sake.

Key Takeaways
🩺 NSW Health's large-scale adoption of iHealth devices is a major shift towards mainstream remote patient monitoring in hospital-in-the-home programs
💡 Clinical accuracy and integration with hospital systems are critical for monitoring devices, distinguishing them from general consumer wearables
📱 Simplicity, usability, and clinical reliability are fundamental criteria when selecting and deploying health monitoring devices
🔋 New devices such as Vital Patch are enabling continuous, real-time monitoring of key vitals like ECG and respiration rate
🌏 The adoption of virtual care and remote monitoring is accelerating nationwide, not just in rural/remote locations but also in metropolitan settings

Timestamps
00:00 - Introduction to Craig Simmonds and Propell
05:45 - NSW Health iHealth device rollout
07:37 - Core measurements: vital signs at home
10:43 - Data integration and real-time hospital alerts
13:30 - Funding and logistics for device programs
16:27 - Usability and support for patients
21:08 - Future: continuous devices and the Vital Patch

Check out the episode and full show notes on the Talking HealthTech website.
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In this episode of Talking HealthTech, Peter Birch speaks with Andy Hurt, Head of Strategic Accounts at Ericom, and Sam Yang, Co-founder and CEO at Xandar Kardian.
The discussion focuses on contactless, continuous vital signs monitoring using impulse ultra-wideband radar technology, exploring how this approach differs from traditional wearables, cameras, and threshold-based alarm systems.
The conversation covers practical applications in health and aged care, palliative care, mental health, and correctional settings, along with regulatory considerations such as FDA and TGA clearance.
Andy and Sam discuss data-driven care models, the role of individualised patient baselines, and how longitudinal data can reveal deterioration days before it becomes clinically apparent.
They also touch on the cost and system-wide benefits of early detection, the importance of integrating this technology into existing clinical workflows, and its emerging potential in low-resource and global health settings.
Throughout, the episode highlights the impact of predictive baseline data on prioritising clinical resources and improving patient outcomes.

Key Takeaways
🔎 Contactless radar-based monitoring addresses privacy and compliance issues found with cameras and wearables
🩺 Continuous monitoring provides longitudinal health data to inform clinical workflows and early intervention
💡 The technology assists rather than replaces clinicians, supporting prioritisation and proactive care
🌏 Regulatory approvals in multiple countries, including FDA (US) and TGA (Australia), underpin adoption
🚑 Early detection reduces hospital admissions, ambulance use, and overall costs, with use cases in remote and resource-limited environments

Timestamps
02:31 - Radar-based, contactless health monitoring explained
07:02 - Clinical and aged care use cases
11:06 - Early intervention and POBC method
13:00 - Regulatory pathways and global expansion
14:50 - Impact on healthcare system and cost savings
18:51 - Handling alarm fatigue and baseline deviations
22:34 - Integration into health facility workflows
25:15 - Broader global and low-resource applications

Check out the episode and full show notes on the Talking HealthTech website.
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In this episode of Talking HealthTech, Peter Birch speaks with Aaron Leibtag, Co Founder of Pentavere, now part of HEALWELL AI (TSX: AIDX), where he is Global Health Systems Leader.
The conversation covers Aaron Leibtag's transition from finance to healthtech, the founding story of Pentavere, a HEALWELL AI company, how AI technology is being leveraged to improve healthcare data utilisation, the practical impact of these solutions in real health settings, and what partnerships with organisations like Orion Health mean for the future of health systems in Australia and beyond.
Aaron explains why roughly 80% of existing health data sits unused, buried in free-text notes, referral letters and PDFs that analytics and decision-support tools rarely reach.
He walks through how Pentavere's DARWEN™ AI engine works, using natural language processing to read and interpret that material and build summaries that reflect the judgement of clinical experts, with full source document verification so clinicians can trust what they are seeing.
The discussion also looks at the SMARTSummary powered by DARWEN™ AI pilot delivered with Canada Health Infoway and integrated directly into the EMR, alongside close to eighty real-world evidence studies run across Canada, the United States, Europe and the Middle East.
From there, the conversation turns to the ethics, privacy and governance questions that come with deploying AI in clinical settings.
Peter and Aaron close on what Australia's existing health information exchanges make possible, why medical error and missed screenings remain such costly problems, and why solving the basics matters more than chasing the next breakthrough.
Key Takeaways
🩺 The majority of documented healthcare data remains unused, with AI technology now helping to extract and utilise this information for patient benefit
🌏 Implementation of AI-driven real-world evidence studies is already underway in countries including Canada, the US, Europe, the Middle East, and Australia
⏱️ AI tools that summarise patient data significantly reduce clinician administrative load and improve accuracy in patient care decisions
🔒 Ethical, secure, and compliant deployment of AI in healthcare is a global priority, with regions like Europe leading on policy frameworks
🤝 Partnerships with organisations like Orion Health are helping accelerate access, interoperability, and clinical utility of healthcare data in Australia and globally
Timestamps
00:01 — Introduction & guest background
03:01 — Why healthcare data is underutilised
05:10 — Real-world AI implementations
07:57 — Immediate and long-term impact of solutions
15:06 — Clinician-level AI tools
21:10 — Orion Health’s role in the Australian context
Check out the episode and full show notes on the Talking HealthTech website.
If you’re enjoying the show and want access to exclusive healthtech discussions, meetups, and member-only content, you can learn more about becoming a THT+ Solo Member here: talkinghealth.tech/solo_shownotes
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Mentioned in this episode:
Join THT+ Solo to connect with other people working in or moving into digital health through members-only events, deeper content and the Talking HealthTech community hub: talkinghealthtech.com/thtplus.