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Welcome to the Empowered Patient Podcast with Karen Jagoda.  This show offers a glimpse into the latest innovations in applying generative AI, novel therapeutics and vaccines, and the evolving dynamics in the medical and healthcare landscape. One focus is on how providers, pharmaceutical companies, and payers are empowering patients.  In addition, conversations often focus on how technology is empowering providers, care facilities, pharmaceutical companies, and payers to improve patient outcomes and reduce friction across the healthcare landscape.  Popular Topics Include: Virtual and digital health Use of AI, ML, and robots for clinical and administrative purposes  Value-based healthcare  Precision and stratified medicine Next-generation immuno, cell, and gene therapies Vaccines for infectious diseases and oncology Biomarkers and diagnostics Rare diseases MedTech and medical devices Clinical trials  Population health Chronic conditions l Clinician and staff burnout Smart hospitals The audience includes life science leaders, researchers, medical professionals, patient advocates, digital health entrepreneurs, patients, caregivers, healthcare solution providers, students, journalists, and investors.

Dec 15, 2025

Dr. Asher Eghbali, Co-Founder of Fuerte, has developed a platform to address the significant communication challenges between healthcare providers and pharmaceutical industry representatives. The goal is to streamline this relationship by replacing inefficient scheduling methods, and eliminate miscommunication and missed meetings to reduce frustrations and wasted time. The app is designed to combine professional networking with social media elements, including user profiles and notifications, to help build stronger, long-lasting professional relationships that benefit everyone involved.

Asher explains, "Within the life science companies and pharmaceutical reps, as we know, they're working very hard to commercialize medications and new drugs, new therapies that come out there that they want to get into patients’ hands. But sometimes they have a very hard time scheduling and putting in time to go to the doctor's office. Traditionally, they conduct a lunch-and-learn session or a coffee consult, where they come on-site to a doctor's office or a hospital setting."  

"Right now, to schedule that appointment, it's being done where the medical assistant or the office manager is writing down that individual's name on some kind of paper calendar, at most, maybe some kind of Google sheet, or a Google Meet account that they have within the office section. And that's the way that they're scheduling it. Healthcare reps are sometimes cold walking in, sometimes they're cold calling. They're putting in a lot of effort. They're working very hard to figure out how to get in and educate providers and their staff on new advancements."

"What Fuerte hopes to do with a streamlined communication platform is make it very easy for the providers to find the reps and the reps to find providers to keep in touch with each other, to search each other by disease state, by therapeutic drug, by medical advancement, and to have a shared calendar system that they can keep in constant communication and contact."

fuerteapp.com

Download the transcript here

Fuerte