AT&T has named Dr. Eric Topol its new chief medical advisor. In his new position, Topol will have the ability to oversee and influence the development, design process and delivery of the organization's IT services in the health care sector. Overall, Topol's efforts will be based primarily on providing connection solutions to health care groups that will boost outcomes and improve care delivery processes for patients, doctors and practitioners.
In addition to his new chief medical advisor position with AT&T, Topol will also maintain his current employment as chief academic officer at Scripps Health. His new career with the telecom organization will allow Topol the opportunity to provide advice in a range of business sectors, including emerging devices and m-health offerings. The telecommunications provider hopes Dr. Topol's guidance will improve current health IT products and services and boost customer and enterprise adoption of these solutions.
Topol will replace Dr. Geeta Nayyar, who took on the position in 2011 when it was created by AT&T to help bridge the gap between the mobile technology and health care sectors.
Chris Hill, SVP for AT&T’s Business Advanced Solutions division, said Topol's program assistance will drive the company's competitive practices and help employees focus on providing network-powered solutions.
"Dr. Topol is a change agent who has dedicated his career to creating awareness and promoting adoption of health IT solutions to improve patient care," Hill said.
AT&T has a number of m-health partnerships with several industry organizations including WellDoc, Vitality and MedApps. The company also offers application, mobile, cloud-based and networking solutions for the health care market. Topol said he is honored to begin working with AT&T as they create products and services to shift the digital health sector and improve patient outcomes.
"With connected devices, the flow of health and medical information is going through a radical change, which puts patients in an exceptionally powerful and important position," Topol said.
