The South Asian Healthcare Leadership Forum (SAHLF) marked its 10th anniversary with a gathering of over 100 prominent physicians, policy makers, and executives at Brigham and Women’s Hospital on Saturday, September 20.¹ This invitation-only event brought together South Asian leaders across health care sectors to discuss the community’s growing influence and future contributions to American health care.

SAHLF cofounder and CEO of SCAN Group and Health Plan, Sachin H. Jain, MD, MBA, opened the forum in celebration of the evolution of South Asian representation in the health care industry, according to the news release.

“My father, the late Dr Subhash Jain, came to this country 50 years ago with little more than a suitcase and a dream. At that time, there were few South Asian faces,” he stated. “Today, we occupy leadership roles across American health care. The question of the day is how can we do more together than we are able to accomplish individually?”

Founded in 2014, SAHLF was established to harness the potential of South Asians in leadership positions across government, managed care, clinical medicine, biopharma, and academia.

South Asian Leadership Strengthens at Critical Time in US Health Care

Fostering relationships across and within communities is particularly important as the US faces a physician shortage while concurrently trying to address the pervasive disparities among patient access and quality of care. Earlier this year, Sen Bernie Sanders (I, Vermont), chairman of the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP), led a hearing that hosted a panel of health care professionals, each of whom spoke to the importance of cultural competence when establishing a provider-patient relationship and improving health outcomes.²

Key gaps in care access and patient outcomes for South Asians in the US can be attributed to the lack of detailed, nationally representative data that distinguish between subgroups, according to data published in Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health.³ Socioeconomic and cultural factors also play a major role in shaping health outcomes within this population. Additionally, culturally tailored prevention, diagnostic, and treatment models are scarce, particularly related to mental health in this community.

SAHLF: Leadership, Race, Entrepreneurship, Innovation

The anniversary event featured a series of discussions on pivotal topics, including the role of race in modern health care and stories of leadership and entrepreneurship from the South Asian diaspora.¹ Public sector speakers included Aneesh Chopra, MPP, former chief technology officer under President Barack Obama; Seema Verma, MPH, former CMS administrator under President Donald Trump; Micky Tripathi, PhD, President Joe Biden’s National Coordinator for Health IT; and Ashish Jha, MD, Biden’s COVID-19 response coordinator.

Private sector leaders also took the stage, including Prathiba Varkey, MBBS, president of the Mayo Clinic Health System; Sree Chaguturu, MD, chief medical officer at CVS Health; Pooja Ika, CEO of Eternal Health; and Niyum Gandhi, chief financial officer of Mass General.

A highlight of the meeting was a discussion on glass ceilings in health care, moderated by Sahar Malik, principal at Heidrick & Struggles, with panelists Simmi Singh, MBA, chief people officer at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts; Meenu Chhabra Karson, MBA, a prominent life sciences executive; and Amol S. Navathe, MD, PhD, professor at the University of Pennsylvania and MedPAC vice chair.

The forum also focused on entrepreneurship and innovation, with Pooja Chandrashekar, MD, MBA, of Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, leading a talk with industry figureheads including Krishna Yeshwant, MD, managing partner at GV; Asif Dhar, MD, Deloitte’s Health and Life Sciences leader; Arun Mohan, MD, MBA, entrepreneur; Najat Khan, PhD, of Recursion Pharmaceuticals; and Rahul Rajkumar, MD, CEO of Accompany Health.

“We are at the beginning of a new wave of contributions in digital health, care delivery innovation, and artificial intelligence. It’s a remarkable outcome that can be traced to the Civil Rights movement and US leadership around the immigration of skilled labor,” SAHLF cofounder Vishal Vasishth, MBA, managing director of Obvious Ventures, stated.

The event was co-organized by SAHLF’s founders, including Vasishth; Chandrashekar; Aman Bhandari, PhD, of Vertex Pharmaceuticals; Chopra, now the chief strategy officer of Arcadia; and Vishal Arora, MD, of McKinsey and Company. The organizing team was joined by Kushal Kadakia, MSc, of Harvard Medical School.

Sponsors of the event included Obvious Ventures, Arcadia, HSBC, Orrick, Lazard, Deloitte, and Eternal Health, reflecting SAHLF’s broad support from across industries.

This milestone gathering not only celebrated the accomplishments of the South Asian health care community but also set the stage for its continued impact on the future of health care innovation and leadership across the country.

References

1. South Asian Healthcare Leadership Forum held in Boston. News release. SAHLF. September 24, 2024.

2. Grossi G. Panel addresses minority physician shortage, maternal health at senate hearing. AJMC^®. May 15, 2024. Accessed September 25, 2024. https://www.ajmc.com/view/panel-addresses-minority-physician-shortage-maternal-health-at-senate-committee-hearing

3. Gany F, Palaniappan L, Prasad L, Acharya S, Leng J. South Asian health. From research to practice and policy: an overview. J Immigr Minor Health. 2019;21(suppl 1):3-6. doi:10.1007/s10903-017-0552-1