FRISQ employs health tech leader and professional as Chief Product Officer
The potential to improve and facilitate care with better real-time collaboration between care teams and patients is so huge that we sometimes miss seeing how much the small steps mean to achieve this. That's what Karen Ventura says, who now joins FRISQ as Chief Product Officer (CPO). Karen is an experienced healthtech leader, who has, among other things, been Head of Interoperability at Servelec, a leader in connected software and services for healthcare, with responsibility for defining product development direction and business transformation.
Karen Ventura has a broad cross-functional skill set and a track record of transforming businesses. She has an extensive experience of running high profile, high risk and complex multi-discipline delivery and product development teams, with a successful track record. She has a significant experience in building teams and she has directed cross-business change programmes in multiple market sectors, driving operational consistency across geographically dispersed markets such as UK, US, Europe, India and Australia.
To get to know Karen a bit better, we asked her a few questions:
Why are you joining FRISQ?
My passion is joining up healthcare for improved outcomes for both the patients and their families and clinicians. Creating treatment/care plans with a multi-disciplinary professional team and empowering the patient to engage in that process could really change how care is delivered. The FRISQ product offers this, so being part of this team is something I am very excited about.
What are the main challenges in the care industry that you want to be part of solving?
We have a lot of inspirational people that work in healthcare day in and day out saving lives but integrating health care is complex with a lot of moving parts. The impact for professionals and patients being able to work together across care settings in a digital way real-time is huge, but sometimes it’s a scary thought when there is a big mountain to get over in front of you. Often, there is a desire to change at scale, but I firmly believe that you can make change in small steps to allow professionals and patients to become familiar with new ways of managing day to day care. I would love to see both professionals and patients engaging together talking about how care needs to be delivered so that everyone gets what they need, truly co-producing to create a seamless transition between care settings.
Meaningful innovation together with small steps that are fully focused on outcomes could revolutionize how care is delivered across Health & Social Care. Social Care is much more part of the conversation in today’s world which is important when it comes to care plans – care plans are not always purely clinical, and we shouldn’t forget that!
What previous experience do you bring as the new CPO?
I have worked in the Healthcare industry for 10 years, and I have been lucky to work in companies that have spanned most care settings. At EMIS Health we covered primary care, community health, and some acute settings and at Servelec, we covered community health, child health, mental health and importantly Social Care and Education.
In my previous roles I have delivered products internationally, nationally and fulfilled local agendas in specific regions. For some products, there is not a “one size fits all” because the patient population in different regions have different needs, meaning that we must be flexible.
I like to get things done, and an agile approach will allow us to deliver products iteratively and gain feedback early and often from users. I am a firm believer in customer and patient engagement to shape products; we don’t have all the answers and therefore need to involve the end user in the product development cycle.
I am looking forward to getting into all the details and listening to the team around the product to ensure that we have a relevant future roadmap and action plan to be able to deliver the products that the society, the care providers and patients really need.
What is your best personal care experience?
2 years ago I had surgery, and I am so lucky to have been cared for by the NHS and the inspirational people that work there and give their all every day. My care was first class. Being in hospital is stressful without doubt and the NHS staff do a brilliant job.
Improved interoperability would make the brilliant job they do easier!
