HealthTech Hour

HealthTech Hour is a leading healthtech podcast exploring the people and technologies transforming healthcare. Each episode features conversations with healthtech founders, healthcare leaders, clinicians, investors and innovators building the future of digital health, AI, diagnostics, medtech and healthcare innovation. Whether you're a founder, investor, healthcare professional or simply passionate about health technology, HealthTech Hour brings insights from the people shaping the future of healthcare. 🌍 Listeners in over 50 countries. 🎙 New episode bi-weekly. 🗣 Hosted by Steve Roest.

HealthTech Hour is a health podcast hosted by Steve Roest, with 161 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Steve Roest hosts HealthTech Hour, a health show with 161 episodes published.

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  Episode #153

  Why Community Pharmacy Is Propping Up the NHS | Jay Patel, Day Lewis

  Sep 23, 202650 min

  Community pharmacy, pharmacist prescribing, Pharmacy First, NHS medicine shortages, prevention, blood pressure checks — Jay Patel, co-CEO of Day Lewis, on why the pharmacy on your high street is the most underused and underfunded part of UK healthcare. A blood pressure check he almost declined caught the heart disease that would have killed him. Steve Roest sits down with Jay Patel — qualified pharmacist, MBA, Community Pharmacy England board member and co-CEO of one of the UK's largest pharmacy chains — on why community pharmacy is quietly becoming the front line of prevention, and what it could do if the system actually backed it. In this episode: Why a routine pharmacy check saved Jay's life, and what it says about prevention Why every newly qualified pharmacist in the UK can now prescribe How pharmacies are paid less for medicines than they cost to buy Why Pharmacy First is the backbone of what's coming next How AI will make pharmacists better, not replace them Why online pharmacy hasn't killed the high-street model The four lessons from building a 250-pharmacy family business 0:00 The pharmacy check that saved his life 0:44 Intro 3:10 Welcome & why community pharmacy keeps growing in importance 5:50 Growing up in the back of a pharmacy 11:11 Why pharmacy is a bigger front line than your GP 14:12 The blood pressure check that saved Jay's life 19:13 Pharmacist prescribing and Pharmacy First 24:49 Why AI will make pharmacists better, not replace them 47:45 Why pharmacies lose money on your prescriptions 49:27 The four lessons that shaped him New episodes bi-weekly with the founders, clinicians, journalists and leaders shaping the future of healthcare.

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  Episode #152

  The Mental Health Crisis Starts in Primary School | Laura Earnshaw, myHappymind

  Sep 8, 202652 minS1

  Children's mental health, prevention vs treatment, resilience, self-esteem, the CAMHS waiting list - Laura Earnshaw, Founder of myHappymind, on why we're solving children's mental health at the wrong end, and what teaching it early actually looks like. What if most children's mental health problems could be prevented years before they ever reach a waiting list? Steve Roest sits down with Laura Earnshaw, former Global Head of Talent at AstraZeneca, now Founder and CEO of myHappymind, the NHS-backed programme in over 2,000 schools. After her own son struggled at school and a family member was sectioned, Laura left her corporate career to build the skills she'd been teaching senior leaders for children as young as three. In this episode: Why children's mental health needs prevention, not just treatment What myHappymind teaches children as young as three The 120% vs 20% data proving early intervention works The commissioner who wouldn't fund prevention and why Why "character, not competence" builds real self-esteem Why founders should stop publicly blaming the NHS Laura's mottos for getting through the hard days 0:00 Why we get children's mental health backwards 0:51 Intro 2:20 From AstraZeneca to founding myHappymind 5:44 The two moments that changed everything 8:04 A million kids waiting: prevention vs treatment 10:34 What you can teach a three-year-old 11:38 Character, not competence: building real self-esteem 15:54 The data - 120% vs 20% on school absence 19:12 The commissioner who wouldn't fund prevention 40:44 Why founders should stop blaming the NHS 42:42 How the NHS came to her first 50:05 "Everything is figureoutable" New episodes bi-weekly with the founders, clinicians, journalists and leaders shaping the future of healthcare.

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  Episode #151

  The NHS Chair on What The World Gets Right About Healthcare | Dr Penny Dash

  Aug 26, 202652 minS1

  Is there a healthcare system better than the NHS? And what could Britain learn from the countries getting it right? This week, Steve Roest sits down with Dr Penny Dash, Chair of NHS England, for one of the most wide-ranging conversations the show has had. Penny began her career as a hospital doctor, went on to lead McKinsey's European healthcare practice, and now holds one of the most significant roles in global healthcare. After more than four decades in and around the system, she remains a rare voice of optimism, a realist who never sugarcoats, but always sees the potential for things to be better. Together, Steve and Penny take a tour of the world's healthcare systems: why there's no clear "winner," what the UK still genuinely leads on, and why she believes India could become the global exemplar in healthcare by using technology to drive down the cost of care. They get into how Germany prices surgery like a market, why New Zealand and the Nordic countries are worth watching, and what the US gets wrong despite its wealth. Closer to home, they confront the harder truths: why your GP record and hospital record are still two separate systems, why world-class electronic health records too often amount to little more than stored PDFs, and why the fight over a single patient record has echoed the same fears for thirty years. Penny also makes a provocative case that telling patients not to come to A&E gets the problem backwards and explains why nine in ten urgent cancer referrals now find nothing, and what that's doing to the system. It's a conversation about problems, but told through the lens of what's possible and why, after 45 years, Penny is more hopeful than ever. In this episode: Why there's no clear winner among global healthcare systems, and what the UK still leads on Why Dr Dash believes India could lead the world in healthcare How Germany prices surgery like a market to manage waiting lists Why your GP and hospital records still don't connect The single patient record debate, and thirty years of the same resistance Why "don't come to A&E" is the wrong message Why most urgent cancer referrals now find nothing New episodes every week with the founders, clinicians, journalists and leaders shaping the future of healthcare.

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  Episode #150

  The Truth About Your Health Data - with Matthew Whitty (MDClone, ex-NHS England)

  Aug 4, 202650 minS1

  Matthew Whitty is the former Director of Innovation, Research and Life Sciences at NHS England and now Director of Commercial Partnerships at MDClone, a global healthcare data platform. Combining senior NHS leadership with frontline experience in healthcare data and AI, he is an expert on NHS data strategy, safe AI adoption and how health systems can unlock the value of data while protecting patiWho actually owns your health data? Most people assume there's a single patient record sitting somewhere in the NHS. There isn't, and that gap sits at the heart of one of healthcare's most important and least understood debates. This week, Steve Roest is joined by Matthew Whitty, Director of Commercial Partnerships at MDClone and former Director of Innovation, Research and Life Sciences at NHS England. Drawing on a career that's spanned hospital pharmacy, commissioning, consultancy and national policy, Matt offers a rare view from the intersection of government, industry, academia and patient care. Together they unpack why the "privatisation" debate is really about trust and motivation, what the Federated Data Platform and the Palantir contract actually involve, and why de-identified data can still put patients at risk - including the recent UK Biobank breach. They also explore synthetic data, the case for sandbox environments that could make Britain the number one place to build healthtech, and why Matt believes there's far more reason for optimism about the NHS than the headlines suggest. In this episode: Why the NHS can't build everything itself, and what the private-sector "tension" is really about Who owns your health data, and why no single patient record exists The Federated Data Platform and Palantir controversy, explained How de-identified data gets re-identified, and what happened with UK Biobank Synthetic data and the case for UK healthtech "sandboxes" Why the NHS may compare far better to other systems than people assume New episodes every week with the founders, clinicians, journalists and leaders shaping the future of healthcare.ent privacy.

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  Episode #149

  Can the NHS Reform Without Losing Universal Care? | Paul Gallagher

  Jul 24, 202648 minS1

  What would meaningful NHS reform actually look like—and why is it so difficult to discuss? In this episode of Health Tech Hour , Steve Roest speaks with veteran health journalist Paul Gallagher about the pressures facing the NHS, including waiting-list backlogs, workforce shortages, delayed hospital discharges, social-care gaps and the political sensitivity surrounding reform. Paul draws on two decades of healthcare reporting to examine why the NHS repeatedly falls into short-term crisis management, how public expectations compare with the amount the UK is willing to spend, and why discussions about restructuring are so often reduced to fears of privatisation. The conversation also explores the role technology can play in moving care from hospitals into communities, improving prevention and making services easier to access. Steve shares how a single SMS offering an at-home health check generated 80% uptake among previously unresponsive patients , illustrating how service design, not patient apathy, can determine engagement. They discuss: Why social-care shortages keep medically fit patients in hospital How fragmented care and workforce vacancies create system-wide delays Whether technology can meaningfully reduce pressure on NHS staff Why convenience matters for preventative-health participation The difference between private delivery and charging patients Why NHS reform debates often default to comparisons with the US What the UK could learn from healthcare systems in Europe and Japan Whether higher taxation could support better public services How politics and the media reinforce short-term decision-making Paul Gallagher is a health journalist with more than 20 years of experience, including a decade as health correspondent at the i Paper and work for publications including The Times , The Telegraph and The Mirror . He is also contributing to an Alzheimer’s Disease International report focused on clinical trials. Health Tech Hour features the founders, clinicians, journalists and system leaders changing healthcare in the UK and beyond.

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