Chris Humphreys
VP, Strategic Planning and Innovation
Intouch Solutions
Going All In
Chris Humphreys knows that the more we understand patients’ challenges, the more successful we’ll be at finding innovative solutions for them. He played a key role in Intouch Solutions’ #ALLin initiative—the yearlong project that took Intouch on the road to meet hundreds of patients and caregivers at health-related events around the country. Collaborating with the Digital Health Coalition (DHC), Chris led the research effort for Intouch to further understand the impact of caregiving on patients’ health, key challenges caregivers face, and how they use digital technology to help them provide the best care.
Using insights from the #ALLin interviews and research, he organized an internal hackathon to challenge Intouch’s nearly 700 employees to find innovative solutions to help caregivers. Fifteen teams of Intouchers put their heads together, submitting some truly outstanding, innovative ideas. The internal challenge also strengthened Intouchers’ commitment to the agency’s mission to hack healthcare for the people.
Following the internal hackathon, Chris led Intouch’s external #ALLin Accelerator in September 2016. The event brought together patients, caregivers, developers, creatives, strategists, and executives from technology and healthcare industries, including representatives from a number of pharma clients. Chris organized the structure and vision for the event, as well as facilitated the onsite innovation, which led to six potential innovation ideas. The winning idea, titled “Help Me Care,” is a virtual caregiver assistant that leverages machine learning to provide personalized educational content and intuitive recommendations based on previous caregiver behaviors; recommends patient care plans; and connects caregivers to others in their communities for additional support. The Help Me Care virtual caregiver assistant is in development with planned introduction in 2017.
Chris, alongside Mark Bard, Co-founder of the DHC, and Mike Bullis, CEO of the Aging & Disability Skills Gateway, presented the winning idea at Digital Pharma East in October. The #ALLin initiative is just one example from the past 16 years that shows why Chris has garnered the respect of industry stakeholders for his deep understanding of the healthcare industry’s ever-changing needs.
