South Asian Healthcare Leadership Forum Held in Boston

BOSTON, MA (September 24, 2024): One hundred leading physicians, policymakers, and

executives convened for the 10th anniversary gathering of the South Asian Healthcare

Leadership Forum (SAHLF) at Brigham and Women’s Hospital on Saturday, September 21,

2024.

SAHLF, an invitation-only organization that includes leaders across all sectors of the

healthcare industry with South Asian heritage, was founded in 2014 by a group of

healthcare executives to unlock the potential of the growing number of South Asians in

leadership roles in American healthcare including government, managed care, clinical

medicine, biopharma, and academia.

SAHLF co-founder and SCAN Group and Health Plan CEO Sachin H. Jain opened the day

with remarks, “My father, the late Dr. Subhash Jain, came to this country 50 years ago to

pursue advanced medical training with a little more than a suitcase and a dream. And

there were few South Asian faces. Today, South Asians occupy positions of leadership all

across American healthcare. The question of the day is how can we do more together that

we are able to accomplish individually?”

Attendees at this year’s event discussed topics including the role of race in modern

healthcare, and shared stories of entrepreneurship and leadership across the South Asian

diaspora.

Featured public sector speakers included President Obama’s Chief Technology O[icer,

Aneesh Chopra; President Trump’s CMS Administrator, Seema Verma; President Biden’s

National Coordinator for Health Information Technology Micky Tripathi; and President

Biden’s COVID Czar, Ashish Jha.

Featured private sector speakers included Mayo Clinic Health System President Prathiba

Varkey; CVS Health Chief Medical O[icer Sree Chagaturu; Eternal Health CEO Pooja Ika;

and Mass General CFO Niyum Gandhi.

Sahar Malik, a principal in the healthcare practice of Heidrick & Struggles, led a

conversation on glass ceilings with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts’s Chief People

O[icer Simmi Singh; life sciences leader Meenu Chhabra Karson; and University of

Pennsylvania Professor and MedPac Vice-Chair Amol S Navathe.

Pooja Chandrashekar, MD, MBA of Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical

School led a discussion on entrepreneurship, identity, and risk aversion with GV Managing

Partner Krishna Yeshwant; Deloitte Health and Life Sciences Leader, Asif Dhar;

Entrepreneur Arun Mohan, MD, MBA; Recursion Pharmaceutical’s Najat Khan, PhD; and

Accompany Health CEO Rahul Rajkumar.

Vishal Vasishth, Managing Director of Obvious Ventures and SAHLF co-founder, noted

“There is a deep sense of pride around what the South Asian community has achieved in

healthcare—and we are at the beginning of a new waves of contributions in digital health,

care delivery innovation, and artificial intelligence. It is a remarkable outcome that can be

traced to the Civil Rights movement and US leadership around immigration of skilled labor.”

In addition to Jain and Vasishth, co-founders of SAHLF include Aman Bhandari of Vertex

Pharmaceuticals, Vishal Vasishth; Aneesh Chopra (Chief Strategy O[icer, Arcadia); Pooja

Chandrashekar, and Vishal Arora (McKinsey and Company and Parkland Health). They

were joined in organizing the event by Kushal Kadakia of Harvard Medical School.

SAHLF’s sponsors included Obvious Ventures, Arcadia, HSBC, Orrick, Lazard, Deloitte, and

eternalHealth.