How it all began
It was the early 2010s. Our health system had recently been highlighted by President Obama as a model system for healthcare. Dr. Brent James had helped achieve that recognition and become a world expert on healthcare change. During that same time, other industries were being completely transformed by the principles of process improvement taught by Edward Deming. Dr. James saw a unique opportunity to apply those process improvement principles to healthcare and commissioned a development team, led by our now-CTO, David Edwards, to build new software that could make it possible. It was, not surprisingly, much more difficult than they hoped.
For 7 years they toiled away. First, it wasn’t fast enough, so they innovated a lightning fast clinical element model. Second, clinicians needed to decide the process, not engineers – so they made it no code and easy for physicians to build their own pathways. Third, it needed a universal path for all care processes in order to achieve success, so they built the foundation for a way to use any form of data in the EMR, for the development of any process. One by one, as they conquered these obstacles, they began to get traction within Intermountain. First users liked it, then they loved it, and finally they couldn’t live without it. The tech was ready, but to truly change care delivery it needed to grow outside the immediate health system.
Dr. Will Caldwell, a seasoned physician and business leader, was tapped to get funding and build a team. He assembled an unusually deep set of business, clinical, and sales experts to complement the developers. Seeing the possibility for making a difference in the lives of clinicians and patients everywhere, they found a path to raise the funds and start a company with this extraordinary tech at the center. Now, we are excited to introduce the world to the software and technology that powers SaVia Health and have you and your patients experience the transformative speed and power of custom workflow in your EMR.
The SaVia Health team
Chairman and CEOWill Caldwell, MD, MBA
In addition to Will’s company leadership, as a practicing physician and surgeon, he provides critical clinical leadership to guide SaVia’s technology. He joins SaVia from Health Catalyst where he served as Senior Vice President for Population Health. Will has built and managed large provider networks for healthcare delivery systems specializing in physician focused, data driven cultural change. He brings a breadth of experience from private equity consulting, international supply chain development, global health equity promotion, behavioral health integration, digital patient engagement, telemedicine platform build, and early-stage medical device consulting.
Will is triple board certified with additional training in wilderness medicine, facial trauma surgery, public health, and tropical medicine. Serving as Senior Health Advisor to Zanmi Lasante (Partners in Health – Haiti), they recently won two Emmy Awards for a documentary film depicting the work in Southwest Haiti. Will earned his MBA from Wake Forest University, finishing with Highest Honors, and continues to see patients receiving 26 awards for clinical excellence during his 21-year clinical career.
CTODavid Edwards, PhD
David leads the same team and technology that from the earliest build they iterated through to the extraordinary value and reception it grew to within Intermountain Healthcare. He is more enthusiastic than ever to see what started from humble beginnings make the difference in healthcare they had always aimed for. He brings uncommon depth in software engineering having worked for 25+ years on elements as wide as infrared satellites to EEG devices to the deep expertise he brings in hospital information systems.
COOMike McBride
Mike is responsible for product and operations to help bring this technology to as many clinicians and patients as possible. He has led teams from two to 250 for 25 years executing across domains like: lean process improvement, product development, and strategic consulting. He led more than 10 multi-specialty physician clinics and more than 200 employees moving to VBC; recruited and developed high-functioning leadership teams in multiple industries; and led the technology foundations for all claims data at HCAT up to $1 billion valuation.
He’s done this in places from Intermountain Healthcare in Salt Lake, to more than 50 health systems across the U.S,, to international clients in Singapore. He joins SaVia from HealthCatalyst where he most recently recruited and built world-class product teams in scaling web-based products to revolutionize pop health.
EVP of Sales and MarketingSam Taylor
Sam leads the growth and business development for SaVia Health. He brings extraordinary knowledge and leadership with nearly 30 years of technology software IT and healthcare content sales experience. Sam has built and run both large and small sales and marketing organizations ranging from five to 50 people in both newly developing and mature markets. He is passionate about architecting the opportunity to introduce SaVia to health care providers and the many clients he has worked with over the years in order to promote the impact that SaVia can have on patients and patient outcomes.
