Breaking Healthcare Silos: Uniting Stars, Risk Adjustment, and Revenue for Better Patient Outcomes

Welcome to the very first episode of The Healthcare STARcast! In this kickoff conversation, host Subbu Ramalingam dives deep into Subbu’s fascinating journey from growing up in an entrepreneurial household in Chennai, India, to becoming a thought leader in the U.S. healthcare industry. Subbu shares how his early experiences in technology and finance ultimately led him to discover his true purpose in healthcare, using data and analytics to make a tangible difference for patients. Throughout their discussion, Subbu unpacks the philosophy of "Vivega" — the art of discerning the right priorities amid the chaos of modern healthcare — and explains why it’s crucial to break down silos between star ratings, risk adjustment, quality, and cost. He reflects candidly on building high-performing teams, the importance of ethical leadership, and why even metrics-driven healthcare is fundamentally about people, not just numbers. If you’re a healthcare leader, operator, or someone interested in transforming managed care, this episode delivers practical guidance, inspiring stories, and a preview of what’s to come in future deep dives. Get ready to reimagine what’s possible at the intersection of clarity, compassion, and value-based care! Timestamps: 00:00 Healthcare Consultant & Executive Coach Journey 05:02 Early Healthcare Analytics Success 09:06 "Vivega: Personalized Healthcare Prioritization" 11:32 Integrating US Health Care Measures 14:47 Optimizing Patient Care Delivery 18:53 Building a High-Performing Team 21:14 Tailoring Success Strategies by Market 25:18 Essential Executive Tasks for Team Success 30:07 Risk Adjustment Strategy and Communication 35:19 Adapting to Change as Leaders 39:34 Align Ethics with Organizational Goals 41:58 Value-Based Care Quality Measures 45:02 Healthcare STARcast: Technical Deep Dives Quotes, Hooks, & Timestamps: "So Vivega is actually the power of discernment, which is fundamentally looking, trying to find the truth amongst chaos." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:07:29 → 00:07:33] "Healthcare is such an individual thing. So Vivega, the concept, as I mentioned, is necessary, meaning it is necessary to look at all the different things that are happening and ensure that we are able to prioritize the right things to bring the right value or outcomes to members and patients." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:09:06 → 00:09:40] "So healthcare in terms of the work that we do across the board is generally siloed. Siloed because of the structure of healthcare." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:12:11 → 00:12:27] "It's about reaching out to the members or patients at the right time. It's about the providers making sure they're able to reach the member or take care of the member at the right time and at the right place." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:15:29 → 00:15:47] "Not all playbooks apply for all markets. So for example, the market I was in with Care first in Maryland, D.C. and Northern Virginia. The same concepts that may apply to California or New Jersey, New York, Philadelphia may not apply for a state like Maryland where there are unique rules with the healthcare financing system there the provider behaviors are different, the zip codes are different within those areas, the needs are different, the community is different." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:21:25 → 00:22:08] "Sometimes outcome may not be 100% guarantee, but the effort towards the right things and the metric showing that will give confidence to people that things are happening and the teams are really plugged in to get the results." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:25:55 → 00:26:20] "it'll be very, very important for VP of risk adjustment to also think beyond just the revenue component and also think about the care that is being delivered." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:32:09 → 00:32:27] "We are in the behavior choosing business and not behavior changing business." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:40:56 → 00:41:01] "As part of the healthcare Starcast, we're going to deep, you know, having a lot, going to have a lot of deep dive into each of these concepts in looking at the different measures, tactics and strategies, a little bit more deep dive into like how to improve them." — Subbu Ramalingam [00:45:59 → 00:46:19] Show Website - https://healthcarestarcast.com/ Subbu Ramalingam - Show Host - Linkedin -   / subburamalingam   FloWise Leadership - https://flowiseleadership.com/ ViVega Business Services - https://www.vivega.co/ Media Partner - TopHealth - https://tophealth.care/