#452 – Robert Coombs, Founder & CEO at Baton Health

Introduction

In this episode of the Slice of Healthcare podcast, host Jared Taylor sits down with Robert Coombs, the CEO and founder of Baton Health. Robert shares his unique journey from working in nonprofits and politics to becoming a healthcare tech entrepreneur. He dives deep into the challenges of healthcare credentialing and how Baton Health is revolutionizing the process with innovative, data-driven solutions.

Robert Coombs’ Background

Robert Coombs’ path to healthcare tech is anything but traditional. With a career rooted in nonprofits and politics, Robert has always focused on operating lean and maximizing resources. His journey into healthcare credentialing began at CredSimple, a small community-based organization (CBO) where he scaled credentialing processes from 200 to 25,000 credentials a month, eventually rebranding as Andros.

The Birth of Baton Health

The complexities of credentialing in the healthcare sector became apparent to Robert during his tenure at Andros and later at Medallion. He noticed a recurring issue: companies in the credentialing space faced identical challenges, relying heavily on manual data entry due to outdated databases and limited APIs. This realization led Robert to establish Baton Health, aiming to address these inefficiencies head-on.

Innovative Approaches to Credentialing

Baton Health adopts a fundamentally different approach to credentialing. Instead of piecemeal solutions, Baton Health gathers every piece of primary source information for all healthcare providers, creating a comprehensive federated dataset. This enables faster and more accurate primary source verification, unlocking capabilities like identifying practitioners with specific licensure and automating previously manual processes.

Real-World Impact

Robert shares a compelling example of Baton Health’s efficiency. In collaboration with a national virtual care delivery network, Baton Health drastically reduced credentialing time for a practitioner with 33 state licenses from six hours to just 645 milliseconds. Such efficiency is especially crucial for virtual care providers, where practitioners often hold multiple licenses.

The Path Forward

Looking ahead, Baton Health aims to expand its data collection to include sanctions, exclusions, and board certifications, moving towards real-time credentialing. This approach promises to revolutionize the industry, providing instantaneous, accurate, and comprehensive credentialing data.

Conclusion

Robert Coombs’ innovative vision and Baton Health’s data-driven solutions are set to transform healthcare credentialing. By tackling the hardest problems head-on, Baton Health is paving the way for a more efficient, transparent, and reliable credentialing process. Stay tuned to the Slice of Healthcare podcast for more updates on Baton Health’s journey and the latest in healthcare innovation.