Jerry Katzman, MD - Chairman, President and CEO

Jerry Katzman, MD, is the Company’s Chief Executive Officer, President, and Chairman of the Board of Directors. Dr. Katzman has always been an entrepreneur, scientist, and pioneer in medical science. His focus has targeted various biotechnology companies, biopharma, and Wall Street. Upon completion of his medical training, Dr. Katzman joined a multi-specialty group practice in Brandon, FL where he founded and established the group’s department of ophthalmology. 

He then entered into a private practice where he designed and built one of the first state-licensed in office freestanding ambulatory surgical centers. The center also provided a multitude of services, including pharmacy, audiology, retinal dx, and treatment, as well as, general eye care, eye surgery, and optical. In 1993, Dr. Katzman founded EyeCare International, the nation’s first and largest non-insurance based discount vision network consisting of over 13,000 provider locations.

After 17 years with Amacore Group, Inc. (successor to EyeCare International) he retired as its Chief Medical Officer and continued his work on healthcare initiatives to promote affordable healthcare and an emergency electronic medical records program. 

Thereafter, in 2008, co-founded Core Corporate Consulting Group, Inc. a private company designed to purchase and rejuvenate ailing public companies that were headed into bankruptcy. 

In 2013, founded Disruptor Technologies Inc., a marketing and consulting company, and served as the CEO. Disruptor was developed to research, identify, evaluate, obtain, develop, promote, manufacture, and/or market groundbreaking technologies in health and science. 

Dr. Katzman is also the host of the podcast Healthy, Strong, and Active: Your Strategy for Life.

Dr. Katzman graduated from Boston University with a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering in 1974 and thereafter earned his M.D. from the Universidad de Guadalajara in Jalisco, Mexico.
 

Herbert L. Gould, MD, FACS - Chief Science Officer

Dr. Gould graduated from Bowdoin College and received an MD from Columbia’s College of Physicians and Surgeons.  He served his internship at the 1stMedical Division, Bellevue Hospital, and was a resident at the Manhattan Eye, Ear & Throat Hospital, where, as a senior resident, he initiated the Contact Lens Clinic. He continued his medical studies at the Institute of Ophthalmology (London), Harvard Medical School, and the Downstate Medical Center, NY, where he received a corneal fellowship which included Moorfields Eye Hospital, London. 

He was a co-founder of the Contact Lens Society of Ophthalmologists and the New York Intraocular Lens Implant Society. He was a founding member of the American Intraocular Lens Implant Society, now ASCRS, was elected to the International Intraocular Lens Implant Club (IIIC), and later was a founding member of the International Society of Refractive Surgery. Dr. Gould was the founder and first president of the New York Keratorefractive Society. He has been a Teaching Fellow at the State University of New York, was Assistant Clinical Professor in Ophthalmology at State University of New York (Downstate), Associate Clinical Professor at New York Medical College, and served as an Instructor at the American Academy of Ophthalmology.   

Numerous presentations were made to professional associations in the US and throughout the world, including ophthalmological meetings in Athens, Prague, Stockholm, London, Vienna, Milan, Alexandria (Egypt), Shanghai, Korea, Algarve (Portugal) and Cannes, where he was also awarded a Bronze Medal from the Cannes Film Festival (Best Surgical Film: Corneal Transplant & Intra-Ocular Lens Implantation). He has published over 80 articles and chapters in professional books and journals. He has numerous professional memberships. 

He implanted the first intraocular lens in China with the IIIC. He trained in Russia and introduced radial keratotomy to the US and later helped develop the Lasik technique. He had one of the first lasers in NYC after FDA approval, and later helped set up the laser center at the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary. He served as a Major in the U.S. Air Force, where he served as a Flight Surgeon, for five years.

 

Vinay Mehindru, MD, MBA - Board of Directors

Dr. Mehindru is an accomplished physician executive with over 25 years of healthcare experience that includes population health, physician performance management, and building physician alliances with clinical and financial integration. He is well known for taking a vision and transforming it into reality through sound strategy development and execution.

Vinay was born in a very poor family in North India where he struggled for basic needs. Despite his humble origins, he continued the accelerated track for education and ended up starting college at age 14. He graduated from medical school at age 21, one of the youngest graduates in the country. He moved to the United States to fulfill his dream of superior postgraduate education.

In his relentless pursuit of higher education, Vinay joined the top tier Internal Medicine residency program at the Cleveland Clinic. During the intense training at the clinic, he had the privilege of working under the tutelage of world-renowned physicians like Dr. Charles J Fisher (Critical Care), Dr. Eric Topol (Cardiology), and Dr. Steven Shay (Gastroenterology). Vinay did research with Dr. Shay in the area of Gastro-Esophageal Reflux Disease (GERD), the publication listed at the end of the last page. He also had the honor of serving as faculty at the Cleveland Clinic at the age of 26.

Vinay, in his dedication to education, joined the University of Florida for a second residency in Emergency Medicine. This residency program had been ranked in the top 10 for several years. Vinay had the honor and privilege to learn difficult airway management from Dr. Robert Luten, a worldwide authority on difficult airway management for both adults and pediatrics. Working in this busy Level One Trauma center, Vinay also worked under Dr. Ann Harwood-Nuss, author of the Emergency Medicine textbook.

After graduating from his second residency from the University of Florida, Vinay joined a private group of Emergency physicians on the east coast of Central Florida with 47 providers, 75 employees, and over 100,000 annual visits. He had tremendous experience in airway management working at this level two trauma center for 10 years.

Vinay had been an instructor for both Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support (ACLS) and Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) for 16 years. Vinay taught difficult airway management along with cardiac arrest resuscitation for adults and the kids to physicians, RNs, EMTs, and paramedics during this time.

Following his relentless passion for education, Vinay joined Masters in Healthcare, an on-campus physician’s only program, at the University of Texas at Dallas (UT Dallas). Then he joined the Healthcare Executive MBA program at UT Dallas. Vinay graduated Executive MBA with honors and received the Beta Gamma Sigma award, an international business honor society award offered only to the world’s top 5% business schools.

Then Dr. Mehindru served as Chief Medical Officer for Wuesthoff Health System (now under Steward Health Care’s ownership) where he led the licensing of a new Coronary Cath lab with interventional capabilities along with the development of a new surgical program. In 2011, he joined AdventHealth Waterman as Chief Medical Officer where he spearheaded the establishment of a new hospitalist program and received recognition for excellence in seven metrics under Partnership for Patients (a CMS sponsored program to reduce harm and improve quality). He was the executive sponsor for QUEST, a national program for improving quality and reducing cost.

His continued success led to Dr. Mehindru’s appointment as the President of AdventHealth Physician Network, Tampa Bay (formerly called Physician Alliance of Florida Hospital), and AdventHealth Physician Network Ocala (formerly called Physician Health Partners at Munroe Regional). As the President of these Clinically Integrated Networks (CINs), and with his focus on population health management, he responsibly managed over 40,000 covered lives made up of; a self-funded employee health plan, a commercial health plan, and Medicare beneficiaries. In his journey towards transforming health care from volume-based to value-based, Dr. Mehindru successfully built a network of over 1,000 physicians, established quality benchmarks and metrics, and bent the total healthcare spend cost curve from a historic annual increase of fifteen percent (15%) to just one percent (1%).

In his continued passion to improve outcomes for patients, Dr. Mehindru led the initiatives between the two major health systems in the Tampa Bay, Florida area, consisting of an exclusive health and wellness innovation partner for the first planned “Smart Gigabit Community,” a 160 employee Home Health Care company, and a Joint Venture with the largest local radiology physicians group, including 16 outpatient imaging centers.

Dr. Mehindru served as a member of the AdventHealth West Florida Division Strategy and Growth Council that oversees strategic initiatives of this $1.5 billion revenue division. He also served as a judge and a council member for Innovation X, National Council of Presidents. This is an AdventHealth annual premier competition for start-ups and mid-stage innovative companies to present their solutions to top health challenges that align with strategic AdventHealth imperatives.

His participation in AdventHealth boards and committees also included the Population Health Service Organization, the Accountable Care Organization, and the Population Health IT.

Dr. Mehindru currently serves on the Advisory Board and Pharmacy & Therapeutics Committee (P&T) for OrchestraRx, a modern Pharmacy Benefit Manager (PBM).