Dan Riskin

Early life and education

Riskin was born on October 15, 1971 and grew up in Los Angeles, California. He began writing software at age 5, selling software at age 12, and winning regional awards in software programming during grammar school. As a teenager, Riskin studied at Brentwood High School, where he won awards in math and science and was recognized with the Bausch and Lomb Outstanding Scientist Award. He began college at age 16 as a Regent’s Scholar at University of California. Medical training included a medical degree from Boston University, surgery residency at University of California, Los Angeles, and critical care and acute care surgery fellowship at Stanford University. Business training included an MBA with focus in bioinformatics and bioengineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and fellowship in medical technology innovation at Stanford University. Upon completion of his training, Riskin was promoted from Lecturer to Consulting Assistant Professor of Surgery at Stanford University. He was later promoted to Adjunct Professor of Surgery and Adjust Professor of Biomedical Informatics Research.

Business

While a student at MIT, Riskin described a wearable sensor to measure metabolism and physical performance. He worked with Roche Diagnostics to build, gain FDA approval, and commercialize these early efforts. Subsequently, as a fellow at Stanford, he designed and was issued US patents and FDA approval for a painless wound closure device. Riskin cofounded Wadsworth Medical Technologies, which commercialized the product under the Dermaloc brand. The company was acquired by DQ Holdings and the product was rebranded DermaClip for sales in the US and China.

Upon completing training, Riskin joined Mohr Davidow Ventures as Entrepreneur in Residence. In his first full time venture, he founded and was CEO of Health Fidelity. In this capacity, he invented products to address clinical quality and risk, secured relationships with Harvard, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, and grew the company through three rounds of financing. In 2014, Riskin raised a $29 million strategic investment round and transitioned company leadership. The company continues rapid growth, working with large health systems, payers, and partners to support value-based healthcare.

In 2015, Riskin outlined a vision to use learnings in US digital health to create a better patient experience and more tailored care in the US and abroad. Subsequent products and companies have focused on this vision.

Policy and public service

Riskin has supported bipartisan efforts to leverage data to improve US healthcare quality. As part of the Obama Campaign Healthcare Advisory Committee starting in 2007, he promoted a transition to electronic health records and use of data to improve care, with efforts enacted through the HITECH Act. His academic work "Re-examining health IT policy: What will it take to derive value from our investment?" encouraged national discussion on innovation and analytics. In Congressional testimony, Riskin described approaches to adjust national health infrastructure to enhance care quality and support innovation. He subsequently worked with both parties in Congress to define actionable steps to improve laws through the 21st Century Cures Initiative, with features incorporated into the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) and the 21st Century Cures Act. Riskin has continued to focus national attention on healthcare quality as a member of the HHS Quality Measurement Task Force, in Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Grand Rounds, and through academic publication.