Dr Eyal Zimlichman, MSc
Co-Chair BigData in HealthCare TLV 2019

Dr Eyal Zimlichman is an internal medicine physician, a healthcare executive and researcher focused on assessing and improving health care quality and value, patient safety and patient engagement. Dr Zimlichman is currently Deputy Director General, Chief Medical Officer and Chief Innovation Officer at Sheba Medical Center, Israel’s largest hospital. Prior to this Dr Zimlichman also held the position of Lead Researcher at Partners Health Care Clinical Affairs Department in Boston.
Dr Zimlichman is a graduate of the Harvard School of Public Health Executive Healthcare Management Master of Science program and earned his MD at the Technion Israel Institute of Technology.
Prof David L Reich MD
Co-Chair BigData in HealthCare TLV 2019
Prof David L Reich is President and Chief Operating Officer of The Mount Sinai Hospital.
After arriving at Mount Sinai in 1984, Prof Reich completed a residency in anesthesiology and a fellowship in cardiothoracic anesthesia. Prof Reich serves on Mount Sinai’s Appointments and Promotions Committee and on the Board of the Independent Practice Association. In 2011, Mount Sinai’s nurses and nursing leadership honored Prof Reich with the Physician of the Year Award. In 2014, he received the Jacobi Medallion from The Mount Sinai Alumni Association.
Prof Reich’s research interests include neurocognitive outcome following thoracic aortic surgery, outcome effects of intraoperative hemodynamics, medical informatics, and hemodynamic monitoring. He has published more than 200 peer-reviewed articles, invited articles, editorials, and book chapters. Additionally, Prof Reich is an associate editor of the text Cardiac Anesthesia, editor of Monitoring in Anesthesia and Perioperative Care, and co-editor of Perioperative Transesophageal Echocardiography.
Prior to his residency in anesthesiology, Prof Reich completed two years of residency in general surgery at Harbor/UCLA Medical Center in Torrance, California. He received his Bachelor of Science degree with highest distinction from Pennsylvania State University in 1980 and his medical degree from Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia in 1982 through the Penn State-Jefferson Five-Year Cooperative Program.
Keynote Speaker
Prof John D Halamka MD
Prof John D Halamka, MD, is the chief information officer (CIO) at Beth Israel Deaconess System, chairman of the New England Healthcare Exchange Network (NEHEN), and a practicing emergency physician. He is also the International Healthcare Innovation professor at Harvard Medical School.
Prof Halamka completed his undergraduate studies at Stanford University, where he received a degree in medical microbiology and a degree in public policy with a focus on technology issues. He entered medical school at the University of California, San Francisco and simultaneously pursued graduate work in bio-engineering at the University of California, Berkeley focusing on technology issues in medicine. He completed his residency at Harbor–UCLA Medical Center in the Department of Emergency Medicine.
In his role at BIDMC Prof Halamka is responsible for all clinical, financial, administrative and academic information technology, serving 3,000 doctors, 12,000 employees, and 1,000,000 patients. As chairman of NEHEN Prof Halamka oversees clinical and administrative data exchange among the payers, providers, and patients in Massachusetts. As a Harvard professor, he has served the George W Bush administration, the Obama administration, and national governments throughout the world planning their healthcare IT strategy.
Prof Halamka has authored five books on technology-related issues, hundreds of articles and thousands of posts on the popular Geekdoctor blog.
He runs Unity Farm in Sherborn, MA and serves as caretaker for 150 animals, 30 acres of agricultural production and a cidery/winery.
Keynote Speaker
Prof Joel Dudley
Prof Dudley is Director of the Institute for Next Generation Healthcare, Associate Professor of Genetics and Genomic Sciences and Population Health Science and Policy at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and Executive Vice President of Precision Health at Mount Sinai Health System.
His work is focused at the nexus of -omics, digital health, artificial intelligence (AI), scientific wellness, and healthcare delivery. His work has been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Scientific American, MIT Technology Review, CNBC, and other popular media outlets. He was named in 2014 as one of the 100 most creative people in business by Fast Company magazine.
Speakers
Prof Varda Shalev MD MPH
Prof Varda Shalev MD MPH is the director of the institute of research and innovation, Maccabitech (Big Data and Epidemiology research), and an active primary care physician in Maccabi Health Care Services. With an MD degree from Ben-Gurion University Medical School, she completed her residency in family medicine and earned an MPA in Public Health Administration at Clark University. After a two-year fellowship in medical informatics at the Johns Hopkins University Hospital, Professor Shalev established the Department of Medical Informatics at Maccabi and was responsible for planning and developing its computerized medical systems. She has pioneeered the development of multiple disease registries to support chronic disease management. She served as director of the primary care division in Maccabi. Shalev’s research interests are in epidemiology, medical informatics and predictive analysis in community healthcare. She is a member of the European Health Telematics Association and the American Medical Informatics Association. Professor Shalev is an Associate Professor at the Tel Aviv University School of Public Health, and she teaches Big Data and medical informatics in Tel Aviv University. She has authored or co-authored over 130 publications in peer-reviewed journals.
Prof Ran Balicer MD, PhD, MPH
Prof Ran Balicer MD, PhD, MPH serves as Founding Director of the Clalit Research Institute, an award-winning data-driven health innovation center that was designated as the World Health Organization Collaborating Centre on Noncommunicable Diseases Research, Prevention and Control. In parallel, he serves as Director of Health Policy Planning for Clalit, Israel’s largest health maintenance organization. In these roles, he is responsible for the strategic planning of novel organization-wide interventions for improving healthcare quality, reducing disparities, and increasing care effectiveness. These include the introduction of data-driven innovative tools into practice, including predictive modeling, real-life effectiveness markers, decision support tools, and proactive preventive care. Prof Balicer also serves as a Full Professor and Track Director in the Master of Public Health program at Ben-Gurion University in Israel. His research is focused on the study of extensive clinical databases in care provision and policymaking, integrated care, and quality management. In addition, he is Chair of the Israeli Society for Quality in Healthcare, advisor to Israel’s Ministry of Health, Board Member of the International Foundation for Integrated Care, Council Member of the European Federation for Medical Informatics, and a member of senior advisory groups in the World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe.
Dr Michal Rosen-Zvi
Dr Michal Rosen-Zvi is the Director for Health Informatics at IBM Research and a visiting Professor at the Faculty of Medicine, the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. She is also heading the Health Informatics Department at IBM Research, Haifa, a department that is researching seed ideas for AI-based innovative healthcare technologies and bringing them to fruition for IBM clients. She has published more than 40 peer-reviewed papers, is a member of various program committees of Machine Learning and Bioinformatics conferences, and serves as the Israeli delegate at the Management Committee of the European Network for cost containment and improved quality of health care.
Prof Kira Radinsky
Prof Kira Radinsky gained international recognition for her work at Microsoft Research, where she developed predictive algorithms that recognized the early warning signs of globally impactful events, including political riots and disease epidemics. In 2013, she was named to the MIT Technology Review’s 35 Young Innovators Under 35, in 2015 as Forbes 30 under 30 rising stars in enterprise technology, and in 2016 selected as “woman of the year” by Globes. She is a frequent presenter at global tech events, including TEDx, Wired, Strata Data Science, Techcrunch and academic conferences, and she publishes in the Harvard Business Review.
Dr Gidi Stein
Dr Gidi Stein is a practicing physician, researcher and serial entrepreneur. Early in his career, Gidi served as CTO and Chief Architect of several algorithm-rich startup companies in Israel. In 2002, Gidi graduated from Tel Aviv University Medical School and later specialized in internal medicine, treating patients and teaching students and residents in one of Israel’s largest hospitals. Gidi received a PhD in Computational Biology from Tel Aviv University, harnessing mathematical and biological models to help fight breast cancer. In 2012, Gidi co-founded MedAware, which utilizes machine learning algorithms to eliminate prescription errors and promote patient safety.
Prof Matthew Levin
Prof Matthew Levin is Director, Clinical Data Science Team, Mount Sinai Health System, a board-certified Cardiac Anesthesiologist, Associate Professor of Anesthesiology, and Director of Research Informatics for the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative & Pain Medicine. He began his career by working for five years in Silicon Valley and the software industry during the dot-com boom. He then changed careers to pursue medicine, but never lost his passion for technology. Now he is excited to be bringing the latest innovations in systems architecture, machine learning and big data into the healthcare arena, to improve patient care and save lives. Prof Levin holds a BS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT, and an MD from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.
Dr Ahuva Weiss-Meilik
Dr Ahuva Weiss-Meilik is the head of the Data Science and Quality Division at Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center. In that capacity, she leads the hospital’s data science innovation and research strategy. Previously, she served as the national coordinator of the Middle East Quality in Health Care Program coordinated by Harvard University and also served as the head of the clinical and economic performance unit at Sheba Medical Center. She holds a PhD degree from the Technion in Haifa and attended multiple advanced programs at Harvard University, Dartmouth Hitchcock College, and Intermountain Healthcare (LDS).
Shira Lev-Ami
Shira Lev-Ami CEO & Co-Founder, SpringYa is an expert in the field of digital health. For seven years she has served as head of the Digital Health and Computerization Department at Israel’s Ministry of Health. The Ministry underwent a revolution in information systems and promoted a national strategic plan for leveraging digital health for the entire health system. This included the establishment of a national infrastructure for Big Data and genetics studies.
Shira has an interdisciplinary background, with Masters degrees in Political Science (Public Policy) and in Law, and an MBA (Management of Information Systems and Organizational Behavior), all from Tel Aviv University, through an Interdisciplinary Excellence Program.
She has experience in the business world, including strategic consulting at Shaldor, managing complex transactions in the Fishman Group, and in the charitable sector – in strategic and operational positions in the Yad Hanadiv Fund. Shira is a mother of three and lives in Modi’in.
Dr Ben Gross
Dr Ben Gross MD, MMSc is the Chief Medical Informatics Officer at Sheba Medical Center, working to optimize the use of IT systems and data to improve patient care and to strengthen and expand Sheba’s innovation center.
Dr Gross served as a physician in the IDF and later led the design of multiple clinical information systems. He served as a Senior Clinical Informatician at Partners Healthcare System, focusing on medical terminology. Dr Gross is a member of the American Medical Informatics Association, and holds an MD from the Hebrew University and a Master’s Degree in Biomedical Informatics from Harvard Medical School.
Lital Shnaiderman
Lital Shnaiderman is the Director for Digital Health at the Center for Digital Innovation (CDI) where she is responsible for developing strategy and tools to support digital health startups while building a community of start-ups, industry leaders and investors in the digital health space. She brings 15 years of experience in managing data driven projects and analytics teams across various industries, including 5 years in the healthcare industry in the US, she holds BSc in Information Systems Engineering and MBA specialized in Entrepreneurship and Innovation, from Ben-Gurion University.
Dr Hovav Dror
Dr Hovav Dror is the Chief Science Officer of MDClone, a health IT startup company, introducing a groundbreaking environment for data-driven healthcare exploration, discovery, and collaboration.
An experienced researcher and research team leader, Dr Dror has a PhD in statistics from Tel Aviv university and is a retired colonel who lead two of the IDF main research teams – serving as the head of the Center for Systems Analysis in the IDF general headquarters and as the head of the Israeli Air Force Operations Research unit.
Prof Avinatan Hassidim
Prof Avinatan Hassidim leads the research group in Google Tel Aviv. Before that he graduated from Talpiot and from HUJI, was a postdoc at MIT and a professor at BIU. His works won numerous prizes, including PRL’s editor choice for 2010, Best Paper at SIGMETRICS 2011, and Runner Up for Best Paper in INFOCOM 2012, 2013.
Russ Branzell
Russ Branzell is CEO at the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives
Dr Nathalie Bloch
Dr Nathalie Bloch is Director of the ARC Innovation Center, Sheba Medical Center
Eliran Malki
Eliran Malki is Co-founder & CEO of Belong.life, the world’s largest social network for cancer patients, caregivers and healthcare professionals. He has been recognized for his role in the development of advanced enterprise solutions, software development and business intelligence projects. Over the past 20 years, he has founded, managed and led several successful companies. Eliran is an active member of several health committees, including Health CEOs Forum, The Digital Health “Patient in the Center” initiative organized by The Ministry of Health, and others.
Several years ago, Eliran lost his grandfather and his aunt to cancer, prompting him to create Belong.Life, the world’s largest social network for cancer patients, caregivers, and medical professionals. Today, the Belong community unites more than 150,000 cancer fighters, providing education, tips, peer-networking, access to global medical experts, clinical trial matching and digital patient tools.
Eliran has lectured at leading international digital health and business conferences, including E&Y Digital Health Summit Panel, the OECT (Operational Excellence in Clinical Trials) Summit in Berlin, BioMed Summit, The CMPRR Summit (Clinical Monitoring Study feasibility and Forming Alliances), MedCity Converge, Innovation Nation, KP Morgan and others.
Dr Noa Dagan
Dr Noa Dagan is Chief Science Officer at the Clalit Research Institute
Mrs Esti Shelley
Mrs Esti Shelly is Director of the Digital Health Division at Israel’s Ministry of Health
Dr Elan Sasson
Dr Elan Sasson is a Hi-tech entrepreneur and DSG’s CEO & Co-Founder. Early in his career Elan served as a CEO of several software startup companies in Israel. In his PhD Elan investigated knowledge representation, graph mining and temporal trend detection of unstructured data. He is currently an adjacent lecturer at Tel Aviv University, teaching graduate courses in big data analytics, data science, and machine learning.
In 2015 Elan Co-Founded Data Science Group (DSG) together with Dr Gideon Rosenthal, a neuroscience PhD with an extensive background in machine learning and deep learning.
DSG is an independent leading AI COE in Israel with a strong team of experts which provides end-to-end machine-learning and data science-based solutions.
Nigel Hughes
Nigel Hughes is Scientific Director, Janssen Clinical Innovation, Patient Data for Research, Janssen Research and Development. He has a thirty-five year career spanning the NHS in the UK (16 years), NGOs and patient organisations (10 years) and within the pharmaceutical industry (17 years; Roche, Gilead, Novartis, Janssen). He has worked clinically in HIV and viral hepatitis, liver disease, and in sales & marketing, medical affairs, market access and health economics, R&D, precision medicine, advanced diagnostics, health IT and Real World Data/Real World Medicine. His experience covers clinical, education, as an advisor, consulting, communications and lobbying over the years. He is currently the Project Lead for the IMI2 European Health Data & Evidence Network (EHDEN), and was Platform Co-Lead for the IMI1 European Medical Information Framework (EMIF), as well as consulting on numerous projects and programmes in the domain of RWD/RWE.
Prof Ido Wolf
Prof Ido Wolf completed his BMedSc and MD studies at the Faculty of Health Science, Ben Gurion University of the Negev and specialized in internal medicine and medical oncology at the Sheba Medical Center. He completed his MA at the Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University and did a postdoctoral fellowship at the Division of Hematology Oncology, Cedar-Sinai Medical Center, UCLA School of Medicine under the supervision of Prof HP Koeffler.
Prof Wolf was formerly head of the Oncology Department at Sheba Medical Center and currently heads the Oncology Division of Tel Aviv Medical Center. He also Heads the Oncology Research Lab at Tel Aviv Medical Center. His research focuses on endocrine aspects of cancer. His team discovered the tumor suppressor activities of the hormone klotho and was among the first to identify novel mutations of the estrogen receptor, which confer resistance to hormonal therapies. Current projects in the lab focus on the role of genomic alterations in determining tropism of metastases. He has published over 60 peer-reviewed articles and won prestigious grants and awards, including ISF, BSF, ICA and the Hirchberg Foundation award.
Dr Ami Appelbaum
Dr Ami Appelbaum is Chief Scientist, Israel Innovation Authority
Prof Robert Klempfner
Prof Robert Klempfner is Director of the Cardiac Rehabilitation and Prevention Institute, Sheba Medical Center, Israel. Prof. Klempfner is the former chair of the Israeli Working Group on Cardiac rehabilitation and an active researcher Involved in multiple studies in the areas of exercise training, remote rehabilitation and prevention in cardiology, and the clinical use of innovative sensors for exercise monitoring.
Dr Zack Dvey-Aharon
Dr Zack Dvey-Aharon is CEO & Chief Scientist, AEYE Health LLC
Daphna Laifenfeld
Daphna Laifenfeld is Chief Strategy Officer, Ibex Medical Analytics
Mrs Mila Orlovsky
Mrs Mila Orlovsky is Clinical Data Scientist, Zebra Medical Vision
Dr Yiftach Barash
Dr Yiftach Barash, Sheba Medical Center
Dr Gad Segal
Dr Gad Segal, Sheba Medical Center
Amit May-Dan
Amit May-Dan is CEO, MilagroAI
Dr Chuan Hong
Dr Chuan Hong, Harvard Medical School
Dr Eyal Bartfeld
Dr Eyal Bartfeld, Irody Inc
Dr Eran Harary
Eran serves today as the Clinical Lead in Teva’s Global R&D, Neuropsychiatry. As part of his global leadership roles Eran was involved in evaluating, developing and implementing innovative digital and technological tools to support drug development.
BigDataTLV Agenda