New York City-based digital health company Progyny, which offers a number of fertility services including concierge services for in-vitro fertilization, egg freezing, adoption and fertility benefits, has hired David Schlanger, former head of WebMD, as its new CEO. Schlanger left WebMD by mutual agreement in September.

“I’m thrilled to be joining the Progyny team and look forward to leading the company through the next phase of its growth," Schlanger said in a statement. "Progyny’s focus on helping individuals successfully address their infertility issues is a natural extension of my experience in empowering people to take charge of their own health. In a short period of time, Progyny has made substantial progress in developing unique science-based and data-driven technology and in penetrating the employer market for fertility benefits.”

In addition to the CEO change, Progyny also announced the appointment of Dr. Norman C. Payson to its board of directors. 

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CareMore Health System has hired Dr. Vivek Garg in the role of chief medical officer of new markets and business development. He will oversee clinical operations in the organization’s new business markets, including Iowa and Tennessee. Garg previously served as director of medical operations for Oscar Insurance and medical director of One Medical Group. In his career as a physician he worked at Weill-Cornell Medical Center and New York Presbyterian Hospital.
 
“Dr. Garg brings a long-standing career of clinical leadership to CareMore,” Dr. Sachin H. Jain, president of CareMore, said in a statement. “Passionate about  health care innovation, Dr. Garg will serve as a conduit for advancing CareMore’s mission to transform the American health care delivery system.”

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Steve Lieber, president and chief executive of HIMSS since 2000, announced his plan to retire today. Lieber broke the news to the HIMSS staff in a morning conference call, saying that he expected to stay through the end of 2017.

“The past 17 years at HIMSS have been the most exciting and rewarding time of my professional life,” Lieber said in a prepared statement. “I feel that our work at HIMSS has resulted in considerable improvements to the quality of care delivered to patients, to the safety of the treatments they receive and to the value of care provided. I hope that, in some way, I can continue this work of making care better and safer through information technology.” 

MobiHealthNews is owned by HIMSS Media, a business unit of HIMSS. More on this story at our sister site, Healthcare IT News.

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West Health, Gary and Mary West's philenthropic enterprise focused on improving aging, has given Tim Lash, executive vice president of successful aging for West Health and president of the West Health Policy Center, a new title. Lash will now also serve as Chief Strategy Officer at West Health. 

"Tim has been working tirelessly, and with great passion and energy, to develop West Health's robust successful aging portfolio," Shelley Lyford, president and chief executive officer of West Health, said in a statement. "I am very grateful for his leadership and partnership in helping us achieve major milestones this year, including establishing a senior emergency care unit at UC San Diego Health and launching the Gary and Mary West Senior Dental Center – both of which provide older adults with access to care tailored to their needs."

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Reflexion Health, a virtual physical therapy startup that began its life as a West Health spin-off, also had a recent new hire. Sudipto Sur joins Reflexion as Chief Technology Officer. He was previously chief information officer at Signal Genetics and founded two other companies before that. 

"With his significant expertise creating next-generation technology solutions and his ability to manage development processes in a regulated environment, Sudipto’s experience and leadership will accelerate our ability to improve clinical outcomes at a lower cost and on broader scale,” Reflexion CEO Joseph Smith said in a statement. 

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Nick Desai, cofounder and CEO of digital-enabled house call service Heal, has joined the American Heart Association (AHA) Los Angeles County Division Board of Directors. According to a press release, Heal "will play an active role in helping the AHA increase education and awareness of heart disease, as well as take the necessary steps to reduce heart attacks."

"I am thrilled to join the AHA's Board because heart disease has touched my family and is a condition I know Heal can help prevent. My mother - a lifelong vegetarian - is a heart attack survivor," Desai said in a statement. "Together, Heal and the AHA can help people lead healthier, happier lives." 

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Marc Benioff-backed Gobiquity, which makes a vision screening app for children called GoCheck Kids, hired a new chief technology officer, Bob Quinn. Quinn founded 22otters, a patient engagement platform company that was acquired this year by a mysterious buyer. Previously, he spent more than eight years as Chief Technology Officer at Epocrates.

“I am thrilled to join a progressive organization like Gobiquity," Quinn said in a statement. "I am inspired by its mission to enable early detection and prevention of vision impairment through broad access to specialized mobile technology, and the unparalleled momentum achieved to date,” said Quinn. “I look forward to contributing to the evolution of its leading mobile vision screening platform, GoCheck Kids, and supporting the scalability and development of the company’s portfolio of vision solutions.”

In addition, Michelle Snyder, currently the Chief Marketing Officer at WellDoc, has joined the company’s Board of Directors.

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Healthcare team collaboration platform maker PerfectServe has promoted Mary Hatcher, who has been with the company for 15 years in various roles, to vice president of product development. She will lead all product development initiatives including a team representing product management, engineering and quality assurance.

"Mary is an exemplary professional who recently received our company award recognizing the employee best exhibiting the PerfectServe culture," Terry Edwards, CEO and President of PerfectServe, said in a statement. "Mary's well-deserved promotion reflects a 15-year track record of designing workflow solutions for providers. She led the prototypes of our group practice solution as well as the first application in the acute-care hospital setting to improve nurse-to-physician communication."

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Mira Wilczek, a mobile analytic consultant and daughter of Nobel Prize winning physicist Frank Wilczek, has joined the Board of Directors at CareDash, a startup focused on online doctor reviews. 

“CareDash is creating an optimized mobile platform that allows patients to shop for doctors, schedule appointments and find high quality, low-cost care from the convenience of their phone or tablet,” Ted Chan, Founder and CEO of CareDash said in a statement “Mira’s extensive background in understanding consumer behavior on mobile devices will be critical in guiding how CareDash implements a truly user-centric experience that allows all patients – regardless of their socioeconomic status – to find quality, affordable care.”

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Bill Maris, former CEO of Alphabet’s GV, has reportedly scrapped plans for his life sciences and healthcare fund. Earlier this month, there were murmurs from sources close to Maris that he had raised $230 million for a new fund to focus on healthcare investments. But Maris later contacted news site Recode and said that while there had been plans to create a fund (which he was reportedly calling Section 32), and said he was abandoning the plan.

“I was talking to investors about raising my own fund, the capital was available and [I] was about to file the papers this week, but staring down the barrel of doing again exactly what I just did was not inspiring me, and I pulled the plug,” Maris told Recode in an email.  “Life is too short to not be true to yourself. I'm still taking time off and exploring some other ideas that may be more fun and impactful.”