In this compelling episode of The Scope Forward Show, Praveen Suthrum interviews Jeff Glueck, a tech entrepreneur best known for leading Foursquare and Travelocity, who has now turned his focus to healthcare. Jeff shares his deeply personal story that inspired the founding of Salvo Health — a virtual platform redefining chronic GI care by integrating traditional medicine with lifestyle and environmental health practices.
Jeff discusses the fragmentation in GI follow-on care, the unrealistic expectations placed on patients post-diagnosis, and how Salvo aims to close these gaps. The conversation also dives into the role of private equity, the pressures on community GIs, and why collaboration — not bypassing — is key to healthcare innovation.
Watch the episode.
Top Insights from the Interview:
1. Childhood Seeds Can Shape the Future of Healthcare
Raised by a conventionally trained physician father and a lifestyle medicine-inclined mother, Jeff Glueck saw both worlds early. Salvo Health is a direct synthesis of these influences—clinical rigor meets lifestyle-based prevention.
2. A Personal Tragedy Exposed the Learning Deficit in Healthcare
After losing their first child to a preventable condition, Jeff asked: “Where is the data engine that learns from this?” The silence from the OB-GYN revealed a brutal truth: healthcare isn’t learning fast enough. That moment lit the fuse for Salvo.
3. Environmental Health Still Sits Outside the Clinical Mainstream
When his newborn twins reacted to hospital-recommended products, Jeff and his wife discovered how everyday exposures are ignored in standard care. This gap led to MadeSafe.org—and a belief that chronic care must account for what surrounds the patient.
4. Gut Health Is the Access Point to Whole-Body Care
Salvo chose GI not because it was trendy, but because the gut influences everything—metabolism, immunity, brain health. Starting with IBS, MASLD, and IBD, Salvo tackles the neglected zones of follow-on care.
5. Endoscopy-Centric Care Is Creating a Follow-Up Void
Community GIs are under relentless pressure to stay in the endoscopy suite. When 99% of scopes show no cancer, what happens to the chronically ill patients? Often, nothing. That’s the void Salvo stepped into.
6. Behavior Change Isn’t a Handout—It’s a Process
Telling a MASLD patient to “lose 10% weight and come back in 6 months” doesn’t work. Without sustained support—coaching, digital monitoring, personalized food and psychology—those patients worsen. Salvo designs for that missing middle.
7. “Doctor in the Cloud” Works Only If It Respects the Ground
A digital center of excellence means little if it doesn’t integrate with real-world practices. Salvo’s model isn’t virtual vs. physical—it’s human + tech, layered thoughtfully.
8. Chronic GI Care Must Evolve Into Precision, Intelligence-Based Support
The long arc of care needs to be reimagined—from episodic and procedural to continuous and insight-driven. Salvo Health is building this new engine—one that learns daily from patients and adapts in real time.