Digital medicine has been at the center of attention in modern medicine as hospitals, payers, and technology companies seek to improve outcomes and lower costs. A significant portion of adults are affected by chronic illnesses, which play an essential role in driving healthcare spending nationwide. This issue has prompted innovators to look beyond traditional clinical settings and utilize consumer technology and behavioral science tools to reach patients where they are.
In this changing world, Nathan Larson’s professional life itself is noteworthy for its steady emphasis on the patient experience. He worked in hospitality and experiential marketing before transitioning to health technology, industries that rely on an understanding of how individuals perceive services. That background transferred to his later work in health care, where engagement and ease of use can literally make or break patients’ ability to control their conditions.
Larson’s medical innovation career began at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in New Hampshire, where he was involved in the Center for Telehealth Innovation during the early 2010s. The initiative created an “innovation zone,” a space where clinical personnel and entrepreneurs tested new ideas to improve patient care and communication. According to Dartmouth-Hitchcock reports at the time, the center saw thousands of patients and served as an early model for integrating consumer design sensibilities with clinical expertise.
In 2014, Larson co-founded ImagineCare, a health remote monitoring service that used sensors and mobile applications to track chronic conditions. The company was founded as remote patient monitoring was expanding exponentially; reports estimate that a substantial number of patients worldwide are being remotely monitored, a figure that has grown significantly in recent years. ImagineCare combined continuous data capture with real-time feedback, offering a program designed to help manage various chronic conditions.
Larson’s stint at ImagineCare involved customer interaction and behavior design to help patients support healthy routines. The company’s patent list lists him as a co-inventor, a sign of his role in developing the platform’s user experience strategy. The service continues to operate and has been cited in peer-reviewed journals discussing the adoption of remote monitoring among the rural regions of the United States.
After ImagineCare was founded, Larson continued to work at Optum, a UnitedHealth Group subsidiary, where he worked in Population Health. Optum’s research arm provides analytics and technology solutions for millions of patients nationwide, and its portfolio includes programs designed to reduce the chronic disease burden through proactive care. Optum has reached a large number of consumers in the US, enabling new models of patient engagement and behavior change to scale across a wide population.
Larson eventually moved to UnitedHealth’s Research and Development division, where he worked on Level2, an initiative that studies remission interventions for Type 2 diabetes. Level2, a combination of continuous glucose monitoring and digital coaching, has been trialed to help participants reduce or eliminate the use of certain medications. Many Americans are affected by diabetes, with a significant portion attributed to Type 2, highlighting the efforts of companies like Level2 in addressing the issue.
His enthusiasm for applying technology to mental health led him to a position at Health Rhythms, a company that develops passive-sensing devices to track mood and behavioral changes. Passive sensing detects data from smartphones and wearables to provide clinicians with clues about trends that might indicate depression or anxiety. Research published in journals such as JMIR Mental Health recognized the potential of this type of early intervention approach, and Larson’s work supported the company’s efforts to develop services patients could adopt without added burden.
Larson also serves as a mentor for the Black River Innovation Campus in Vermont, in addition to his direct work with healthcare companies. BRIC supports rural start-ups in their initial phases with product development and creative problem-solving advice. The campus has worked with scores of entrepreneurs across fields spanning renewable energy to digital applications since its launch in 2019, and Larson’s dual technology-arts background adds a multidisciplinary perspective to the program’s advisory board.
Combined, these experiences demonstrate a career guided by the intersection of art, consumer experience, and medicine. Larson’s early photography and narrative training may appear far removed from the practice of health technology. Yet, both practices rely on knowledge of how people respond to information and how design influences behavior. In applying lessons from one field to another, he has helped spearhead a broadening movement that sees patients not merely as the passive recipients of care but as active agents in their own health.
Nathan Larson’s path from tech-savvy entrepreneur to healthcare innovator is a case in point for the broader trend of combining technology with human-centered design. His experience with Dartmouth-Hitchcock, ImagineCare, Optum, UnitedHealth R&D, Level2, Health Rhythms, and Black River Innovation Campus shows a consistent effort to bring principles of consumer marketing to healthcare settings. As chronic disease and mental illness remain a scourge of the world community, his professional experience is a notable example of how cross-industry thinking can inform the development of patient-centered solutions.
