My Articles on Tech-enhanced Life

From MD to Alexa Skills Developer: My Journey

Retired physician, Dr Bob Kolock, shares his new “hobby”: Alexa Skills Developer. He describes how he came to be interested in Alexa, and describes some of the 13 skills he has developed. Many of these skills are useful for older adults, and Dr. Kolock’s perspective from “both sides of the stethoscope” makes them especially intriguing.


My Background:

Dr. Bob Kolock has over 35 years of experience in healthcare delivery.  After completing his Internal Medicine post-graduate training at Georgetown University Hospital, he began the practice of Internal Medicine in 1977.  After about 14 years of practice, he decided to move into medical management.  This was prompted by changes in healthcare delivery that made it clear that clinicians needed to step up and play a more active role in maintaining and improving the quality of healthcare.  Too many non-clinicians seemed to be influencing clinical decisions at that time.

During the following 20 years, he held executive positions that encompassed quality improvement, physician credentialing, chronic care management, network development, clinician coaching, and data analysis.  He applied the expertise he learned in areas such as physician & patient education, behavior change, predictive modeling and targeted messaging.  A frequent presenter at numerous national healthcare conferences, he was also invited to be a speaker on behalf of the American Heart Association in their National Spotlight Series. In this initiative, he presented a variety of clinical topics in primary care cardiology to the physicians of hospitals and other healthcare organizations.

Prior to his 2014 retirement, he served as Medical Director of an Accountable Care Organization (ACO) in Tennessee.  There he was responsible for the coordination of cost-effective, quality care for over 55,000 Medicare beneficiaries.  While establishing health education programs for the patients of over 140 primary care physicians, he developed processes and tools to improve the collaboration of specialists and those primary care physicians resulting in enhanced care delivery to their mutual patients.  He used technology through predictive modeling to target those beneficiaries with the most complex care needs and then directed teams of Nurse Care Coordinators, Social Workers, and Pharmacists to address those needs.

After retirement, his recognition of how technology and the rapidly developing usage of a vocal interface can impact healthcare delivery led to his learning JavaScript and developing 13 Amazon Alexa skills as of this writing.  While most of these focus on health, several of them reflect his sense of humor.

It has been an interesting 40 years for this graduate of Georgetown University College of Arts and Sciences where he was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa, the national college honor society and Georgetown University School of Medicine where he was inducted into Alpha Omega Alpha, the medical school honor society.  Dr. Kolock’s vision continues to be on the future and learning new technologies to meet patient needs and contribute wherever he can.

Learn more about me:

https://linkedin.com/in/drbobkolock

https://www.InsightsForHealth.com