Saurabh Gombar

Current Position

Title: Co-Founder & Chief Medical Officer Company: Atropos Health Location: Palo Alto, CA (Stanford area)

Professional Background

Dr. Saurabh Gombar brings a rare combination of clinical medicine, computational expertise, and entrepreneurial vision to digital health. With an MD/PhD from Albert Einstein College of Medicine (completed 2014) focused on computational biology and genetics, combined with early software engineering experience at Ericsson, Gombar is uniquely positioned at the intersection of medicine and technology. He co-founded Atropos Health in late 2020 alongside Stanford biomedical informatics professor Nigam Shah and Brigham Hyde, transforming research into a commercialized real-world evidence platform. The company emerged from a Stanford Medicine research project initiated in 2011—the "Green Button" concept—which demonstrated how physicians could instantly access insights from anonymized electronic health records to inform patient care decisions.

Gombar's medical career has been oriented toward clinical informatics and evidence generation. Currently, he serves as an Adjunct Clinical Assistant Professor in Pathology at the Stanford University School of Medicine and is affiliated with Stanford's Center for Artificial Intelligence in Medicine & Imaging (AIMI). His research focuses on closing the "last mile" problem in clinical practice: how to translate evidence from millions of patient encounters into actionable insights at the bedside. Prior to Atropos, he was involved in healthcare innovation and digital transformation initiatives, positioning him as both a practicing clinician and technology innovator.

Gombar has been recognized as one of Modern Healthcare's Top 10 Executives to Watch in 2024, validating both his individual impact and Atropos Health's significance in the digital health landscape. Under his medical leadership, the company has achieved CB Insights' recognition as one of the 50 most promising digital health startups in 2025.

Career Timeline

Education

• MD/PhD in Computational Biology and Genetics, Albert Einstein College of Medicine (2007-2014)
• Bachelor of Science in Computer Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2001-2005)

Public Presence

Social Media

Note: Only publicly accessible profiles are documented.

Published Writings

• "It is time to learn from patients like mine" — npj Digital Medicine (2019)
• "Using Aggregate Patient Data at the Bedside via an On-Demand Consultation Service" — NEJM Catalyst (2021)
• "'Patients like mine' technologies must rest on solid evidence" — STAT News Opinion (2024)
• "Examining LLMs for healthcare" — Featured in MobiHealthNews analysis and research
• Multiple peer-reviewed publications in clinical and computational journals

Public Speaking

• Precision Medicine World Conference (PMWC) speaker (2023)
• NPR Cool Science Radio interview on precision healthcare (2022)
• HIMSS TV presentation on "Studying LLMs for Healthcare Use"
• Panel discussions on AI and data quality in healthcare
• Stanford Medicine speaker and thought leader on real-world evidence

Communication Style

Tone: Professional, technically precise, clinician-first perspective with pragmatic skepticism toward technology hype Recurring themes: Real-world evidence, "patients like mine" concept, AI/LLM evaluation in healthcare, evidence quality standards, bridging last-mile gap between research and bedside Notable positions: Strong advocate for rigorous evidence standards and guardrails on AI applications in clinical settings; cautionary voice against passing superficial analytics off as clinical evidence

Dr. Gombar communicates with the clarity of someone fluent in both clinical medicine and computational science. His writing is accessible yet technically substantive—he avoids both oversimplification and unnecessary jargon, making complex informatics concepts understandable to health system leaders. A recurring motif in his published work is the concept of "patients like mine," which he frames as both opportunity and responsibility. His 2019 npj Digital Medicine article established this as a foundational principle, emphasizing how clinicians need to learn from aggregated patient experience.

What distinguishes Gombar's communication is his emphasis on evidence rigor in an era of AI enthusiasm. His STAT News opinion piece ("'Patients like mine' technologies must rest on solid evidence," June 2024) explicitly warns against the danger of "simple analytics" being presented as clinical evidence, reflecting a clinical physician's caution about unvalidated tools affecting patient care. His recent research examining five large language models in healthcare contexts demonstrates this commitment to measurement and validation before deployment. On LinkedIn, his posts emphasize team collaboration, clinical validation milestones, and partnerships with established health systems—positioning Atropos as a serious clinical tool rather than a tech startup. He balances enthusiasm for Atropos's mission with explicit acknowledgment of the work required to ensure safety and validity.

Notable Achievements

• Co-founder of Atropos Health, now recognized as one of the 50 most promising digital health startups by CB Insights (2025)
• Named to Modern Healthcare's Top 10 Executives to Watch (2024)
• Recipient of The Order of the Long Leaf Pine award (North Carolina, 2023)
• Published foundational papers on real-world evidence and clinical informatics in high-impact journals (Nature, NEJM, Clinical Oncology)
• Adjunct Clinical Assistant Professor at Stanford University School of Medicine
• Key researcher at Stanford's Center for Artificial Intelligence in Medicine & Imaging (AIMI)
• Led significant research validating and critiquing large language models for healthcare accuracy
• Clinical informatics innovator with 15+ years bridging medicine and technology

Key Relationships

• Nigam Shah — Co-founder, Stanford biomedical informatics professor; original architect of "Green Button" research project
• Brigham Hyde — Co-founder and CEO of Atropos Health
• Stanford Medicine faculty — Active researcher and educator within AIMI and Department of Pathology
• Health system leaders — Collaborative relationships with major health systems implementing real-world evidence platforms
• Academic and industry collaborators — Contributors to peer-reviewed research, advisory relationships with digital health organizations
• Healthcare AI community — Visible participant in precision medicine and health informatics conferences and forums

Additional Context

Gombar represents a specific archetype in digital health leadership: the clinician-technologist with credibility in both domains. His continued academic appointment at Stanford while running a health tech startup positions him as a bridge between innovation and validation. The emphasis across his communications on evidence standards and guardrails—particularly around AI—reflects his role as both entrepreneur and physician, suggesting someone unlikely to compromise clinical safety for commercial velocity.