What if the real power of AI in healthcare isn’t the technology itself, but how we apply it responsibly and intentionally?

In this episode, Ajoy Ranga, Chief Digital Officer of Healthcare at UST Global, and Ashok Chennuru, Chief Data & Digital AI Transformation Officer at the Digital Platforms and Artificial Intelligence Office at Elevance Health/Carelon, discuss how their partnership between UST and Elevance Health is leveraging AI, data, and digital transformation to improve healthcare outcomes and consumer experience. They emphasize that scaling AI responsibly requires strong governance, human oversight, and a clear stance against using AI to deny care. Both highlight that high-quality, actionable data is foundational, but must be practical, cost-effective, and usable even when imperfect. Ultimately, they stress that success in healthcare innovation comes from starting with user experience, rapidly prototyping solutions, and fostering a mindset of continuous learning and experimentation.

Tune in to hear how Elevance Health and UST are balancing innovation with responsibility to unlock AI’s true potential in healthcare.

About Ajoy Ranga:

Ajoy Ranga is the Chief Digital Officer of Healthcare at UST. Ajoy Ranga is a distinguished technology executive with over 20 years of experience driving digital transformation in healthcare. As former Vice President of Product Engineering at Elevance Health, he led the strategy and delivery of all external-facing digital channels, impacting millions of members and partners. Ajoy is known for pioneering industry-first innovations—including AI-powered tools, conversational interfaces, and cloud-native platforms—that improved member engagement and operational efficiency. With deep expertise in product-centric engineering, mobile-first design, and scalable architectures, he has built and led high-performing global teams while advancing enterprise agility, AI adoption, and cloud modernization.

About Ashok Chennuru:

Ashok Chennuru is the Chief Data & Digital AI Transformation Officer at the Digital Platforms and Artificial Intelligence Office at Elevance Health/Carelon. In his role, is responsible for driving healthcare innovation through the transformative power of data and AI across the organization. In recent years, Ashok has led transformational efforts to revolutionize the business, develop foundational AI platforms, enhance operations, drive exceptional experiences, and develop an AI-enabled workforce. Ashok also spearheads much of Elevance Health’s clinical and payer-provider integration efforts, including Health OS - an interoperability platform that connects provider, payer, and member data - as well as value-based platforms, population health management, and provider analytics.

Things You’ll Learn:

Responsible AI must be governed, monitored, and continuously evaluated.
AI should augment care decisions, not restrict access to care.
Actionable, integrated data matters more than perfectly clean data.
Experience-first design leads to faster alignment and better outcomes.
Lifelong learning and experimentation are essential for success in modern healthcare technology.

Resources:

Connect with and follow Ajoy Ranga on LinkedIn.
Follow UST Global on LinkedIn and visit their website.
Connect with and follow Ashok Chennuru on LinkedIn.
Follow Elevance Health on LinkedIn and visit their website.