Jenny Yu

Entrepreneur-in-Residence

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Dr. Jenny Yu is a board-certified Ophthalmologist with subspecialty training in Oculoplastics. She attended George Washington University and received both her BS with Honors in Biochemistry and MD from The Ohio State University. She spent 15 years as a practicing academic clinician at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) with focus on innovative care delivery, translational research and education. In her role as the Associate Program Director and Vice Chair of clinical operations, she led initiatives on mentorship, access through telehealth, as well as regional and international expansion of service lines. She has authored numerous book chapters, contributed to both peer and non-peered reviewed journals, and an international lecturer during her academic tenure. Her academic research ranged from novel drug delivery methods to imaging technology to innovative surgical approaches. A recipient of National Science Foundation’s I-corp grants as well as funding from the Department of Defense, she and her team was awarded a patent for their research focused on a new biomaterial for drug delivery in the setting of facial trauma.

Her passion for innovation and care access led her to co-found Project Theia, a 501c3 in Pittsburgh, PA focused on surgical education, care, and solutions for global communities of need in 2017. They have served communities in Ghana, Kenya, India and Honduras and supported care access in under-served communities domestically (Pittsburgh, Dallas) during the pandemic. The organization has also published research for 3D printing of ocular prosthesis and the pediatric eye screening process by supporting public health and medical students.

In 2020, she stepped into the consumer healthcare space as a medical expert. She joined the medical integrity team at Healthline (a digital consumer health information property) and most recently served as the Chief Medical Officer of RVO Health – a 3-year old joint venture between UHG/Optum and Red Ventures. In this role, she worked with various stakeholders (leadership, business, product, data/engineering, editorial, legal, marketing) to ensure medical integrity, clinical validity, and market relevance for all RVO Health direct-to-consumer and B2B offerings. She is involved in the build versus buy strategy, vetting clinical ROI in the M&A strategy of the company. She worked closely with the clinical and business leads of Optum and UHC as well as other healthcare companies for business development and partnerships. She also served as the external voice for the company and is often tapped for various speaking engagements at industry events such as HLTH, MM+M, Ai4, PHM, as well as interviews for news outlets and podcasts. She has been recognized by PM360 in 2023 as a transformational leader and MM+M in 2024 for their Women of Distinction awards – for the work of establishing a proprietary methodology to create transparency and quality around consumer health goods (supplements, skincare, etc.) for users.

She has served and continues to serve on advisory boards and speaker’s bureau for both the healthcare industry as well as the education and disaster relief organizations. She serves on the Clinical Quality Board of Fabric (a digital-first telehealth company) and a committee reviewer of HIMSS Continued Medical Education committee. Since stepping away from her full-time CMO role at RVO Health, Dr. Yu has been involved in EIR roles for healthcare incubators/accelerators affiliated with academic medical centers and universities such as Carnegie Mellon University, University of Connecticut, University of Pittsburgh, UPMC and Highmark. In her spare time, she is an avid reader, traveler, and a partner and mom to her husband Ryan and two teenage girls, Chloe and Sylvie.

Dr. Yu is passionate in taking her varied expertise and experience in solving the challenges within healthcare. She is interested in taking other industries’ best practices and adopting it for the appropriate usage in improving the patient and clinician experience. Her experience in research, technology, and innovation from the various vantage points within the healthcare industry will continue to provide the foundation for her future work.

Examples of ideal advisory engagement given clinical/systems expertise, digital health product leadership, and innovation management:

Digital Health Product Strategy

• Advising on the launch or scaling of telehealth solutions, remote patient monitoring, or digital therapeutics, ensuring both clinical validity and user experience.
• Supporting consumer healthcare startups in establishing evidence-based methodologies and transparency for products such as supplements or medical devices.
• Supporting consumer healthcare startups in audience strategy from a clinical perspective (plan members intersected with conditions / co-morbidities).
• Advising on clinical quality and safety, particularly around the use of AI/ML models (e.g., setting up review boards, quality committees, or clinical validation pipelines).
• AI/ML governance – advising on evaluation, benchmarks, transparency, and data

Innovation Commercialization

• Guiding startups through the NSF I-Corps or similar programs to transition research into commercially viable products, including regulatory strategy, IP development, and go-to-market planning.
• Providing mentorship for research teams in areas like novel drug delivery methods, imaging technologies, or biomaterials, including grant applications and fundraising
• GTM strategy with both market and clinical perspectives to ensure the product-market fit for early stage digital product solutions.

Scaling Operations and Care Models

• Advising on regional and international expansion strategies—especially for companies looking to scale tech-enabled care models into new markets.
• Helping founders build robust clinical governance, quality assurance, and mentorship systems as their companies grow.
• Guiding teams through the hybrid approach of digital and physical solutions in new care delivery models with appropriate payment models.
• Strategic consulting on build-versus-buy decisions for healthcare technology platforms or B2B service expansions, evaluating clinical return on investment and operational fit.
• Organizational transformation projects to bring best practices from established health systems (and other industries) into startup environments, improving patient and provider experiences.