Chris Toth, CEO, Vantive, talks to Jade Williams about his new role, what excites him most about kidney care, how to improve the patient experience for people on dialysis and more
Interview by Jade Williams
Can you tell us more about Baxter’s decision to separate its kidney care unit into Vantive?
So, Vantive is founded on the history that Baxter has in the dialysis space. Baxter introduced peritoneal dialysis, which is a therapy that enables patients to receive their treatment at home, maintain their chosen lifestyle and can provide a great bridge to transplantation. But it’s vastly underutilised.
This led to the realisation that we had a business with around $4.5bn of revenue that could make a much bigger impact in vital organ therapy. It’s not just about what we can do for kidney disease patients, it’s about what we can do for those who end up in the ICU, who need critical interventions to help remove toxins. That’s the foundation.
And as the strategy for Baxter continued to evolve and accelerate, the different capital needs in terms of where to invest to drive therapy innovation and therapy penetration around the world were different than the capital allocation for the other parts of the business. So, that just ultimately culminated in the decision to say, let’s have Vantive be a standalone company.
With improving dialysis being a key focus for Vantive, why is this important?
Prior to coming to Baxter, I had the blessing of working for a company in the cancer care space. What I saw there was that dialysis and the way we care for patients needs additional investment to create a disruptively positive experience for caregivers and patients.
My philosophy is we need to do our jobs as if the patient that we’re serving is our mother, father, brother, sister, or child. In that mindset, when I look at what’s in our portfolio and I look at how low the penetration rate is for some of these therapies and where it should be, we have got a lot of work and a lot of investment to put forward. And being in a private equity-backed environment we expect will allow us to accelerate those investments on a go-forward basis.
We’ve touched on some of the challenges faced by patients with kidney disease, but what are the biggest issues they face?
If you’re a patient with late-stage kidney disease or end-stage renal disease, you’re in a position where your comorbidities are not just kidney failure, but more broadly, potential heart problems or other challenges. The current standards of care are doing their best to keep patients alive over a period of time, but there aren’t enough kidneys to necessarily replace them for patients.
So, the quality of life is what I want to emphasise here. That is what I believe is the paramount for a kidney patient. As they’re navigating this journey, how do we help them not only stay alive but have the best quality of life? Because the higher that quality of life, the more likely they are to be around longer and increase their probabilities of a bridge to transplant.
There’s also an important cost-effectiveness component. Healthcare costs continue to rise, and there are not unlimited dollars available. So in that context, by increasing the quality of life, you also typically see a reduction in comorbidities or other issues. This can reduce total cost of care to serve the patient.
What is a project you’re particularly excited to bring to the kidney care field?
With the challenges I mentioned earlier, there is a need to train faster and to provide better scalability of resources. We saw that in the critical care setting, the ability to use virtual reality to train new nurses who hadn’t had experience with patients was great, as it enabled them to understand how to serve patients without actually having to physically train on them. That’s super critical, because if a patient is in the ICU, that is a life or death moment in many cases.
The second area relates to our focus on increasing home dialysis here in the UK. We see so many benefits, but one of the biggest hurdles is how to ensure that patients are prepared for home dialysis. We have multiple dialysis training centres, but last year we recognised the need to upgrade and expand our centre in London. We will therefore be opening a new centre in London that will double our capacity. We’re also going to put our Vantive UK headquarters in the same building – demonstrating our commitment to patients.
What does a typical day look like for you as CEO?
It all starts with the right mindset. That’s the most important thing. I’ve always believed that it’s not about being a CEO, it’s not about being in a position – you need to be part of an organisation that you believe in and feel all-in on what you’re seeking to do for society.
We have to do our jobs as if it’s a member of our family that we’re treating – I’ve had some very personal experiences in my life that I’ve gone through that bring that to life. In that sense, you have to think about what your North Star is, and that can be what drives you through.
My daily routine is pretty simple. I like to start the day early in the gym and have a moment to calibrate and reboot. The reason I like to do that is because it allows you to step back and make sure you’re not getting caught up in the moment based on what’s in your inbox.
Outside of your work, do you have any personal passion projects?
I’m very committed to cost-effective healthcare, and work with several organizations focused on this critical issue. But my real passion is my family. My wife Kelle and I, we have three kids and watching them go through the different steps in life and understanding the importance of being there, interacting with them, and embracing all the ups and downs that come with family is one of the most special gifts you can have.
If your life was turned into a novel, what would the title be and why?
“You can do anything, not everything. Choose wisely.” Life is short, you know? So what are you going to do that’s going to create a better world than you came into? If you try to do everything all the time, you’re going to bump your head into a lot of walls.
