Spotlight: Mike Docktor, MD @ Dock Health

A spotlight is a short-form interview with a leader in health tech. In this spotlight, you'll hear from Mike Docktor – MD, CEO and co-founder of Dock Health.

What does Dock Health do?

Dock Health is an AI-powered productivity platform built to transform healthcare operations. We help health systems, ambulatory groups, and care teams work smarter by automating and orchestrating workflows like referrals, intake, and care coordination. In short, we make the invisible work of healthcare – the operational tasks, collaboration, and handoffs behind every patient journey – visible, measurable, and more efficient. 

How did you end up working in health tech?

I started my career as a pediatric gastroenterologist at Boston Children's Hospital, where I saw firsthand how hard it was for care teams to manage the constant administrative pressure – chasing follow-ups, closing loops, coordinating across team members and departments. Technology was transforming almost every other aspect of our world, but workflows in healthcare were still stuck in email, spreadsheets, and sticky notes. Dock grew out of that frustration and a conviction that we could make healthcare work better by reimagining how teams collaborate and execute critical operational tasks. 

What’s one thing you wish you could change about U.S. healthcare?

I wish we would stop treating operations as an afterthought. There’s incredible focus on clinical innovation – new drugs, devices, diagnostics – but the operational “pipes” of healthcare are leaking billions of dollars and burning out the very people who power the system. If we invested even a fraction of the same energy and resources into fixing how work gets done, how we work better together as teams, we’d see massive improvements in efficiency, staff retention, and patient outcomes.

What do you think healthcare will look like two years from now?

Over the next two years, I think we’ll see a real shift from digital transformation to digital productivity. The industry has bought the tools – now the imperative is making them work together. AI will become less of a buzzword and more of a quiet enabler behind the scenes, helping teams prioritize tasks, track progress, and measure ROI in real time. We will be one step closer to the autonomous future of healthcare operations. The most forward-thinking health systems will treat operational data like clinical data – as something to analyze, optimize, and improve continuously. That’s the future Dock is building toward: a system where healthcare actually works as well as the people within it.