Dr. Nitya Thummalachetty

Dr. Nitya Thummalachetty—armed with a Master’s in Bioethics and a Doctor of Public Health from Columbia University—is an expert in how structural constraints impact everyday choices, with a focus on how private sector practices impact the general public. Internationally recognized by the BBC, Nitya has dedicated her life to understanding how power affects access to safety and well-being in various settings.

Nitya is a co-founder of the Nau Project. Here, she applies her systems expertise—the ability to see how one variable interacts with and impacts many interwoven variables—to the obtuse and opaque American healthcare system.

She draws connections between healthcare processes and the systemic inefficiencies contributing to the high costs and red tape insured Americans often experience.

Dr. Pramod Pinnamaneni

With more than a decade of experience in rural American healthcare and an MBA from Columbia Business School, Dr. Pramod Pinnamaneni has a unique background: an urban-trained practicing cancer physician who understands healthcare policy and its real impact on rural lives.

Pramod operates the only private oncology practice in Lufkin, Texas, a town of roughly 34,000 people, and the largest independent oncologist practice in a sixty-mile radius. His geographic isolation solidifies him in the trenches with everyday rural Americans fighting cancer. He witnesses unique aspects of barriers to care and how specific agents in the healthcare system extract far more than they contribute.

Pramod co-founded the Nau Project with Nitya to peel away the layers of complexity around the American healthcare system. He believes that with better information and financial literacy, patients can protect themselves from the prison of fine print and focus on what matters most: their health.

Dr. Nitya Thummalachetty

She draws connections between healthcare processes and the systemic inefficiencies contributing to the high costs and red tape insured Americans often experience.