Adam Rogas – CEO and Co-Founder of NS8 by IdeaMensch · Nov 30, 2016 287Share Tweet 66Share Adam-e1480959343307 Find a problem you think you can solve and really focus on it. Resist the urge to move from that problem until you have demonstrated by positive user feedback and growth that you have actually solved it. Adam Rogas is the CEO and Co-Founder of NS8. With over 14 years of senior development and management expertise, as well as extensive knowledge in the fields of online fraud and spam filtering, Adam brings a tremendous amount to NS8. He was a founder of LoadMail and has worked as a trusted advisor to Postini, London Board of Tourism, Vivendi Universal, and Napster. In each case, Adam has helped implement big data, email, spam and virus filtering, and data security solutions. Mr. Rogas has architected extremely large-scale spam and virus filtering platforms, dealing with well over 100,000 messages per hour. He has also played a central role in the architecture of numerous large scale analysts solutions. Adam brings his love for safe, effective communication and startup ventures to NS8. He is married and also calls Las Vegas, Nevada home. Where did the idea for NS8 come from? My partners and I have run some significant and highly transactional websites and services prior to NS8. We understood that the common threads of fraud, abuse and poor user experience affected each of them in some way, shape, or form. Knowing this, we felt there had to be a better way to protect these types of sites and services, from being abused, regardless of their size. We also knew that any solution we created had to be easy to deploy, manage, and understand. What does your typical day look like and how do you make it productive? In an early stage company you are wearing lots of hats. I work a ton of hours. So, the key for me, is to keep my thoughts organized. I usually divide my day up into 3 or 4 segments and then identify what I think I can accomplish in each one of them. Once I do this, I make a list for each segment. This gives me a semblance of structure to my day that helps me get my mind right for the tasks I have to tackle. It also helps me walk away and not overthink the ones I have already completed. How do you bring ideas to life? I usually start with an idea or something that would really matter to a specifc group of people and then I start asking questions. I will then usually build some simple example, or take steps to create what I’m trying to do, and show it to people get feedback and repeat until I reach my goal. What’s one trend that really excites you? It has gotten easier and easier to bring big ideas to life, and to compete, due to the growth of cloud services. To me, it really levels the playing field for a lot of ideas, that just 5 years ago, would have been impossible for all but the largest companies to bring to life. What is one habit of yours that makes you more productive as an entrepreneur? I try to be fairly aware of my own ADD and so I will make lists to hold myself accountable for the items on them. I also try to solve this problem in our hiring practices by surrounding myself with people that are very detail and process focused. What advice would you give your younger self? Find a problem you think you can solve and really focus on it. Resist the urge to move from that problem until you have demonstrated by positive user feedback and growth that you have actually solved it. If you do that, and continue to do it over and over again, you will be successful. Tell us something that’s true that almost nobody agrees with you on? That I am a good singer ? I don’t know that I am very persuasive here …. but I do know I can’t sing. As an entrepreneur, what is the one thing you do over and over and recommend everyone else do? I am constantly talking to our customers. I try to involve them early on, and very often in our process. This is one area I struggle with as we evolve and scale our product development processes, but it is critical to maintaining that connection as to why your customers want your product in the first place. What is one strategy that has helped you grow your business? Please explain how. Surrounding myself with supremely talented people and partners. It has been instrumental to my own growth and the growth of my businesses. What is one failure you had as an entrepreneur, and how did you overcome it? That would probably be my first company, Load Ltd. Load was a hosted application service provider before there was a term for Software As A Service (SaaS). We had a popular email product called LoadMail, that was used by a number of major companies. About 1 year into the business we chose to offer additional services above and beyond just mail and it was this decision that would prove to be our failure. As a team, we didn’t fully understand how diversifying our focus would negatively impact our effectiveness. I tell everyone who asks for advice to pick a problem you can solve and focus on solving it well. Successful entrepreneurs have one thing in common — they never give up. What is one business idea that you’re willing to give away to our readers? I like ideas that take subject knowledge and find a way to productize it. One idea I had was to do this for athletic departments in D1 schools, so they could crowdsource from their athletes, managers, and students the creation of social marketing content. They could then manage it from a centrally controllable compliance system. Or Plastics !! Invest in Plastics (god I’m old) What is the best $100 you recently spent? What and why? Money spent on experiences, dinner with my wife or friends, or money that helps someone. Recently, since we are living across the country from each other, it would be dinner with my wife the last time I was at home in Las Vegas. What is one piece of software or a web service that helps you be productive? How do you use it? Slack. It helps our entire team communicate. What is the one book that you recommend our community should read and why? “Start With Why” by Simon Sinek. It helps you think about what you are building in a way that really focuses on how it will be consumed by those whom you are selling it to. What is your favorite quote? “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” -Winston Churchill Tell us about one friend or acquaintance of yours who we should interview on IdeaMensch. Who are they, what are they doing and what’s their email address? I actually have two Nick Jones, Nick and I started what was our first real company together Load Ltd along with my current business partner Paul Korol. Nick’s is currently working on a great project focused on personal and affinity based content creation called JRNL.com, they have recently been through boom Startup a SaaS focused startup accelerator in Salt Lake City and have just completed a seed round of funding. John Njoku, John is working on a great project RentHub.com, which is at the intersection of Multifamily Residential Realestate and Big Data Analytics. RentHub has some huge clients such as StarWood capital and The Lefrak Organization and has recently completed the Elmspring accelerator based in Chicago. Contact : https://www.ns8.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ns8 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ns8inc Twitter: @ns8inc 287Share Tweet 66Share Filed Under: Interviews, Software, Technology Tagged With: Herndon, Virginia https://ideamensch.com/adam-rogas/

一位北醫畢業目前在紐約當住院醫師的張銘凱醫師寫照顧COVID-19經驗，寫得非常棒，跟大家分享這篇文章： [經驗分享] 我在紐約市的公立醫院擔任內科住院醫師即將完訓，七月開始會做美國感染科次專訓練。目前紐約災情慘重，我所在醫院確診加疑似病人就超過一百人，我這段其間都在顧ICU因此對於重症COVID的照顧也算有心得，我至少照顧過超過20位以上之住院病人，因為在ICU的關係大部分病人都插管，到目前為止，我應該比許多台灣醫生有武漢新冠肺炎治療之實戰經驗。因為台灣目前防疫做的非常好，多半輕症或無症狀隔離，但是我們隨時要準備如果已經是社區流行，那作為醫生該如何care這些病人，因此做個簡單的分享與教學，所以講解的對象應該是以臨床第一線之醫師或NP為主。但我要說很多evidence都不斷更新，以下是盡量有所依據的臨床處理方式，reference就不一一列舉，有些我可能覺得是一般臨床工作者應有的基本概念也許就沒有多加說明，如造成閱讀上不順暢，也請多多包涵。 #流病學:相信台灣臨床醫生現在非常仰賴旅遊史畢竟沒有大規模社區感染，但是我要提醒的是如果有天已經大流行，旅遊史可能不是那麼重要了，懷疑就該驗。美國之前CDC一直很在意旅遊史而不隨意驗，結果後來發現根本大流行已經來不及了。在大爆發之前，可能會有一個空窗期就是很多原本我們以為低感染風險而沒有驗到的人，他們其實已經可能被感染。此外年輕人或沒有病史病人也非常多，這是在過去醫院前所未見的。在美國輕症就算陽性也不會住院讓他們回家，所以我所看到是真正的病人，我們已經擴充非常多病房了，但是病人真的很多，感染力真的很強要小心！至今我們已經有三個住院醫師中獎了。 #臨床表現:除了發燒咳等呼吸道症狀，還常有拉肚子等GI症狀，我要特別提醒很多病人會有"味覺失調或消失"的症狀，這不是鼻塞引起的味覺降低。很多文獻少提味覺問題，但是一定要注意，這可能是一個sign就該檢驗。此外有些病人會表達胸痛，不一定就是很嚴重的myocarditis，就純粹是無法解釋的胸痛，但還是會建議驗一下CPK/Trop。這個病毒的潛伏期根據我看到的paper，大概平均是五天多，當然最長可能兩個禮拜，不過我現在講的是一個常態分佈的結果，你要算到最嚴苛標準，也許就兩個禮拜，但是平均還是五天多，所以你如果有接觸史，過了一個禮拜還是沒發病，你大概就safe了。 #抽血:CBC(不一定會leukocytosis，反而容易lymphocytopenia and or thrombocytopenia), 常transaminitis(GOT/GPT高)。我們會大概三天監測一次Ferritin, ESR/CRP, LDH, D-dimer來觀察對藥物反應。基本blood culture, HIV, urine Legionella/strep pneumonia最好也住院時驗一下排除其他問題。 #影像:CXR bilateral infiltrations。相信大家一定常常不知道病人什麼問題但是看到CXR有點白白髒髒就當肺炎收進來打抗生素住院(其實可能根本不明顯)。我要說的是這些COVID住院病人，不會只是CXR微微白白髒髒，而是一看就是明顯兩側蔓延，在我住院醫師期間真的從來沒有看到那麼多CXR都是長這個樣子的，現在我幾乎可以看到CXR就診斷。至於CT chest雖然比較清楚，但是我認為不需要，因為大部分CXR就很明顯了，加上抽血上述markers等等就算PCR還沒有等到就可以很有把握診斷了。安排CT chest只會讓醫院感控暴露風險(因為機器要大消毒，浪費時間也可能使真正需要CT的人沒辦法照到) #氧氣治療方面:如果有SOB or hypoxia，當然要監測O2 sat.一開始nasal cannula, simple mask 下一個nonrebreather mask，中間不要試BiPAP/CPAP/High flow NC你就要early intubation了！因為BiPAP等會有把病毒釋放出來空氣傳播的風險。而且COVID病人desaturation or decompensation進展真的非常快！sat keep不住就要early intubation。另外不要使用neubulizer等會霧化的藥物治療，如需支氣管闊張劑可以用MDI手壓的pump。另外ARDS常用的臥趴姿勢prone position效果感覺非常好，病人一prone血氧真的會稍微提升，有些病人甚至沒有被插管的，血氧稍微差一點的我們就會叫他趕快趴著!還真的很有用。很多插管病人我們也會給他prone，我看討論串好像台灣不是很喜歡prone因為很耗費護理師人力，不過至少我在我們醫院我看到是一大早三個主治醫師就一起合力把病人翻姿勢，其實美國醫師工作也是很辛苦的。 #藥物治療: 1.我知道很多診所喜歡開類固醇給"感冒"的病人，但是絕對要避免因為類固醇有延長viral shedding的副作用，之前在MERS等病人的研究也是類固醇壞處大於好處，因此使用類固醇除非是有其indication才用(例如septic shock等等)。 2.高劑量Statin似乎有研究對防止病毒結合有幫助，因此如果LFT, CK允許可以考慮使用(lipitor 40 or 80, etc)。 3.Litonavir愛滋病藥物nejm已經發表確定沒用。 4.在美國我們幾乎每個病人都會給hydroxychloroquine(400mg bid for a day, then 200mg bid for 4 days)會影響lysosome fusion抑制病毒, 使用藥物前一定要EKG，如果QTc>500就不要用。我們醫院現在不加azithromycin了因為兩個一起用會延長QTc就有致死案例。對於法國研究Hydroxychloroquine+azithro很好但是我保持樂觀態度，那個研究病人量很少(n=21)，而且我實際臨床經驗覺得幫助好像有限，但是因為in vitro研究有效，我們還是會給病人就是了！ COVID似乎會跟其他呼吸道病毒一起co-infection所以還是要驗一下flu, 但是如果flu negative也不需要給tamiflu因為對covid無效。除了病毒還常bacterial superinfection，所以我們幾乎還是會給抗細菌抗生素，macrolide or levofloxacin擔心prolong QT所以我們醫院現在給doxycycline。記得驗一下Urine Legionella因為跟covid一樣都常有GI症狀。 5.Remdesivir在美國第一個case就是靠這個治好的，各國都在臨床試驗中，我個人很看好，我們醫院也要開始實驗這個了... 6.日本藥favipiravir聽說也很成功但是因為我在美國比較不熟。 7.很多COVID病人為什麼這麼sick，明明年輕人卻full blown ARDS比老人更嚴重，因為很多是cytokine release syndrome的關係。所以IL-6 inhibitor如tocilizumab or sarilumab本來治rheumatoid arthritis的生物製劑或許也有用。現階段也還在臨床試驗中，可以抽血IL-6監測。聽說MGH用tocilizumab，而我的醫院也要開始臨床試驗sarilumab #Code status：COVID大部分還是胸腔性疾病，很多就是插管呼吸器ARDS mode來治療，因此插管是很重要的環節。但是有些運氣不是很好的病人，多重器官衰竭等等突然coded需要CPR的情況，這對醫療團隊來說是暴露極高風險甚至多半可能徒勞。我認為有必要一開始就要跟病人談好DNR，這不代表就要DNI，該插管還是要插管，但是真的不幸心跳停止等，要量力而為。 #醫院管理：至少在紐約我們的物資設備都輸台灣很多也嚴重不足，不過也許可以給台灣要是不幸疫情大爆發做個借鏡。現在醫院幾乎都是COVID病人，也不可能一人一間病房了，因此直接把COVID病人直接放在同一間房間，反正都得病了也不怕被感染了。不過還是建議最好病房的門是有窗戶的至少從外面看進去可以知道病人好不好，而且就我剛剛所說，病人原本可能好好的就突然血氧掉非常喘需要趕快插管，每個住院病人真的像未爆彈。另外ICU病人因為常常有很多pump點滴，護理師要一直進出隔離房不方便穿脫PPE，可以考慮直接把pump放在房間外面，點滴線延長出去就好，這樣如果護理師要調sedation or pressors等等就可以不用進入房間更改設定。 #國家防疫：現階段台灣防疫做很好，還在containment的階段，就是把最有可能的人抓出來隔離，但是對於平均每個個案的隔離成本很高，國家也很不容易控制，目前台灣有兩百多的個案，但是某天要是慢慢累積好幾百個病人甚至破千，我們也許就要調整策略，因為把全部只要是陽性的病人都抓到醫院關那是不可能的，台灣沒有那麼多的醫療能量，也不能這樣浪費，而且輕症染病的病人，要多久PCR會轉陰性，我還沒看到研究統計出來，應該也很少人會做這樣研究，因為很少國家會像台灣如此嚴格標準檢疫隔離的，就好像今天得influenza A，如果不太嚴重也是讓病人回家，病癒就是病癒，一般醫師也不會再重複flu swab；同樣如果有C.diff病人，把PO Vanc的療程吃完沒有再拉肚子，你也是當作好了不會再去驗糞便。個人覺得台灣可以把輕症病人平均多久時間PCR轉陰性做個統計發表研究。我最近看了世界著名病毒學專家何大一博士的專訪([https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/tip-iceberg-virologist-david-ho-bs-74-speaks-about-covid-19?fbclid=IwAR1XVnPHq82gD97Y2Y06FkIFzAtNNfopnMgqa98fHAwX7WHzHGyBVbnZlIQ](https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/tip-iceberg-virologist-david-ho-bs-74-speaks-about-covid-19?fbclid=IwAR1XVnPHq82gD97Y2Y06FkIFzAtNNfopnMgqa98fHAwX7WHzHGyBVbnZlIQ)) 個人覺得這篇寫得不錯，裡面他就有寫到目前也不知道陽性的病人過多久後才不會有傳染力，他說猜測大概三週。至於已經得過COVID的病人之後會不會再重複感染，他是覺得應該是不會，也就是現在所有的防疫工作，就是在爭取時間讓疫苗可以製造出來讓群體都可以有保護效果。現階段幾乎的國家都大爆發，就不可能像台灣還在containment的防疫階段，因為你要假設所有人都有可能是病人，那能做的就是#緩和曲線了flatten the curve，我覺得這個概念相當重要 ，基本上就是拖延戰術，減少不必要的社交和聚集，要social distancing，不必要的商業活動要停止，電影院酒吧夜店要關，餐廳只能外帶等等，這可以避免加速接觸感染，讓病人增加量不要達這麼快一下超出醫療能負荷的數量避免醫療崩壞，很多國家都在這麼做了，目前聽起來表現比較好的國家像是南韓，雖然他們一開始防疫沒有做好導致非常多人得病，但是經過大規模檢驗，還有避免出門要待在家等等，目前疫情也有和緩的趨勢，算是亡羊補牢，也不是不行。台灣目前表現全球數一數二，但是我們總是要做最壞的準備跟打算。 #後記：沒想到一下就寫這麼多，這算是我第一線醫療工作者的紀實與經驗分享，目前紐約疫情雖然已嚴重崩壞，但實際上還只是開始而已不見緩和。不過美國參戰之後相信會有更多醫學研究與臨床治療準則可以參考，實際上也不完全是壞事。你問我會不會怕我每天也是提心吊膽的，都很怕生病，每天都要很注意自己的身體狀態，但偏偏美國住院醫師工時非常長(週休一日而已也沒有PM off)又不斷把我們明明不是在病房rotate的時候抓來上班取消我們的門診等等，我都盡量多休息有時間就睡覺保持免疫力。現在在醫院其實也是看到很多恐慌的面孔，我們醫院是公立醫院，平常病人多為社會最底層的人，吸毒的、遊民的、酗酒的，總之各種問題台灣一個比較健康的社會大概很難想像是一個怎麼樣的場所。不過最近因為COVID病人大爆發，我發現很多可能社會上的一般人或中產階級，他們可能是警察、可能是清潔工、就某天感染病毒生病了，這時候醫護站起來照顧他們治療他們，讓他們免於恐懼，這是作為醫學生涯也算比較榮光的時候，因為我們平常的訓練，就在這時候派上用場，也算是找到一點點行醫的意義跟價值。可以平安地活著其實就很好。目前台灣社會可以安全的生活著也真的很好。

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/ROqgLOKExOhZ3D5kOn9FOQ

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/YpkE4SBabO1LicF8oRxFdg

新冠狀疫苗突傳大消息，才發現這個中國科學家厲害得超乎想象！ https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/XGrPaePtLbcFuKNN9OCBkA

新冠疫情期間的最大享受😄 一份屬於影迷的福利，全球最大的纪录片影展阿姆斯特丹纪录片节（idfa）在其官网放出300部以上全球纪录片供在线观看！ 如果你注册为会员还可以增加至500多部，可按国家，类型进行选择。 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/_uP9xUg0hV_JhkVgLuExVQ?fbclid=IwAR0FX3JExpQPd9Wzpuq5FTo4VAzUeyNkOLdj3oWgN_Gkav5sVugCa7g9Jmw