Meet Our Team

  • Meet Our Team

Committed to delivering the highest quality of care with every touch.

Dan Herbstman
Co-Founder, Chief Executive Officer

 As Chief Executive Officer, Dan keeps the organization at the forefront of the telehealth industry as it continues to expand in new markets.  Prior to co-founding Third Eye health, he served as Senior Director, Diagnostics and Software, at Haemonetics, the leading medical technology company in blood management, bringing early-stage products from concept to commercialization and to standard of care in the in-vitro diagnostics, software and medical device areas.

Dan has also mentored early-stage companies, including Healthbox, as part of Chicago Innovation Mentors (CIM) and the Chicago Lean StartupChallenge. He was an early investor for b.good, a New England-based restaurant chain. Dan started his career in health care consulting with Abt Associates and Perot Systems before moving into the medical technology area with EPIX Medical.

He has an undergraduate degree from Washington University (St. Louis, MO) in Biology.

Lucas Baran
Co-Founder, Chief Technology Officer

As Chief Technology Officer, Lucas drives product innovation and development initiatives for Third Eye Health. The original developer of the organization’s highly sought-after proprietary tablet-based telehealth technology, Lucas leads a team of highly skilled developers in the platform’s evolution through design and execution, ensuring a sustainable product market fit. He also upholds the responsibility of maintaining the secure transfer of PHI with SOC2 certification and custom EHR-integrations.

Prior to co-founding Third Eye Health, Lucas developed trading floor applications for Fidelity Investments and led a team of developers for Dynamic Clinical Systems, specializing in self-reported surveys using touch-enabled software that was acquired by Press Ganey.

Lucas holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science and a master’s degree in Information Security.

Laurie Dotas

Senior Vice President of Operations

Laurie serves as Third Eye Health’s Senior Vice President of Operations, overseeing all training, implementation, and support initiatives as well as credentialing, third party billing, physician practice operations, and payer enrollment. Her journey with Third Eye Health began on the client engagement side, where she managed training and account management as the Director of Customer Operations.

Before joining Third Eye Health, Laurie dedicated over 25 years building her career in long-term care, the majority of which she served as a licensed nursing home administrator, working for organizations including Signature Healthcare, Kindred Healthcare and Prestige Healthcare.  She also was the Regional Vice President for MedOptions Behavioral Health, working directly with long-term care partners.

Paivi Smith
Vice President, Finance

As Vice President of Finance, Paivi is responsible for the daily finance activities and treasury of Third Eye Health.  Since joining Third Eye Health, her focus has been on improving the financial systems and processes, identifying additional income generation opportunities, positively impacting the organization’s financial forecasting and outcomes.

Paivi has held financial leadership roles for 20 years, most recently she was the Vice President of Accounting / Finance at Stratus Video, a mobile technology interpretation service for hospitals, where she helped navigate the organization through two acquisitions.

Paivi received her master’s degree in Accounting and Finance from the University of Jyväskylä in Finland and is a Certified Public Accountant.

Zahra Shariff MD
Senior Medical Director

Dr. Shariff leads the nationwide team of over 80 Third Eye Health physicians delivering acute virtual care to patients in skilled nursing and long-term care environments.  Her medical expertise includes extensive experience as ED Attending Physician at Michael E DeBakey VA Hospital in Houston, Texas and Hunter Holmes McGuire VA in Richmond, Virginia.  She has a deep interest in international health, having traveled to Tajikistan to establish a clinic and train local providers on Diabetes Mellitus Type II (DMII) and hypertension treatment protocols.

Dr. Shariff received her medical degree at University College Cork in Ireland followed by a residency in internal medicine at St. Louis University Hospital, serving as Chief Resident her final year. Originally from Canada, Dr. Shariff received her undergraduate degree from McGill University.

 

Suzanne Carney, RN, CDONA/LTC

Vice President Of Clinical Services

As Vice President of Clinical Services, Suzanne establishes and builds relationships between clinical leadership and Third Eye Health.  Our clinical nursing expert, Suzanne’s best practice guidelines are imperative to driving quality initiatives and outcomes. Her journey at Third Eye Health began as Director of Care Coordination where she developed the care coordination platform as it exists today, later transitioning to Director of Clinical Operations where she managed the Care Coordination team, an essential arm of Third Eye Health.

 Before joining Third Eye Health she served as Director of Nursing Services and Center Nurse Executive for over 10 years establishing deficiency-free surveys and 5-star CMS status as her standard of practice. With over 35 years of health care service, starting her career as an LPN then RN, she is now working toward a master’s degree in Nursing.