Diaspora.nz S2 | E10 - Dr. Zachary Tan (Optain Health, Aegis Ventures) on navigating the U.S. healthcare system as a founder investor, venture studios, and why the eye is the key to preventative medicine.
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* Spotify
When Zachary Tan - actually, Doctor Zachary Tan - became president of Optain Health, the role combined three lifelong passions: treating patients, running future-focused tech businesses, and taking exciting risks with venture capital in one of the world’s most important areas: the health of human beings.
Zach’s career has gone from strength to strength. He was in 2022 recognized by Forbes as 30 Under 30 for Healthcare & Science, before going on to be elected as a director of The Fred Hollows Foundation in the US.
In today's episode, we chat through how one gap year away from medical school to run a future-focused healthcare business became a ‘gap decade,’ what he learned from the differences between treating one patient in Sydney and working with a healthcare provider treating millions of patients in upstate New York, and how there is potential to massively disrupt the economics around insurance costs and the cost of treatment simply by examining a patient’s retina.
Zachary also tells us about two deeply significant businesses he’s worked with on his journey: Osara Health, as well as New York’s VC studio Aegis Ventures - of which he is a partner - and how he has currently settled on Optain to apply his passion.
In today's episode, we discuss:
* Leaving Auckland at age 17 for Queensland- then hearing the call of the United States, a healthcare industry worth four trillion dollars
* Using the eye as a window to the body to detect and diagnose disease and save billions - as well as save lives
* Tech solutions for New York’ state’s biggest hospitals
* Using AI in healthcare to minimise admin for healthcare staff, speed up diagnoses, diagnose disease early and reduce costs on patients, insurers and everyone in-between
* Investing in tech to tackle disparities between healthcare access for babies, adults, ethnic groups and other patient segments
* How healthcare practitioners were forced to embrace telemedicine technology across the last five years as the Covid pandemic put pressure on staff to work remotely
* What Zachary thinks could be improved in the intersection between patients, insurance and healthcare ‘payviders’
* Steps to take when you’re looking at doing business in America’s healthcare sector and you need FDA approval.
Referenced:
* Optain Health: https://optainhealth.com/about/
* Aegis Ventures: https://aegisventures.com/
* Northwell Health: https://www.northwell.edu/
* Osara Health: https://osarahealth.com/
* The Fred Hollows Foundation: https://www.hollows.org/
Where to find Zachary Tan:
* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zacharytan/
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