TT – Từ căn bệnh ung thư hiểm nghèo của cha, thấu hiểu nỗi khổ của gia đình người bệnh, Tạ Minh Tuấn tìm tới thế giới y khoa và đã cho ra đời mô hình y tế dự phòng mang tên “Bác sĩ riêng”.
At 24, Tuấn is CEO of HELP International Joint Stock Company. He said his father’s illness inspired him to work and contribute in healthcare.
Noble Colleagues
Tuấn researched and found that cancer rates in Vietnam remained high because prevention was inadequate. He believes treatment addresses symptoms rather than the root problem. This concern drove him to seek ways to ‘give people tools for disease prevention and make them their own best doctors.’ And the preventive healthcare model called ‘Personal Doctor’ (www.bacsirieng.com) was born from that.
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HELP's Services “Private Doctor” provides at-home medical examinations on request or routine checkups by prior appointment, with prices depending on the service package. In addition to examinations, “Private Doctor” performs the tests needed for disease screening and provides medical information on treatment and prevention. In addition, “Personal Doctor” also provides services such as personalized lifestyle planning, periodic health examinations for corporate employees, physiotherapy at home and home nursing care. HELP currently works with a team of 45 doctors and 25 nurses. |
In 2009, Tuấn launched the project. Lacking experience, he told himself he needed to proceed very carefully. Tuấn set a goal of meeting at least one friend each day from a prepared list to share his project. Some days, he spoke with eight or nine people in succession. ‘I poured my heart out, with all my passion and enthusiasm. Clearly, only by sharing could I find the right people,’ Tuấn recalled. After a full month of this, 20 young people with medical expertise agreed to collaborate with him.
The pressing problem was that Tuấn… had no money to pay salaries! But that was all right: 20 colleagues supported the young man by each devoting two hours a day to HELP without pay for an entire year. Tuấn calculated that 20 people contributed 40 hours a day, equivalent to five full-time employees; adding his own tireless work brought the total to 55 hours/day. “55 hours of work a day without having to pay salaries is a tremendous asset when starting a business,” Tuấn said.
The initial difficulties were eventually left behind. In just two months, Tuấn raised VND 14 billion to fund the project for three years. He sought partners who shared his community-oriented mission because, for Tuấn, “business must be profitable, but its effectiveness is measured not only in money but also in the impact it creates in society.”
Give Back to Life
Now, Tuấn also spends both weekend days speaking and sharing experience at YUP Entrepreneurship and Leadership Academy, which he founded late last year. Tuấn says life is so short that we should contribute as much as we can. “What matters most is the noble mission we pursue, not how many things we do. Whatever industry or field I work in, my goal is to improve Vietnamese people's quality of life,” he concludes.
In 2010, adding to his packed schedule, Tuấn founded a fund supporting people with disabilities called ‘Giấc mơ đôi chân thiên thần,’ named after the debut work of Trần Trà My, a young woman with a disability who dreamed of becoming a writer (‘Trà My on Burning Sand”, Tuổi Trẻ 15-7-2007).
“When I first started out, I received so much from those who came before me that I now want to return those acts of kindness to life,” Tuấn said. It is his way of repaying life and the people who helped him in his inexperienced early days.
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Dynamic Born in 1988, Tạ Minh Tuấn graduated in industrial systems engineering from Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology. Tuấn began his business career by founding digital communications company IDEE in 2008. Recently, the Center for Social Initiatives Promotion (CSIP) also recognized Tuấn as one of 15 social entrepreneurs of 2011.
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