1. Healthcare Karma or Not?
© 2016 Neal Ostman
Like most mother’s in the ‘50’s and 60’s, having a son become a doctor was high on her wish list. But by
high school, she was resigned to the fact that I was only focused on playing football. Unfortunately,
taking a header off my cousin’s motorcycle smack into the dirt road by his farm – no helmet – and yes,
during the season, put an end to those plans.
Mom scrubbed out most of the sand and butterflied my entire forehead. Coach kicked his desk. My
helmet didn’t fit until the last two games of the season. Season shot and the chance to make all-city;
earning a ride to a university- all gone. So, eventually, I became an accountant.
But the healthcare karma story starts with how my mom and dad met. She was a young farm girl,
studying to become a nurse at St. Joseph’s Hospital in 1945. My dad, a city boy from Fort Wayne,
Indiana, was a sergeant in a combat engineer battalion that just returned from Europe. Sadly, his father
was in the hospital dying of cancer. That’s where mom and dad met. Love took its course and after his
discharge they were married.
As they raised a family, my mother worked as a nurse for the next 52 years. She was dedicated to the
profession and learned many different roles as we moved from state to state. She had several nursing
positions. One of the most stressful was when she opened the ICU unit at the new Holy Cross Hospital
in Silver Spring, Maryland. At different times, she was an industrial nurse at major multi-plant GE facility
and office nurse for a family practice doctor. She ended her long career as the Director of Nursing for a
nursing home, and finally she was herself a beneficiary receiving hospice services.
Throughout all the years, she maintained contact with several of her classmates from nursing school.
They also stayed in the profession for many years. There would be occasional parties at each other’s
homes, they wrote to each other, and talked on the phone, and were lifelong supportive friends. At the
time, I never quite understood why this friendship was so strong.
The good news is that before she passed away, she lived to see me involved in healthcare and we were
able to share our stories. I joined a company in the medical staffing and home care sectors as corporate
controller. Over a fourteen year run, as I progressed to CFO and President, the company grew into a
national platform. We would hire over 6,000 caregivers a year, and with active staff of over 19,000, the
company would have caregivers on assignments in over 3,200 facilities nationwide, including a home
healthcare division comprised of thirty-five CHHA’s in multiple states. During those years, I was able to
interact and visit with caregivers in communities and hospitals from Albany to San Diego. This
experience showed me how special they are and educated me on the struggles that beset the noble
profession of healing people.
In time, I realized why the friendships of those in healthcare, like my mother’s and her nursing school
friends, remain so resilient. For how could it be otherwise? When you have like-minded people, who
care about others, who understand that life isn’t perfect or fair, and who must trust each other at every
shift change and visit. And every day perform what’s expected, do what’s right, and be brave enough to
speak up for those who can’t – isn’t that the type friend you want by your side- forever?
And now you know why, even for a numbers-guy – I am so proud to help the people and the enterprises
that invent, heal and guide us to a better state of human being.
“It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else’s life
with perfection.” The Bhagavad Gita