Bianca Nguyen, MHA ’17, Associate Strategy Partner, Cleveland Clinic

By Jon Spayde

“I feel like I got, and still get, so much out of the people in the MHA program that I want to be able to give back however I can.”

As the daughter of immigrants, Bianca Nguyen knows first-hand that the American health care system doesn’t meet the needs of everyone equally.

“My family had a multicultural background ,” she says, “so their experience of health care  was different from that of some others because the American health care system has historically been one-size-fits-all. I went into health care because I have a passion for working against the disparities in care and outcomes that so many people experience. These disparities have been so clearly highlighted throughout the COVID pandemic. Ensuring access to the best care for every person is a huge public health issue.”

That issue is top of mind for Nguyen as she works in the Cleveland Clinic’s strategy office on ways to expand the clinic’s growth in specific health-care markets—-and to help patients take control of their care through education and empowerment. She’s able, she says, to balance the business side of her work and what she calls her “passion projects” around health equity.

And although she’s only four years out of her master’s program, she chooses to donate to the School of Public Health, because her experience there, she says, was empowering for her on a very human level. “The master of healthcare administration (MHA) program really did feel like a family,” she says. “The faculty invested so much time and care in us. We could tell that they valued each person. I still talk to some faculty members from the program every few years, and alumni too.”

It’s this richness of human connection that motivates her to give, she says. “I’ve worked on projects here where I reached out to an alumna or alumnus with whom I had never spoken before, and they would always respond. They’d always be willing to help. I feel like I got, and still get, so much out of the people in the MHA program that I want to be able to give back however I can.”

While in the program, Nguyen, the first in her family to get a master’s degree, received support from the Lowell and Leslie Kruse Scholarship for Community Performance Excellence Leadership, and she feels particularly grateful for that support and particularly close to other recipients. “Thanks to the Kruses, I got to participate in extracurricular programs I wouldn’t have had time for if I had to work forty hours a week and go to school at the same time. I hope that my giving can now open opportunities for other students like those I benefited from.”

To alumni considering following her example in giving–but still hesitating– she has this to say: “I’d ask them, what did you get out of your program, and would you be where you are today without it? Because without it, I really don’t feel like I would be where I am, working in a world-class  health care organization, doing what I love, and doing my part to make a difference in the world.”