The Fiber of Andrey Ostrovsky,
MD Part 1
by Al Hardy
“When we left Ukraine, I
thought I was on a field trip.” Dr.
Andrey Ostrovsky chuckled. This was the
type of chuckle that only retrospection can bring. The type that emphasizes a few things: first,
it’s really not all that funny; second,
sometimes, life was pretty tough; third, there is still only a partial
understanding of how we made it through.
 |
| Dr. Andrey Ostrovsky, CEO and Co-Founder of Care atHand |
Dr. Andrey Ostrovsky is a
pediatric physician, CEO and co-founder of Care atHand, and social entrepreneur. While there is a place, he believes, for
healing one patient at a time, he wants to affect entire populations, starting
locally, then regionally, across the globe.
But what is a social entrepreneur? For that matter, why does the designation even matter? We will not even bother to drift into the deliriously distracting debate as to the value of social entrepreneurs in capitalistic societies. A social entrepreneur’s initiatives may be focused on people or problems that are not seen as prime for investors. Simply put, a social entrepreneur often sees success as both:
- a resolution of a “social”
issue in a way that benefits the targeted populations
- the solution will still render
good returns for investors
Dr. Ostrovsky understands the
criticality of patient by patient treks back to health. He even goes to the point of helping patients
understand the interactions with her/his environments. He will get down to the dirty details to
figure out what’s going on within the patient’s ecosystem.
Dr. Ostrovsky remarked, “I am not just
concerned about treating asthma in a child.
I want to know about what is setting off the asthma. For example, are there cockroach feces in the
apartment?”
The value of the work at Care at Hand as a social entrepreneurial
venture may be best understood through Dr. Ostrovsky’s journey to becoming a
physician. Dr. Ostrovsky was born in
Ukraine. Just before the infamy of the Berlin
Wall was transformed into market demand for pieces of collectible relics, Dr.
Ostrovsky’s parents were classified as refugees and fled to the U.S. His father, who ran a construction company, buckled
down into the hard hustle life of a cab driver. His mother left her position of running a
metal refinery to being paid under the table
in a pizza parlor. Imagine this
transition for his parents. Dr.
Ostrovsky was a child and had a child’s perspective.
“When
we left Ukraine, I thought I was on a field trip. Later, we lived in Baltimore City Housing
Projects. I thought it was normal hearing gunshots. I remember going to work
and having to make pizza boxes in the back room. I was awful.
I was terrible because I kept eating pizza.”
The family lived in Baltimore City Projects
for three years. That could have been
the perpetual ending of the story. Not everyone
wins the fight to find a way out. Not everyone
wins the fight back to the semblance of a previous life. His parents did. I am sure with great costs and great rewards. Those of us, who have never had to escape
home and permanently settle in a foreign country and call that home… we may
never really be able to appreciate the depth of those losses or gains. I certainly would not want to experience such
a thing just to gain that appreciation.
But, I can surely appreciate those who do live that experience.
His parents built new careers. His father owns and manages Network Solutions
of Maryland. His mother is the Vice President
of Technology at Deutsche Bank. It is obvious that Dr.
Ostrovsky did not follow in their footsteps - career wise. I asked how that happened.
“You don’t have much choice as an immigrant child. You have to be a doctor, lawyer, or engineer,” he gave a quick laugh.
I asked, “Were you resistant to it?”
“I had no idea. It
is only in retrospect did I come to understand the grooming that was laid out
before me.” He chuckled. My parents were
very supportive and always said they would be proud of me no matter what. I see, though, the subtle suggestions by them…
and the not so subtle suggestions from the not so tactical grandparents. They said.
You will shame us unless you become a doctor, lawyer, or engineer. It was never anything I was forced into.
“I was
very lucky at the time. When I was about
eight or nine years old, my mom and my then step-father were running one of the
largest Russian restaurants in Baltimore.
It kept them very busy. During my
most formative years, I grew up raising my sister, this small child. I coached basketball for several years. I was good in science in high school. I fell in love with being around kids and voilà, pediatrician.
“But,
when I look at all the privileged kids or the kids that were able to escape
that environment and compare it to all the kids that weren’t able to escape
that environment, why is that? These are
the things that piss me off on a daily basis and why I do what I do.”
Part 2 Coming Soon,
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