Author: John Stephens
Paul Raftery, a colleague and CEO of Projects RH, and business partner asked me to provide a set of stories about my entrepreneur experiences. I have been running medical device start-ups for three decades. The products our teams brought forward were in the space of breast cancer diagnostics, infections control, respiratory care, and prostate cancer diagnostics. I want to share a story that was shared with me by Dr. David M. Long Jr. a famous heart surgeon in the US. I ran Dr. Long’s breast cancer company for fifteen years, which we took public on NASDAQ. I was with Dr. Long and his family when he passed.
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Dr. Long was approached by Earl Baken, an engineer and businessman of Dutch and Norwegian ancestry. Earl provided a device and protocol to test in something he called a “pacer”. He asked Dr. Long to implant the pacer in dogs and give him his opinion on the pacer’s medical safety and efficacy. Dr. Long performed the surgery and protocol for his old friend.
Dr. Long took his results to Earl. Earl asked how did it go, did the device work, and preform in a safe and effective manner? Dr. Long responded, the pacer worked as designed and is safe and effective. He went on to provide additional recommendations to improve the pacer. Earl stressed, did the pacer work as designed, David? Dr. Long let Earl know the pacer worked as designed. Earl, shortly thereafter opened the company which he called Medtronic, which went on to become one of the largest medical device companies in the world.
In that meeting between Dr. Long and Mr. Baken, Earl said to David, “I can always make a better pacer maker the next day, it’s time to go to market with what we have, David.”
My mentor, Dr. David. M. Long, taught me a great lesson with that story we went on that day to speak about our partnership, market opportunities and how medical inventions and entrepreneurs can change the world.
I look forward to writing and telling some more stories for Paul. Paul and I are moving forward with a world changing company I call Neva Healthcare, www.nevahealthcare.com. I sure miss Dr. Long….more soon.
Only good things….John Stephens-CEO / Neva
