What My Mentor Taught Me: Healthcare Entrepreneurs Share Lessons Learned

Behind every biotech discovery or bold startup milestone often is a seasoned voice of experience. Mentors are pivotal players who offer more than encouragement. They are the source of perspective, questions and wisdom that helps shape the careers of healthcare entrepreneurs as they engage in risks in the lab and building companies. Cure asked healthcare entrepreneurs to share, "What was the best thing your mentor(s) ever told you?" Their answers reveal how mentors as coaches helped founders navigate transitions from academia to industry and clinical, regulatory and business milestones.

Amel Ibrahim, MD, PhD

CEO and Founder, Bioworkshop 2022 XSeed Award winner

Amel Ibrahim went to medical school at Imperial College London. She was on her way to becoming a surgeon when another field grabbed her attention: regenerative medicine. One of her surgery mentors helped her choose the best career path for her. "I had received a prestigious fellowship, but taking it meant leaving an academic surgery position early. I was worried I would be letting him down, given how hard these kinds of surgery positions are to create," she said. "He advised me that if he had this opportunity when he was my age, he would have taken it without a second thought. He was very supportive. He also told me that even if he wasn’t supportive, I still should take it. He said to remember that no single person can ever make or break my career, no matter how seemingly influential or important they are. While it’s good to be gracious, don't worry too much about what other people think. And never sacrifice these once-in-a-lifetime opportunities." She subsequently founded Bioworkshop, a company that is revolutionizing neurological disease research with an award-winning biochip platform that models complex brain conditions like Parkinson’s to accelerate drug discovery.

Carol Troy, MD, PhD

Columbia University Neurologist 2024 XSeed Award winner

Carol Troy leads a team of investigators at Columbia University Irving Medical Center who are developing the first noninvasive treatment for retinal vascular occlusion (RVO): the sight-threatening blockage of a vein in the light-sensitive inner layer of the eye. A neurologist and pharmacologist by training, she is driven by an acute awareness of how visual impairment can affect quality of life. RVO currently lacks an effective treatment. Her passion for research led her to the lab, where she is working to make a difference for patients and leading a team of investigators. "My mentors told me that if you want to pursue a career in research, you need to have a passion to do research, so you cannot imagine doing anything else. A research career is not easy, but it is fulfilling if you have that passion," Troy said. "My mentors also gave me independence to discover my interests within the framework of the focus of the larger lab. Today, I incorporate all of this into my own mentoring."

Diego Garzón, PhD

Vice President of Corporate Development, Apertura A Cure Collaboration Residency company

Apertura is developing a novel approach for delivering innovative gene therapies to the brain to treat patients with central nervous system diseases that have limited therapeutic options. Gene therapy is a challenging field, and not everyone makes it to the finish line. That's where mentors can be so important. "The most valuable thing my mentors taught me was the power of having a safe space to vent and think things through. Like great coaches, they didn’t just give me answers — they offered different ways to look at problems and encouraged me to shift perspectives," said Garzón. "To me, great mentors are the people who push you to see things in new ways and help you grow by asking the right questions, not just giving advice."

Moro Salifu, MD

Nephrologist and Co-Founder of Vasocure LLC 2024 XSeed Award finalist

Moro Salifu, MD, is Chair of the Department of Medicine at SUNY Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn. His journey into research began during his nephrology residency at SUNY Downstate, where former Chief of Nephrology Eli Friedman, MD, became his clinical mentor. Salifu had a patient with end-stage kidney disease who could not undergo a kidney biopsy due to a high risk of bleeding. Working with cell biologist Elizabeth Kornecki, PhD, he learned the patient’s platelets were dysfunctional. The findings inspired Salifu to work with Kornecki, whom he regards as his basic science mentor. Salifu, Kornecki, and their collaborators founded Vasocure LLC, which is advancing targeted therapies to prevent arteriovenous graft stenosis for patients on kidney dialysis. Their discoveries may also unlock new treatments for atherosclerosis. Salifu regards Friedman and Kornecki as transformative mentors whose guidance led him to where he is today. "Dr. Friedman motivated and pushed me beyond boundaries, reviewing and commenting on everything I wrote in my formative years. He coached me on the art of scientific writing, thinking through issues and effectively communicating clinical science information," Salifu noted. "Dr. Kornecki and her lab team invested time to help me understand cellular processes, how to structure hypotheses and how to design a basic science study.” Together, their work lead the way to the discoveries that are the basis of Vascocure’s pipeline today.

Shardule Shah, PhD

CEO and Co-Founder, Lime Therapeutics 2022 XSeed Award winner

Mentors can be especially beneficial when you are seeking to make headway in a field where few others have journeyed, let alone succeeded. That was the case for the founders of Lime Therapeutics, whose mission is to create precision medicines for diseases with dysfunctional lipid biology. The role of lipid biology in disease progression had gone largely unexplored — until recently. "When I asked what made him successful — in my eyes, at least — my mentor and Lime business advisor, Jeff Hatfield, told me, 'When others told me I couldn't do something or it couldn't be done, I was able to do it.' To me, that tenacity is what defines biotech founders. Most of our experiments are going to fail because of the nature of science, but figuring out what to do with setbacks is what separates the winners from the losers," Shah explained. "In addition, my mentor and Lime business advisor Robin Mansukhani told me that in the middle of the daily grind, never lose who you are. Show up as yourself every day. That's the path to long-lasting relationships in this industry. There can be disappointing science, and on occasion, people who don't reciprocate the level of respect that you give. But that's never a reason for you to fundamentally change who you are."