As a kid, Havi Nguyen sometimes missed school to translate at doctor’s appointments, and was managing Medicaid paperwork for herself and her sisters, on behalf of their parents who’d immigrated from Vietnam. Whatever life in a new country threw at them, Nguyen as the eldest daughter was there—and the labyrinthine American health care system featured prominently in her world.
At 21, she started working at an early-stage health tech startup focused on therapy for children with autism. It was the depths of COVID, and it was clear to Nguyen there was a gap: There just weren’t enough therapists and technicians, and sometimes they would move on rapidly from one gig to another.
