Iwona Łaszcz

Chairwoman of Centrum Medyczne

For Iwona Łaszcz, experiencing Western healthcare helped her to discover the importance of the relationship between doctors and their patients.

While studying for a degree in medicine at Warsaw's Medical Academy, Łaszcz traveled to Monaco on an internship at the Rechts der Isaar hospital. She said she was shocked by how differently patients were treated there compared to Poland. "Polish hospitals had highly qualified people and good equipment, but they treated patients like objects," Łaszcz said. "It gave me an awareness of patient relations that I couldn't have learned in Poland."

After graduating in 1982, she went on to practice at the Gastroenterology clinic of the Goszczyńskiego hospital. The next year she became a company doctor at LOT Polish Airlines, which allowed her to travel for free - a job she holds to this day.

In 1991, Łaszcz joined a group of colleagues from LOT who were setting up Centrum Medyczne (CM), a small clinic that used part of the LOT medical center in the Marriott Hotel building. She later became its chairwoman. When LOT announced it was to move its medical services to Okęcie airport in 1996, Łaszcz and the center's staff registered CM as a company and took over LOT's three rooms in the Marriott. The building's rent was a heavy burden on the young firm, but patient numbers grew and within two years a second clinic was opened on ulica Domaniewska. By 2000, the Marriott clinic occupied the entire floor. This year, CM received a ISO9001 quality management certificate and is taking part in a tender to outsource medical services for 5,000 LOT employees.

Past notes:

1982 - Graduated from the Warsaw Medical Academy

1982 - Gastroenterology clinic at the Goszczyńskiego hospital in Warsaw

1983 - Company doctor at LOT Polish Airlines

1991 - Chairwoman of Centrum Medyczne

2001 - Centrum Medyczne received ISO 9001 certificate

Word of advice:

"The success of my firm wasn't based on a desire to make money quickly. We wanted interesting jobs that paid reasonably well."

Greg Goodale