At Kaiser Permanente facilities in Vallejo, patien

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At Kaiser Permanente facilities in Vallejo, patients are known to casually drop the name of “Mr. Tyson” as a long time family friend when they want special attention.

Although Vallejo native Bernard J. Tyson is now CEO of the $55 billion, 200,000 employee health maintenance organization based in nearby Oakland, he hopes that all 10 million patients feel as if they personally know the boss.

The result would be better medicine and much better health, he contended during a speech at the University of San Francisco. He particularly cites health disparities among African-Americans as an area where greater cultural competency is needed.

On Friday, the patient was the entire African-American community of San Francisco,surrounded by some of the world’s best health care, but beset with some of the most glaring disparities on the planet and losing black population more rapidly than any major city in the United States.

Tyson said he is approaching diverse needs of his stakeholders by dramatically increasing procurement among minority and women owned businesses from $400 million to $1.3 billion and constantly analyzing patient care data.

He met a local scientist whose discoveries could help both those efforts, Dr. John Commissiong, chief scientific officer of Amarantus Bioscience Holdings. It’s MANF smart protein has promising clinical results in therapies for Parkinson’s disease, diabetes and traumatic brain injury.

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