Beau Wangtrakuldee, PhD on PPE for Women
Dr. Wangtrakuldee shares her mission to create inclusive PPE along with advice for moving women up the ladder in medicine
Beau Wangtrakuldee, PhD is the Founder and CEO of AmorSui, a healthcare tech company on a mission to make personal protective equipment (PPE) more gender-inclusive, innovative, and sustainable to wear.
She comes to the company as a scientist who worked in a laboratory setting for over ten years. She handled toxic chemicals and thus needed to be in PPE. But when she needed it most, it failed her.
“The chemical burned right through my lab coat onto my skin, and it could have been deadly,” said Dr. Wangtrakuldee. “And I recovered from that.”
This incident motivated her to investigate the PPE industry. She discovered that there were many gaps—including a lack of size-inclusive, functional products.
So, she launched AmorSui.
PPE and Medicine
PPE exists as part of a daily routine for many medical professionals—and COVID-19 has only increased demand.
Despite that, female front-line workers likely don’t have access to the right things, as a lot of PPE “doesn’t fit women or persons with smaller frames.”
Moreover, the extensive use of disposable products has increased plastic waste all over the world, over 2 million tons per day to be exact. Dr. Wangtrakuldee sees an opportunity to disrupt this trend and to be at the forefront of a major shift in the protective apparel industry towards more sustainable products. Through the AmorSui Viridi (“green” in Latin) platform, hospitals and clinics can easily automate washable PPE cleaning, life-cycle management, and recycling. The system also tracks real-time usage analytics, environmental footprint, and cost savings. Currently, AmorSui is applying the Viridi platform to offer zero-waste medical gowns to hospitals and clinics, with plans to expand its product lines to other PPE items later this year.
“We play a really important role in the healthcare industry by ensuring everyone has the right protection—protection that is inclusive, accessible, and sustainable.”
Moving Women Up the Ladder
Dr. Wangtrakuldee is a 2021 Forbes' Female Founder and Brand to Watch, a 2020 UBS x Female Founder Collective Project Entrepreneur, a Walton Foundation Supply Chain and Logistics Enterprises Innovation Winner and a 2018 Birchbox Future Starts Now Grant Recipient.
As a rising leader, she says there are still challenges at the top. “Gender inclusivity in PPE is needed. Although over 80% of healthcare workers are women, fewer of them are in executive or leadership positions.”
To create an inclusive healthcare landscape, Dr. Wangtrakuldee said institutions have to be open and supportive of bringing women into leadership roles and figuring out how to keep them in the field.
She also thinks it’s the responsibility of current women at the top to be open to mentoring. “Be a role model, be a mentor, and help bring others up behind you.”
Emerging leaders have a role to play, too. They should actively advocate for themselves and not be afraid to opt into roles where they can get promoted or jump into a leadership position.
“Women should not be afraid to raise our hands to say I'm here, I have qualifications, I can do this,” she said. “The more women speak up, show up, and ask, the more of us that will get there.”
What It Means to Get There
For Dr. Wangtrakuldee, increasing women in healthcare leadership roles would improve the field in many ways. At the top of her list would be a greater understanding of women’s challenges. “In my case, it would reduce gender bias in terms of personal protective equipment. Having a woman in leadership changes my conversations dramatically and increases the likelihood that they’ll make the decision to buy better products for their people.”
She closed by saying, “From providing the right structure in terms of human resources benefit and support, to the right equipment, we need to do everything we can to make sure women know they belong here, and they can rise here.”
More on AmorSui
From day one, AmorSui has provided gender-inclusive PPE options for women whether they’re in healthcare or STEM. We have expanded our product line and made more resources available to hospitals and clinics. Learn more about our turnkey PPE solution that is better for the environment and the bottom line, and how you could get involved to make safety more gender-inclusive, sustainable, and zero-waste with AmorSui.
There are now more women entering medical school than men. But that doesn't mean our work is done. To achieve our best future, women need to be active in leadership roles across the industry from academics, to healthcare, to research. In this series, the Foundation talks to leaders in medicine to get their perspective on how we move forward building on the strides we've already taken.