Dr. Omer Karahan; partner of Genkord brings immense knowledge and experience of Turkish hospital sector through the pivotal roles he played in the advancement of healthcare industry. Given the experience in developing and managing hospitals owned by international financial and strategic investors, he has a deep understanding of running profitable and high quality hospitals while ensuring significant returns to the shareholders.

He is the first medical doctor who has given up his carrier as a doctor to pursue healthcare management in Turkey. He started managing hospitals back in 1989 with the opening of the first state of the art private hospital in Turkey; the International Hospital Istanbul. 

He is a versatile healthcare professional as well as an entrepreneur in the field having extensive experience in start-up healthcare projects, insurance and hospital management along with many international consulting projects and turnaround of troubled companies. 

Omer was the CEO for 6 years and Chairman for 2 years of Acibadem Health and Life Insurance Company along with his duties at the Acibadem Healthcare Group such as being responsible of National and International Business Development as a member of the Executive Committee. He was the principle council to the Group’s Chairman for business development from 1994 to 2003 under consulting engagements prior to joining the group as a full time executive. 

He took over the management of the Group’s insurance business in 2004 when the previous management was found to have embezzled a large amount of money, thus bankrupting it. Although the decision of the board was to close the company down, with an aggressive downsizing and total reengineering of the company, Omer managed to rescue it and carried it to ranking number 4 in the market. He created innovative health plans and life policies that are still widely sold in the market. Acıbadem Health and Life Insurance company is now fully owned by BUPA. 

Omer had the leading role of the negotiations and completion of the transaction with the Private Equity Company Abraaj where the Acibadem Health Care Group was sold along with the insurance business at a valuation of over a billion dollars. 

He has held other positions in the Acibadem Healthcare Group as well. Responsible of business development of Acıbadem, the Group grew from 3 hospitals to 16. He also was the Director of the Acibadem Hospital responsible of the renovation of the first hospital of the group and the interim director of several of the new hospitals of the Group. He lead the HR project taking the group to 11,000+ employees from 3000 while new hospitals were being opened. He was also on the Executive Board of the Group’s Mobile Healthcare Services Company, where remote patient access, patient care and telemedicine technologies were put to use. He left the Group in August 2010. 

Currently is the Managing Partner and Board Member of Genkord Biotechnology Inc; Chairman of SolarBiz, a solar energy company of his family, MutluBiz an orchard farm, and board member of several other family businesses.

Prior to Acibadem Healthcare Group, Omer was the CEO of NextCare in United Arab Emirates for three years, a successful TPA with a very troubled past until his management and later sold to Allianz Insurance Group. 

His involvement in medical insurance and TPA started with MedNet Turkey as the founding partner and managing director in 1994. MedNet became the market leader with 26% share in health insurance in two years’ time and was sold to Munich Re in 1998. He started the first dental HMO Company, a large clinic working with insurance companies for dental care but the company had to be closed down due to regulations not being ready at that time. 

Before MedNet, Omer was the first Turkish Medical Director of the -then 80 year old- American Hospital. He served in several managerial positions at this highly esteemed hospital before being assigned to this prestigious position at the age of 33. His hospital management carrier had started only four years ago at the International Hospital in charge of marketing and administrative affairs.  

Awards and Memberships

Omer received two scholarships during his professional life. First one was as an Executive Associate at The Methodist Hospital Systems in Houston, Texas. He trained for health care management and health care financing systems for a year and returned to Turkey as The Methodist’s Area Consultant, a job he carried on along with his position at the American Hospital and later at MedNet. 

In 1997, he was awarded the “Eisenhower Fellowship” among 189 competitors in the field of healthcare finances and management. This scholarship is given to one person from each participating country to the future leaders in their field. 

Omer wrote the Health in Transition Report in 2000, a book commissioned by World Health Organization along with his two associates. He has held guest lecturer positions at University of Marmara School of Healthcare Management and Bahcesehir University. He is a frequent speaker on healthcare in Turkey.  

During his time at the Acibadem Health Insurance he was elected as a Council Member of International Federation of Health Plans, an organization where the world’s largest and/or most prestigious health insurance companies are accepted as members and was chaired by the CEO of Kaiser Permanente. He hosted the biennial meeting of 400 top insurance executives in Istanbul in June 2010. 

He was a member of DEIK (Foreign Economic Relations Council) in Medical Tourism. 

Consulting Engagements

Through a company he founded with his colleagues, he consulted to over two dozen hospital and other healthcare related projects throughout the past two decades. Among his customers were; Cukurova Holding, Nurol Holding, Acibadem Hospitals, Eczacibasi Holding, Memorial Hospital, Istanbul Surgical Hospital, Alanya Can Hospital, The Corridor Group, Fitch and Associates, AdoPen Group, Yüksel Construction Company, Ministry of Health of Northern Cyprus, Genel Aviation, Gisbir Hospital, Atasaglik Hospital, Regina Maria Hospitals Romania etc. 

Consulting jobs involved feasibility studies, strategic planning, management consulting, mergers, acquisitions, affiliations, master planning and financing. 

With his company ValueHealth, won the EBRD contract for “Monitoring Public Private Partnership Hospitals by the Ministry of Health” consultancy project, which is on hold due to current political situation in Turkey.  

Omer was the Honorary President of Brain Academy, Romania where he gave lectures on Healthcare Management to healthcare executives.