As Pride Month kicks off, we sat down with Dr. Thomas Tsang, Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer here at Valera Health. Since founding the company in 2015, Dr. Tsang has been on a mission to transform mental healthcare accessibility, particularly for underserved communities. Drawing from his own experiences as an immigrant from Hong Kong and a member of the LGBTQ+ community, Dr. Tsang has built Valera Health into a telehealth platform that now serves thousands of patients across ten states and counting.

How did your personal experiences shape your vision for Valera Health?

Dr. Tsang: As someone from an underserved community, I found out early in my career just how hard it was to find high-quality care. This experience wasn't isolated; it connected deeply with my background as an immigrant who came to this country from Hong Kong in 1974. My eight-person family and I lived in a three-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn, and I didn't have health insurance until I was 18 years old. When we were sick, we went to doctors in Chinatown, paid cash, and often had to negotiate the cost of both the visit and medications.

These experiences gave me insight early on into what it feels like when you don't have access to healthcare—whether that's because of your immigration status, economic situation, or identity. That perspective has been fundamental in creating Valera Health with the mission to provide accessible care for all.

Why is serving underrepresented communities so important to Valera's mission?

Dr. Tsang: Throughout my career, I've focused on health disparities, community health, public health, and access to care issues. The statistics show we still have so much work to do. While many telehealth companies focus on mild conditions and did not accept health insurance especially government plans, we deliberately chose a different path at Valera. Over 50% of our patients come from BIPOC communities, and many have government insurance like managed Medicaid and Medicare. Almost 30% of our patients have serious mental illness conditions.

For many marginalized communities, we know there are significant barriers to receiving appropriate care. As someone who understands what it's like to feel excluded in healthcare settings, I wanted to create a service where everyone feels welcome, understood, and properly supported regardless of their background or the severity of their condition.

Why is Pride Month an important time to discuss mental health access?

Dr. Tsang: Pride Month is about visibility, acceptance, and fighting for equal rights—and healthcare access is a right that many still struggle to obtain. Mental health challenges affect queer communities at higher rates due to stigma, discrimination, and the stress that comes from facing these hurdles. Yet finding culturally competent care remains difficult for many.

We've created Valera Health as a place where patients don't have to explain or justify their identities to receive care. Our providers are trained to understand unique challenges that diverse individuals face, and we work to create an environment where everyone feels safe discussing their mental health concerns.

What are the biggest obstacles you see in mental healthcare today, especially for marginalized communities?

Dr. Tsang: For the past 60 years, mental healthcare has been completely siloed off from the rest of healthcare, which has created enormous barriers. We don't have enough providers in the ecosystem, and we're never going to be able to train the tens of thousands of additional providers our society desperately needs quickly enough.

For marginalized communities, these systemic problems are compounded by discrimination, lack of cultural competence, and financial barriers. Many people live in mental health provider shortage areas. In fact, the majority of our New York patients come from these designated shortage areas. Without telehealth options that specifically welcome them, many would receive no care at all.

What gives you hope for the future of mental healthcare?

Dr. Tsang: We’re now seeing society talking about mental health more openly, which gives me great hope. These conversations need to happen everywhere: in primary care visits, in prenatal care, in schools and workplaces. The stigma is slowly breaking down.

Technology is also helping us maximize the efficiency of our mental health workforce. At Valera, we're focused on measurement-based care, a robust quality agenda, and fundamentals like interdisciplinary team based collaboration between therapists and psychiatry. 

But what gives me the most hope are the stories we hear from our patients—people who previously couldn't access care now receiving the support they need. That's what drives our team every day: knowing we're making a difference for those who need care most.