It came as devastating news. What was meant to be a happy day turned into tragedy as Donato Tramuto was notified of the death of his sister-in-law, who died while giving birth.
This was one of many life events that led him to the medical field and the beginning of the Donato Tramuto story.
“It was a medical error that caused her death,” says Tramuto. “This, along with the errors along the way during the multiple surgeries I had for my hearing loss, motivated me to pursue a career in health care.”
Tramuto began in the pharmaceutical industry but moved to the health services field later in his career. He started his career in sales at Marion Laboratories but moved on to Boehringer-Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, where he worked in multiple leadership positions until 1990.
After Boehringer-Ingelheim, Tramuto advocated for the AIDS management program for Caremark, where he served as the company’s vice president for disease management. It was after his time at Caremark that he took his first C-level position.
“My first C-level position, following the launch of the company with three other partners, was CEO for Protocare Sciences,” says Tramuto. The position helped launch his future work in healthcare, but it didn’t come without first-time CEO trepidation.
“You always have a reasonable amount of fear with any new position, which I believe is good. However, because I had, by design, worked in so many other positions throughout my career, I felt confident. I had learned the skill of leaning on the talents of other people to get things done. My job was to identify their skills and be the chief obstacle remover to ensure they succeed.”
Tramuto held other executive positions after Protocare, including CEO of pharmaceutical services company i3, a business unit at UnitedHealth Group, and as an outside director at Healthways, where he later became the CEO. During his time at Healthways, he led the creative sale of its population health business and re-launched the remainder of the company under the new name Tivity Health.
“When we sold Healthways (a population health company), giving up the name was requested as part of the negotiations. At first, I was reluctant, and then I realized our focus was now on empowering older adults to live their best lives. It made perfect sense to change the name of the company.”
Tivity Health went on to acquire weight loss company Nutrisystem prior to selling it to a private equity firm. Tramuto left Trivity in 2020 but has continued to work on his other ventures, which, yet again, have been motivated by tragedy. On September 11, 2001, Tramuto lost three of his friends to terrorism.
“The loss of our three friends on 9/11, and the stark reality of how close I came to death having left the night before when my friends and I were planning to leave together – these emotional and painful events influenced my partner and me to do something that would help to somehow plug the hole in our hearts.”
After the tragedy, Tramuto launched the TramutoPorter Foundation, a non-profit organization that provides scholarships to underprivileged students.
“The Foundation started small and remained that way for the first five years while we reflected on what we wanted to create to remember our friends. They were committed to human rights, education, health access, LGBQT inclusion, and so many other initiatives.”
In addition to student scholarships, the Foundation also supplies grants to other organizations, including a significant grant to the RFK Human Rights Foundation in 2018 for a workplace dignity program, as well as the Lwala Community Health Alliance to support the construction of a maternity center to help reduce maternal and infant mortality.
“We are proud that the Foundation has touched on those initiatives that defined who our friends were as individuals and as a family,” adds Tramuto.
In 2011, Tramuto launched Health eVillages, a non-profit organization that provides medical technology to areas of the world with vulnerable populations. The technology includes medical references and handheld devices in order to access health information.
Tramuto has no plans of slowing down.
“We will continue to support global issues like the Robert F Kennedy Human Rights Italia, where we have supported programs for inclusion of migrants in that community; educating students in Kenya; and reducing infant and maternal mortality in East Africa;” and moving forward the compassionate leadership movement.
Tramuto has turned tragedy into something that has benefited others and underscored his personal commitment to leading with compassion and understanding.
“We should always be open and vulnerable to the many possibilities that remain with those individuals who will find common ground in our story. Unfortunately, business spreadsheets have been focused on the language of companies. We need to change that to having compassion and kindness as the new language.”
