Volunteer Community Healthcare in Partnership with Multiple Churches (Room 103)
Do you have a desire to do “medical missions” but just can’t find the time to go overseas very much? Do you want to use your medical skills for God’s purposes? Learn how medical providers with IJN have done Domestic Missions work over 185 times now and are having a HUGE impact on non-believers, believers, churches, participants and basically everyone involved! Come! See what God is doing! We have seen over 5,000 patients and performed over 80 surgeries for free… all, In Jesus’ Name! LEARN how it works! LEARN how you can impact your community and perhaps other communities for Jesus. Put your medical skills in action!
“He died for all so that they who live (that’s us) might no longer live for themselves but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf” 2Cor 5:15
Scott Southard MD is the founder and president of In Jesus Name Medical Ministry (IJN). He is joined by Dr. Carol Swartz as they discuss how Doctors, PAs, FNP’s and APRN’s can “reach into communities” by “partnering” with local area churches and providing FREE medical clinics for people in need.
The Significance of the Soul in the Doctor/RN/NP/PA-Patient Relationship
(Room 104)
We will discuss issues related to the existence and nature of the soul, and why it matters, both in general terms and for the doctor-patient relationship specifically.
Dr. Wilson practices Emergency Medicine in Southern California, where he lives with his wife Michal. They have 2 grown sons, Caleb and Joshua, who live in Southern California as well. In addition to practicing medicine, Dr. Wilson completed an MA in the Philosophy of Religion and Ethics at Talbot School of Theology, with a focus on issues related to the mind-body problem and personal ontology. Exploring the impact of the metaphysics of the soul on the practice of medicine is a particular interest of his.
402-960-2635
The Intersection of Academic Medicine and Faith: Mentoring, Missions, and Medicine
(Room 106)
In this workshop, we will explore the field of academic medicine through teaching and mentoring trainees about faith and spiritual care, opportunities to witness to colleagues and staff about our faith, and approaching our patients with whole person care. We will also explore some challenges faced by Christians in academic medicine but why it can be a rewarding domestic medical missions field.
Dr. Andre Cipta serves as the Program Director of the Kaiser Permanente Palliative Medicine Fellowship, Founding Director of the Kaiser Permanente Palliative Medicine Mid-Career Fellowship, Palliative Medicine Clerkship Director at the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine, and Associate Medical Director of the Kaiser Permanente Los Angeles Hospice Agency. He is board-certified in Family Medicine and Hospice and Palliative Medicine. He is a recipient of the 2022 American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine Leadership Scholar Award and holds the rank of Assistant Clinical Professor at the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine.
His interest in serving those in need led him to study Social Welfare at the University of California at Berkeley, spend a year at the Master’s Seminary, and complete a Palliative Medicine Fellowship at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). As a palliative medicine physician, he finds profound meaning in supporting those living with advanced illness and is passionate about training future generations of clinicians to further optimize the care of the seriously ill.
Dr. Cipta has a particular interest in innovation. As Fellowship Director, he created an innovative mid-career fellowship track in collaboration with the University of Pennsylvania through the ACGME Advancing Innovation in Residency Education (AIRE) program and expanded the program from two to four fellowship positions (two traditional, two mid-career), which is embedded in a unique, longitudinal curriculum spanning across palliative care settings. He created the Palliative Extubation Simulation-Based Formative Activity for both graduate and undergraduate medical learners, and co-created a novel wellness curriculum entitled, “iRISE (Initiative for Resiliency Self-care and Empathy) which was awarded an innovations grant and presented at numerous national conferences.
His research interests lie primarily in exploring the role of spirituality in optimizing whole-person, patient-centered care, which led him to train at Loma Linda University Medical Center and Glendale Adventist Medical Center for medical school and residency, respectively. He was awarded the Christian Academic Physicians and Scientists Faith and Medicine Research Fellowship Award and most recently published on the topic of spiritual distress in serious illness in the BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care.
Dr. Cipta serves as a deacon at Immanuel Bible Church in Los Angeles, CA.
323-313-5426
Janet Ma is a Med-Peds primary care physician at UCLA. She integrates her faith into medicine and practices spiritual care with her patients. She is also a clinical educator, and works regularly with residents and medical students. She is the current faculty advisor for the UCLA Christian Medical Student Association, and mentors Christian trainees during their medical journey.
Residency considerations for those interested in healthcare mission
(Room 123)
Choosing a residency is a huge decision. If you're interested in healthcare missions, there are some specific questions you should be asking as you evaluate programs. The skillsets you'll need when working in under-resourced environments can differ from what your fellow trainees will be seeking. During this workshop you'll hear from a panel of physicians with extensive experience both in residency education and in missional healthcare both in the US and abroad.
Rick Donlon grew up in New Orleans and graduated from Texas Christian University in 1986. He completed medical school at LSU-N.O., and a combined Internal Medicine and Pediatrics residency at the University of Tennessee, Memphis. In 1995 he and three medical school classmates opened a primary-care health center in Memphis’ most medically underserved neighborhood. The work eventually grew to include eight health centers, three dental clinics, and a family medicine residency program—providing over 170,000 patient visits annually.
Beginning in 2003, many of the medical and dental providers, including Dr. Donlon, moved into the underserved communities where they work. In those same low-income settings, they’ve planted over a dozen house churches. That house church network has subsequently sent dozens of long-term medical missionaries to North Africa, Centraland South Asia, the Arabian Peninsula, and the Horn of Africa.
In September of 2020, Dr. Donlon became the Memphis Area Director for the Christian Medical and Dental Associations (while continuing to practice medicine half time).
Physicians, dentists, and other healthcare workers who’ve trained with Dr. Donlon in Memphis have started or joined similar ministries in low-income communities across the US. Dr. Donlon, his wife Laurie, and their seven children live in the Binghampton neighborhood where he serves as an elder in the house church network.
Doug joined CMDA as the director for the Center for Advancing Healthcare Missions (CAHM) in 2020. He and his wife Ruth are both family physicians. He graduated from Loyola University Chicago in 2003, completed his family medicine residency at Waukesha Family Practice Residency outside Milwaukee in 2006, and did a one-year rural health fellowship at East Tennessee State University.
The Lindbergs served in Nepal as missionaries from 2009 -13, and Doug served as the medical director at HDCS TEAM Hospital Dadeldhura. They returned to the US in 2013 for what was intended to be a one-year home assignment. But a series of events, including a life-threatening cancer diagnosis for Ruth, led them to permanently relocate back to Wisconsin. Ruth is now miraculously cancer free since 2015. Doug is thrilled to utilize his experiences as a healthcare missionary and family physician to advance the cause of healthcare missions with CMDA. In addition to his work for CAHM, he continues to practice part-time as an urgent care physician for ProHealth Care. He has two children, Maddie (2008) and James (2011).
773-706-3093
Laurel G. is in her last year of Complex General Surgical Oncology fellowship. As she has journeyed through medical training, she has actively looked for ways to learn from and to serve God’s children around the world. Travel to multiple regions of the globe has strengthened her passion for reaching the unreached with hope. Her desire is to be among those who “follow the Lamb wherever He goes.” Revelation 14:4
SESSION CANCELLED DUE TO DR. KANG BEING SNOWED IN
Was to be: Faith, Hope, & Love: The Superforces of Christ the Healer
(Room 124)
Faith, hope, and love are the three superpowers described by the Apostle Paul in 1 Cor 13 as the gifts of Christ that will remain and continue to be powerful across eternity. Join this discussion of how you can nurture and release these powerful forces in everyday clinical practice in ways that deeply impact the hearts and health of your patients and colleauges. Hope gives us the power to persevere, to be courageous, and to believe for change in impossible situations. Our living relationship with Jesus becomes the source of this hope, which we can then freely give away. Hear stories of the power of God's hope and how choosing hope in these everyday work situations can make a space for faith to land and bring impossible answers and connection to God's heart. And see how, when the love of God motivates our hope, the people around us can truly encounter the King that can change everything for them. What would it look like in your everyday work if faith, hope, and love were your most relied-upon expert resources? "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." (Romans 15:13)
Dr. Jennifer Kang is an Obstetrician-Gynecologist actively practicing in Redding, California, where she resides with her husband and four children. She received her B.S. in Neuroscience and M.D. at the University of Rochester, and then completed residency training in Ob/Gyn at Brown University/Women & Infants Hospital. She then served in the US southwest Indian Health Service, where she began to discover the reality of her dual-realm authority, synergizing her medical and scientific training with Jesus-centric lifestyle and values in a way that more comprehensively meets the needs of individual patients, systems, and communities.
In 2013, she moved her family to Redding, California and founded Selah Women’s Health, a private medical practice where partnership with the Holy Spirit is regarded as central to healing and the practice of medicine. She also founded a non-profit, Selah Health International, that has a mission to elevate the health and value of vulnerable individuals, communities, and healthcare provisioners. As part of this, she leads Restore Healthcare Project, which seeks to inspire, recruit, and connect healthcare innovators who believe that healthcare can be a living manifestation of the gospel and power of Jesus Christ.
Work/Life Balance: Maybe It's Not a Thing
(Room 125)
Healthcare is a demanding profession which requires high commitment and sacrifice. Increasing evidence suggests that burnout and compassion fatigue are higher in the healthcare field than in other jobs. This workshop will discuss whether work-life balance is possible in healthcare and how we can approach this topic as a Christian.
Hobart went to medical school at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He completed his family medicine residency at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. He was a chief resident there and completed an Academic Faculty Development Fellowship with a focus on creating a Global Health Track. He is passionate about whole person care and training new family physicians!
Disaster Relief
(Room 203)
Dr. Parsa will discuss the difference between relief and development in short term medical missions and discuss his work with the Samaritan's Purse Disaster Assistance Response Team providing medical care in various disaster contexts around the world, and discuss how you can become involved.
Dr. Parsa is an Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Medical Education for the Department of Emergency Medicine, Paul L Foster School of Medicine, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center El Paso, where he and his pediatrician wife have served as the CMDA campus advisors for over 13 years. He is an active member of the Samaritan's Purse DART teams, having served with SP in Iraq, Bangladesh, Haiti, Ecuador and Ukraine, and also in Kenya with the SP World Medical Mission branch. Prior to El Paso, Dr. Parsa and his family served as long term missionaries with Pioneers (pioneers.org) at Rumginae Hospital in Papua New Guinea. A California native, he completed his emergency medicine residency in El Paso, his MD at Creighton and his BA at UCSD.
Global Missions in the United States: An Update on “Domestic” Missions
(Room 204)
“The earth is the Lord’s...and those who dwell in it” (Psalm 24:1, AMP). God has one great mission, and it is global. From God’s perspective, it is all domestic. America is a growing mission field that is a significant and strategic part of God’s global mission to fill the earth with His glory through the knowledge of His son. This session discusses ways medical Christians are living out the gospel through healthcare in areas of strategic need here in the United States, and how many of those efforts tie in to advancing Christ’s kingdom globally.
Steve has been the Executive Director of Christian Community Health Fellowship (CCHF) since 2007. He has been involved inchurch planting and Christian leadership development in the U.S., the United Kingdom, Southern and Central Africa, India and Central America. In 1993, he founded City Builders Youth Organization, a youth-based Christian community development organization in urban Memphis, Tennessee. “There is no great field of need or opportunity than among the underserved. Christian healthcare to the poor is a major key in helping the church to break out of its bubble and reconnect the world with the message of Christ and His kingdom.” In addition to his work with CCHF, Steve and his wife Victoria continue to work with urban youth in a under-resourced area of Memphis. They have two grown daughters and a foster son, all of whom love Jesus and are committed to serving Christ by serving others.