Join Us for Our Next Advocacy Grand Rounds Session

Join Doctors for America for September’s Advocacy Grand Rounds. 

Info coming soon…

This event is FREE for all, but CME is only available to DFA Members.  To become a DFA member, please click here.

Application for CME credit has been filed with the American Academy of Family Physicians. Determination of credit is pending.

Honing Your Narrative for Gender Health Advocacy

April 9, 2024

Session Speakers

Arli Christian

Arli Christian is a Campaign Strategist in the ACLU’s National Political Advocacy Department advancing legislative and administrative initiatives to support and protect LGBTQ people. Arli develops innovative campaigns to ensure all LGBTQ people have access to competent healthcare, accurate ID documents, safe housing, employment opportunities, and other rights and protections we need to survive and thrive. 

Prior to joining the ACLU, Arli served as the State Policy Director at the National Center for Transgender Equality and worked with coalitions across the country to modernize ID document gender change policies, remove insurance exclusions for coverage of transition-related care, and improve other state-level protections for transgender people. 

Arli is a lawyer admitted to practice in New York and Washington D.C. and received a J.D. from American University Washington College of Law in 2013 and a B.A. from Wesleyan University in 2004. Prior to law school Arli worked at an immigration law firm in San Francisco and a financial non-profit focused on equitable and sustainable investments in Maryland. Arli speaks English and Spanish, grew up in New York City, and lives in the soon-to-be state of Washington DC.

Crispin Torres

Crispin Torres is principal and co-founder of Better World Collab, a social impact consultancy rooted in movement building and the creative arts. Crispin is a nationally recognized leader in the LGBTQ+ movement with over two decades of experience in campaign strategy, public education, and communications. His professional focus is in LGBTQ+ narrative shift strategy,  public policy, and community engagement. He has served an array of  leading local and national LGBTQ+ organizations such as Lambda Legal, AIDS United, The Transgender Strategy Center, Howard Brown Health, and Girls Rock! Chicago. He currently serves on the board of Brave Space Alliance–a black-led, trans-led LGBTQ+ center serving the Southside of Chicago. An activist and creative at heart, he firmly believes that the creative arts can teach us how to innovate the work of social change–and even more, propel us to build inertia for the road ahead.

Rebecca Kling

Rebecca Kling is a principal and co-founder of Better World Collab, a social impact consultancy rooted in movement building and the creative arts, as well as co-author of The Advocate Educator’s Handbook: Creating Schools Where Transgender and Non-Binary Students Thrive. Rebecca’’s advocacy work is rooted in a multidisciplinary approach to changing the world, with the understanding that there’s no one ‘right way to communicate’ that will land with everyone.  She worked at the National Center for Transgender Equality to elevate transgender and allied voices in discussions of public education and policy, and spent more than a decade with Harbor Camps, a camp for transgender and non-binary youth. Rebecca firmly believes that understanding combats bigotry, and that everyone has the ability to push for a more just and equitable world.

Previous Advocacy Grand Rounds Sessions

Regulatory Considerations for Addressing the Opioid Crisis

April 27, 2023

Session Speakers

Andrew Kolodny, MD

Dr. Andrew Kolodny is one of the nation’s leading experts on the prescription opioid and heroin crisis. His primary area of focus is the prescription opioid and heroin crisis devastating families and communities across the country. Dr. Kolodny’s testimony before for the United States Congress is available here. Dr. Kolodny has been serving as an expert witness on behalf of state governments in litigation against opioid manufacturers, distributors and retailers. These efforts have resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in settlement funds and have helped raise awareness about the role the defendants played in causing the opioid crisis. He is currently the President of Physicians for Responsible Opioid Prescribing (PROP)
and Vice President – Federal Affairs for Responsible Opioid Prescribing, an organization with a mission to reduce morbidity and mortality caused by overprescribing of opioid analgesics.

Dr. Kolodny previously served as Chief Medical Officer for Phoenix House, a national nonprofit addiction treatment agency and Chair of Psychiatry at Maimonides Medical
Center in New York City. Dr. Kolodny has a long-standing interest in public health. He began his career working for the New York City Department of Health and Mental
Hygiene in the Office of the Executive Deputy Commissioner. For New York City, he helped develop and implement multiple programs to improve the health of New Yorkers
and save lives, including citywide buprenorphine programs, naloxone overdose prevention programs and emergency room-based screening, brief intervention and referral to treatment (SBIRT) programs for drug and alcohol misuse.

Advancing Gender-Affirming Care: From Education to Legislation

March 23, 2023

Session Speakers

Crystal Beal, MD

Dr. Crystal Beal, a Board Certified Family Medicine Physician, started QueerDoc with the mission to raise the bar in gender-affirming care and improve LGBTQ+ lives through:

They leverage their lived experience and medical expertise to offer a level of unsurpassed nuance to their services. Being a “Both, And” informs Dr. Beal’s personal practice of medicine and the training they offer other healthcare workers. 

Dr. Beal attended Florida State University College of Medicine where they helped found the LGBTQ+ medical student group. They completed their training at Valley Family Medicine Residency Program. Dr. Beal sought extensive additional training in sexual health, queer health, and gender-affirming care including self-study, continuing medical education trainings, and shadowing experts in the community. They have focused CME in the topics of cultural humility, trauma-informed care, sex-positive care, and kink-affirming care. They share their knowledge working with medical students and through their online program QueerCME.com

They identify as femme (which is not a binary or cis identity to them) and SUPER queer themself enjoying queer burlesque, vintage fashion, and their queer, kinky, poly family!

Vivian Topping

As Director of Advocacy and Civic Engagement, Vivian Topping works with state-based LGBTQ organizations to craft smart, effective legislative and electoral campaigns that build political power and allow supporters to take action in their communities. Most recently Vivian was the Field Director for the historic, winning Yes on 3 campaign in Massachusetts, Vivian previously led electoral and legislative advocacy programs in Michigan, Florida, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Texas, and Illinois.

Their work in Massachusetts was a groundbreaking success, building the leadership of transgender people, having more than 100,000 conversations with voters, and ultimately winning the first statewide referendum on transgender rights in the nation.

Vivian, whose pronouns are she/her or they/them, hails from Michigan.

Myeshia Price, Ph.D.

Myeshia Price (she/they) is a Senior Research Scientist at The Trevor Project. Dr. Price has more than fifteen years of experience in adolescent public health research, with a focus on sexuality, gender, and LGBTQ youth from an intersectional perspective. After completing their Ph.D. in developmental psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison with research focusing on predicting early sexual behaviors during adolescence, they were an assistant professor at the State University of New York at Old Westbury prior to taking a postdoctoral research associate position at the Center for Innovative Public Health Research (CiPHR). Her primary research interest areas include developmental understandings of adolescent gender and sexuality and reducing LGBTQ youth mental health disparities with a particular focus on the role of protective factors.

Gun Violence Prevention- Grassroots Advocacy & Public Health

February 23, 2023

Session Speakers

Lisa Geller

Lisa Geller is the Director of State Affairs at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions, a Center housed in the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Lisa’s work focuses on research, advocacy, and implementation of evidence-based gun violence prevention policies, including extreme risk protection orders and domestic violence protective orders. Lisa is also a mayoral appointee on the District of Columbia’s Domestic Violence Fatality Review Board. Lisa graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she earned her bachelor’s degree in political science. She earned a Master of Public Health (MPH) in health policy and injury and violence prevention from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Sara Knizhnik holds a BA from Northwestern University and an MA from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. She served as a university-level, English-as-a-Second-Language Instructor at various universities in the Chicago area for 17 years before becoming a professional gun violence prevention (GVP) and criminal justice reform advocate. She has served in recent years as the Organizer of the Illinois Gun Violence Prevention Coalition and then as Director of Community Engagement for Newtown Action Alliance (NAA), a national gun violence prevention GVP organization founded in the wake of the Sandy Hook tragedy. She also served as the Director of Constituent Affairs for State Representative Bob Morgan (IL-58). Sara is currently Chair of the Gun Violence Prevention Initiative at the Lake County (IL) State’s Attorney’s Office. In November 2022, she was elected to the Lake County Board and represents District 18, which includes Vernon Hills, Buffalo Grove, Hawthorn Woods, Kildeer, Long Grove and Lake Zurich. Sara believes passionately in local government and in the power of grassroots activists to build a better America. Sara lives in Vernon Hills, Illinois with her husband and two children.

Elliot Lieberman

Dr. Elliot Lieberman is an otolaryngologist-head and neck surgeon, husband, father, mass shooting survivor and advocate for gun violence prevention. He currently practices at North Shore Ear, Nose & Throat Associates in suburban Chicago.

A survivor of the Highland Park, Illinois July 4th mass shooting, Dr. Lieberman’s role in advocacy evolved in the aftermath of his own trauma. Although his family was not physically harmed at the parade, he witnessed the emotional turmoil that permeated himself, his family, friends and thousands of neighbors and quickly identified his new role of physician and mass shooting survivor as an unheard voice in the gun violence prevention movement. With the organization March Fourth, this past December he and his wife, a pediatrician, recruited a coalition of over sixty physicians from twenty-five states to meet with over forty Senate offices in Washington, D.C. to present an evidence-based viewpoint for reinstating the federal assault weapons ban. In addition to lobbying, Dr. Lieberman has participated in dozens of media interviews to speak as a physician and gun violence survivor. Even though his medical specialty rarely treats victims of gun violence, he believes that physicians of any specialty are uniquely qualified to organize and present data to politicians as well as communicate the ballooning list of reasons we need to curb gun violence through policy.

Medicaid Innovation and Population Health

January 26, 2023

Session Speakers

Joe Kanter

As State Health Officer and Medical Director Dr. Joseph Kanter serves as the top medical official of Louisiana Department of Health, consulting on issues relating to policy, programmatic implementation, quality and accessibility of care, health equity, emergency preparedness and infection control, and bearing responsibility for enforcing the state’s Sanitary Code. His previous state roles have included Assistant State Health Officer, Interim Assistant Secretary, and Regional Medical Director.

Prior to joining the Louisiana Department of Health Dr. Kanter served as Director of Health for the City of New Orleans and led Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s comprehensive opioid mitigation strategy which included issuing a first-in-the-state standing order for naloxone, equipping the New Orleans Police Department with the reversal medication, increasing availability of medication assisted treatment, promoting harm reduction services, and initiating a City-wide effort to reduce the stigma of addictive disorders. A practicing and board-certified Emergency Physician, prior medical director of the Health Care for the Homeless clinic, and Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine at both LSU Health Sciences Center and Tulane School of Medicine, Dr. Kanter cares for a diverse spectrum of patients in the New Orleans area, including some of the most vulnerable in our community. He is a committed academic and works closely with residents, students, and other learners. His primary interests are expanding access to patient-centered care, promoting health equity, and creating efficiencies in systems of health while protecting vulnerable populations.

Pamela Perry

Pam Perry has over 25 years of experience working with Medicaid-focused policies and programs. She currently leads Government and Legislative Relations for Carolina Complete Health, a Medicaid health plan in North Carolina. Previous roles include Vice President of Business Development at Centene, Anthem, and Amerigroup; Deputy Director of Policy at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service’s Bureau of Primary Health Care; Policy Analyst at the Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration; Policy Advisor at the U.S. Senate; and Disease Intervention Specialist in Newark, New Jersey. Pam holds Bachelors degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a Master’s Degree in Public Administration from the University of Georgia. A native of New Jersey, Pam has traveled to all 50 states.

Allyson Evans

Allyson Evans is the Policy Director, and Director of the Medicaid Evidence-based Decisions (MED) Project at the Center for Evidence-based Policy. She joined the Center in 2019. Prior to joining the Center, Ms. Evans served as a policy advisor and staff counsel for Texas Health and Human Services. In these roles, she advised on a range of legal matters related to Medicaid, including managed care, various waiver programs, Delivery System Reform Incentive Payment, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. Previously, Ms. Evans served as an attorney for the City of Austin, where she advised the city’s public health and procurement departments and as a Public Interest Fellow for the Legal Services of New Jersey’s Legal Access to Medical Patients Project. She also has served as a volunteer attorney for Texas RioGrande Legal Aid and other nonprofit organizations, including the Affordable Housing Strike Fund in Austin, TX. Ms. Evans earned a J.D. from the University of Texas School of Law and a B.A. with honors from the University of Wisconsin. She is licensed to practice law in New Jersey, Texas, and Washington.

Beneficial to Whom? A Review of Makena and the FDA’s Accelerated Approval Process

December 1, 2022

Session Speakers

Ealena Callender, M.D.

Dr. Ealena Callender is a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist. In practice for 14 years, Dr. Callender is passionate about helping women reach their full potential in every stage of their lives. Her goal is to empower women and encourage them to be partners in their care. Dr. Callender takes a broad view of women’s health, realizing that there are many factors that can contribute to overall wellness. Prior to her medical career, Dr. Callender was a journalist and continues to use media to help raise awareness of important women’s health issues. Currently a candidate for a Master’s Degree at George Washington University’s Milken Institute School of Public Health, she hopes to continue making an impact on improving women’s health on a national and international scale.

Adam Urato, M.D.

Dr. Adam Urato is a Maternal-Fetal Medicine specialist in his hometown of Framingham, Massachusetts. He grew up there and attended Harvard College and Harvard Medical School. He did his OB/GYN residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital. He did his Maternal-Fetal Medicine Fellowship at Tufts Medical Center. His interests include medication exposure in pregnancy and conflicts of interest in medicine.

The Fight for Federal Drug Policy Reform

November 10, 2022

Session Speakers

Maritza Perez

Maritza Perez is the Director of Federal Affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance in Washington, DC where she leads the organization’s federal legislative agenda and strategy to end the drug war. In this role, she lobbies Congress and the Administration on issues pertaining to drug policy and criminal legal reform. Maritza convenes the Marijuana Justice Coalition which successfully pushed for the passage of the MORE Act in the U.S. House of Representatives in December 2020 and April 2022, marking the first and only times in history a Congressional chamber voted in favor of descheduling marijuana. 

Comprehensive Sex Education

October 23, 2022

Session Speakers

Jaclyn Friedman
Jaclyn Friedman

Jaclyn Friedman is the Founder and Executive Director of EducateUS: SIECUS In Action, and a lifelong activist, advocate and organizer. Friedman’s work has globally popularized the affirmative consent standard of sexual consent. Her first book, Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape, was one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Top 100 Books of 2009, and has inspired new laws in five U.S. states, as well as policies on countless campuses across the country and the world. She also spearheaded the legendary #FBrape campaign, which forced Facebook to address and exclude content that promotes or trivializes violence against women under their hate speech policy, and is founder and former executive director of Women, Action & the Media (WAM!).

Christine Harley

Since 2019, Christine Soyong Harley has led SIECUS to focus on sex education as a vehicle for social change, focusing on the broad benefits of comprehensive sex education to prevent child abuse and sexual violence, and to advance education on consent, gender justice, and affirmation of LGBTQ communities. Chris joined SIECUS with a robust background in public policy, advocacy, program management, and strategic thought leadership, with an emphasis on increasing policy advancements for underserved populations.

Chris brings extensive executive leadership experience to SIECUS, including having previously run her own consulting business and was the Director of Intergovernmental Affairs for the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders under the Obama Administration. Chris also brings experience working in state-level agencies and community organizing to SIECUS. Chris is mixed-race Korean American and Piscataway Indian–the indigenous people of Maryland, a single-mom by choice of twin boys, and the first generation of her family to attend college and graduate school. Chris received her B.A. in Politics from Oberlin College and a Masters in Public Policy from the University of Chicago.

Leverage the Rulemaking Process to Impact Policy

October 13, 2022

Session Speakers

Arka Deb

Arka is a psychiatrist and preventive medicine physician. He has previously been a physician working for New York City’s public hospitals. He has now transitioned to Full Time work with the Federal Government while maintaining clinical practice and residency teaching responsibilities.

His work for the Federal Government is at CMS. At CMS, he works on teams developing payment policies with annual regulatory updates for the medicare physician fee schedule, outpatient prospective payment system, clinical lab fee schedule, and other payment systems. As an HHS medical officer and psychiatrist, he is also called on to consult on a variety of national behavioral health policy issues.

While previously leading the gun violence prevention action area at DFA, he helped to organize the DFA 2021 campaign to voice members’ opinion on ghost gun related safety measures to the ATF. This required thousands of DFA members to participate in the ATF rule making process.

August Advocacy Grand Rounds: Paths to Protection – FDA’s Possible Role in Safeguarding Access to Reproductive Care

August 11, 2022

Session Speakers

Ameet Sarpatwari

Ameet Sarpatwari is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, an Associate Epidemiologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and the Assistant Director of the Program On Regulation, Therapeutics, And Law (PORTAL) within the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics. His research draws upon his interdisciplinary training as an epidemiologist and lawyer and focuses on the effects of laws and regulations on therapeutic development, approval, use, and related public health outcomes. He teaches an annual course on public health law at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, where he also serves as Faculty Director of the JD-MPH program.

Patti Zettler, JD

Deborah Bartz, MD, MPH is an obstetrician-gynecologist fellowship trained in Complex Family
Planning at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH). As such she serves as the Ryan Program
Director for Harvard Medical School where she has a robust program of teaching both residents
and medical students in the form of daily lectures, work on the wards, and both classroom
teaching and hands-on training in abortion. She serves as a faculty expert in complex D&E
techniques, medical abortion, and contraception care in the medically complicated patient. Her
clinical practice acts as a bridge between the medically complex patients encountered at an
academic center and the high-volume ambulatory care provided at Planned Parenthood. This
varied practice offers many teaching opportunities as well. Dr. Bartz’s research has examined
best practices in reproductive health medical education. Given the dearth of access to
comprehensive reproductive services in the United States, she is particularly proud of her role
as an educator to a new generation of women’s health providers.

She serves as the Associate Clerkship Director for the OB/GYN medical student
rotation, as the Medical Director of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health’s Title X
Program, and as the Director of Education for the Connors Center for Women’s Health and
Gender Biology at BWH. Through her educational activities, Dr. Bartz has been innovative in
expanding primary care specialist, resident, and medical student training to include evidence-
based, complex abortion care through simulation and through graduated models of training.
She has received multiple teaching awards. Dr. Bartz’ commitment to mentorship has been
rewarded with entrance into the competitive BWH Faculty Mentorship Leadership Program,
entrance into the APGO Scholars and Leaders Program, and membership on the Board of
Directors for Medical Students for Choice. Dr. Bartz’ current research program focuses on the
development, assessment, and propagation of best educational practices of abortion and
reproductive justice.

Advocacy Grand Rounds: Channeling Your Outrage into Action

July 14, 2022

Session Speakers

Greg Jackson

Greg Jackson, Executive Director of the Community Justice Action Fund, is a community organizer, political strategist and issue advocate.

Prior to becoming the organization’s Executive Director, Greg served as the National Advocacy Director for 2 years. In this role he worked with communities, elected officials, community leaders and impacted residents to advocate for proactive and preventive solutions to end gun violence. Greg led the effort to build political power through electoral participation, spearheading the 2020 Elect Justice Campaign that mobilized over a 1,000 volunteers and connected with over 1.6 million voters across the country.

As a gun violence survivor, gun violence prevention is personal for Greg. While being questioned by law enforcement in his hospital bed, Greg remembers being treated like a criminal and not like a victim. This experience and his recovery propelled Greg into action, becoming a vocal and leading voice on gun violence prevention for Black and brown communities.

Following his recovery, Greg became an avid mentor to local at risk youth and built multiple youth engagement movements like #WeReadDC that empowered hundreds of volunteers to support Washington, DC area youth through monthly reading events.

As the youngest member of Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser’s administration, Greg served as Director of the Mayor’s Office of Community Relations and Services. Greg then went on to lead Community Engagement and Communications for the Washington, D.C.’s Office of Neighborhood Safety & Engagement (ONSE). At ONSE, Greg oversaw community events, outreach activities, policy development, violence reducing programs and direct engagement of residents most at risk to gun violence.

Before dedicating his life to gun violence prevention, Greg worked as a community organizer through various roles, including the Co-Chair of DC for Obama, the Obama for America, North Carolina – Field Director, the Southern Regional Director at Organizing for Action and the National Field Director, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, where he ran the largest mid-term election voter registration program in U.S. History.

Greg, an avid runner that has completed 5 half marathons, enjoys recreational sports and created a citywide organization offering recreational sports activities for thousands of young adults throughout the D.C. area.

Follow Greg on LinkedIn

Dr. Joseph V. Sakran

Dr. Joseph V. Sakran is a trauma surgeon, coalition builder, policy advisor, public health expert, and nationally recognized advocate for gun violence prevention. He is currently Director of Emergency General Surgery, Associate Professor of Surgery, and Associate Chief of the Division of Acute Care Surgery at The Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland.

A survivor of gun violence himself, Dr. Sakran’s interest in medicine and trauma surgery began after a stray bullet nearly killed him during his senior year of high school. He has subsequently dedicated his life to treating the most vulnerable, reducing health disparities among marginalized populations, and advancing public policy that alleviates structural violence in low-income communities. More information can be found here: https://www.josephsakran.com/about

Follow Dr. Sakran on TwitterInstagram, and LinkedIn

Moderator - Kayla Hicks

A motivated leader with proven proficiency in developing innovate solutions to challenges and achieving favorable results. Committed to leading community-based violence prevention initiatives to ensure the voice of those most impacted are central in policy and program  decisions.

Kayla has 35 years of leadership experience and continues to work towards eradicating policies,

procedures, and social norms that create barriers for black and brown communities, particularly Black women, to ensure efforts to reduce violence are consistent with a racial equity and justice focused approach.