Current CEHC Volunteers as of October 2011

Our greatest strength is the compassionate care provided by our volunteers. These are just a few of the many wonderful volunteers in our organization.

Annie De Groot MD, volunteer Medical Director, has been involved in free health care since medical school. Dr. De Groot is boarded in Medicine and Infectious Disease and speaks fluent French and Spanish. She has received numerous awards her community involvement. While she enjoys providing guidance to the clinic as interim Medical Director, the position should always be considered open to interested and dedicated medical volunteers.

Fadi Mansourati, M.D. is one of the founding members of Clínica Esperanza. During the day, he is a private internal medicine practitioner. His busy practice is affiliated with the Memorial Hospital of Rhode Island. Somehow Fadi finds time in his busy schedule to help out at CEHC twice per month, in addition to participating as a member of the Medical Advisory Board. You can find him at the clinic on Tuesday clinic nights, working alongside Medical Director Annie De Groot and 4th year medical student Salman Khan.

Joe Diaz, M.D. is another founding member of the clinic. He is a member of the Brown University Community Health Program and recently obtained a Masters in Public Health. Joe is the primary mentor for the Medical Student Clinic that takes place once per month. He is a straight-shooter with a great sense of humor. Medical students truly benefit from his wide range of experience in primary care medicine, and our patients also appreciate his ability to anticipate their fears and concerns about their chronic health care problems.

Chuck Sherman, M.D. is a new volunteer with CEHC. He is a pulmonary expert who enjoys practicing his excellent medical Spanish with our patient population. The staff looks foward to seeing him when he volunteers because he’s also our volunteer expert on electronic medical records.

Volunteer Women’s Clinic organizer, Julie Steller (PRN, RNP, MSN) practices as a nurse practitioner in gynecologic-oncology at the Caritas Christi Health Care System and served as a nurse practitioner and women’s health clinic coordinator in another local free clinic from 2002-2007. Ms. Steller is responsible for establishing and coordinating the women’s clinic at CEHC. She is bilingual.

Judy Diaz, R.N. long-term CEHC volunteer, is an inspiration to everyone who meets her. She was one of the original founders of CEHC, and has been an enormous help to the younger nurses who staff the clinic. She and board member Anne Sliney, R.N. provide ongoing mentoring and assistance to the CEHC nurses, while keeping a close eye on the policies and procedure that ensure that our patients get the best of modern clinical care.

Wenda Ferraoli, R.N., is another founding member of the clinic who finds time in her life, between trips to Florida, to help CEHC staff get patients vaccinated and to assist patients with diet plans to address their special food intolerance. She brings more than 20 years of experience as a school nurse (at CCRI) to bear at the clinic, and has been one of the main nurse volunteers since the clinic first started operating in 2008, in church basements.

Craig O’Connor is one of our Volunteer Grant Writers and also serves as Community Contact, and is a former CEHC Board member. He works as Advocacy Manager at Neighborhood Health Plan of RI, a Medicaid managed care plan. A longtime local activist, Craig spent five years as directing Ocean State Action, focusing on health care access. Craig assists with CEHC community outreach and coordination of care with other CBO’s.

Volunteer Translator Coordinator Lisbith Moscadello-Sutter, Volunteer Spanish interpreter, moved to the United State from Venezuela 16 years ago and helps supervise the medical translators at the clinic. She is currently on leave from the clinic while fully engaged with an electronic medical records company, providing on-site training. We look forward to having her back soon!

Volunteer Coordinator Rachel Simon is an undergraduate pre-medical student at Brown University. She has experience volunteering in medical clinics both abroad and in urban New York. As a volunteer for Clinica Esperanza for the past two years, she has learned about the importance of access to healthcare among the uninsured and working poor. She is passionate about alleviating health disparities and is both culturally attuned and bilingual.

A long list of current and former volunteers for whom we do not currently have bios:

Daniel Patterson, EMT, intake volunter, webmaster and EMR expert, 2008-present
Ali Bicki, University of Miami Pre-medical student (Summer 2010 and 2011)
Gabriel Meshkov, University of Rhode Island volunteer pre-medical student
Jeff Chau, University of Rhode Island olunteer pharmacy student (URI) 2011-present
Macayla Landi, University of Rhode Island volunteer pharmacy student (URI) 2011-present
Jennifer Lashinsky, University of Rhode Island, volunteer pharmacy student (URI) 2011-present
Suresh Mohan, Jessica Dai, Nachi Gupta, Raj Vaghjiani, Brown Medical School Students who founded Med Student Clinic, 2011
Toby Cohen, Volunteer PreMedical Student (2009-2010) (now at Mt. Sinai Medical School)
Cyndie Wilmot, Human Resource Director, Lifespan, Volunteer, Founder and Former Board member (2007-2010)
Maggie Charpentier, Pharm D., Volunteer Pharmacist (2007-2008)
Britt Doran, Volunteer Medical Translator (2009-2010) (now in Nurse Practitioner school)
Heather Johnson, Volunteer Clinic Administrator (2008-2010)
Deb Norman, Volunteer Site Buildout Coordinator (2009)
George Ortiz, Volunteer Fundraiser (2009)
Daniel Patterson, Volunteer Webmaster and clinic volunteer (2009-present)
Rachel Simon, Volunteer Coordinator (2008)
Geoff Taylor, Volunteer Nurse (2010)
Derek Tessier, RNP, Volunteer Nurse Practitioner(2007)
Sandy Urban Lynch, RNP, Volunteer Nurse Practitioner
Dr. Ed Wing of Providence, Volunteer Doctor (2008)

Join our team!
To sign up to volunteer please write info@aplacetobehealthy.org and copy SophieE@aplacetobehealthy.org

Just started- Medical Student-run Clinic – Tuesdays in September, October, and November