WITH Foundation provides financial support to organizations that promote comprehensive healthcare for adults with developmental disabilities. WITH offers at least 3 grant cycles (2 Open Cycles and 1 RFP cycle) each year. Through our RFP cycle, we typically provide $200-300K to nonprofit organizations in the United States.
During our RFP cycle, we not only receive feedback from our Self-Advocate Advisory Committee who advise on all of our grant cycles, but we also benefit from the expertise and perspectives of our Clinical Review Committee members.
This year’s Clinical Review Committee members are:
Dr. Juan Espinoza (Committee Chair and WITH Board Secretary)
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After completing his undergraduate degree at Washington University in St. Louis, Juan Espinoza received an Intramural Research Training Award (IRTA) at the Immunotherapy Unit of the National Institute on Aging at the National Institutes of Health. During his time at the NIH, Juan worked on small molecule design, developing new therapeutic and research tools. Successively, Juan attended the USC Keck School of Medicine, receiving his MD in 2010. Juan completed his pediatric residency at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles in 2013, and in 2014 he became an Assistant Professor of Clinical Pediatrics at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and the USC Keck School of Medicine.
Dr. Espinoza’s clinical time is focused on complex care coordination and obesity management, while his research focuses on digital health, health information systems, and patient-generated health data. He is the CTSI Director of Clinical Research Informatics for CHLA, and Medical Director of the CHLA Innovation Studio. In 2016, he joined the team at CTIP (The West Coast Consortium for Technology & Innovation Pediatrics) and took over as Director and Principal Investigator in 2018 with a new $6.6 million FDA grant. The guiding principle of Dr. Espinoza’s work is that data and technology have the potential to narrow the health gap faced by underserved communities all over the world.
Juan’s academic interests are complemented by his experiences outside of medicine; in 2010 he co-founded GC/MDDM, a digital media production company that works with television, film, web, and mobile technologies. Through this endeavor, he has partnered with both the entertainment and healthcare industries to create and implement technology and media solutions to healthcare and education problems. Dr. Espinoza utilizes these same skills in his teaching, research, and clinical practice.
Beyond innovation and technology, Dr. Espinoza’s clinical practice includes care for children with medical complexity. As the Director for Research and Data Management for the Patient Centered Medical Home for children with medical complexity, Dr. Espinoza sees some of the most complicated patients at CHLA. In this role, he provides clinical care, care coordination, and navigation support services to assist families in obtaining the resources they need for their children.
Dr. Priya Chandan
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Dr. Priya Chandan is a physician-scientist who engages in health services research to improve the quality of medical care for people with intellectual/developmental disabilities (IDD). As Vice President of Healthcare Quality and Analytics at Kramer Davis, she leads innovative population health, health professional training, and community engagement efforts. Dr. Chandan is also a Clinical Associate Professor at the University of Louisville School of Medicine and is passionate about medical education. She is involved in teaching efforts with both medical students and medical residents nationwide. Dr. Chandan serves as a Senior Editor for PM&R, the official scientific journal of the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, and brings expertise in mixed methods, econometrics, biostatistics, and community engaged research methods. She has been involved in advocacy and policy efforts for over 15 years, currently serving on the Scientific and Clinical Advisory Board for the National Down Syndrome Society and the Board for Special Olympics Kentucky.
Geraldine Collins-Bride, DNP
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Gerri Collins-Bride is an adult nurse practitioner and Professor Emeritus in the UCSF School of Nursing where she is on faculty and teaches in the Adult Gerontology Primary Care Nurse Practitioner program. For over 35 years she has been practicing in General Internal Medicine at UCSF as a primary care provider for adults with developmental and psychiatric disabilities. She is a member of the Redwood Coast Regional Center Telemedicine “TACT” team, and for the past twenty years co-chaired the annual CME course on “Developmental Disabilities: An Update for Health Professionals” with her partner, Dr. Lucy Crain. For the past 28 years, Gerri has been the Clinical Director of a faculty practice that she developed providing primary care for individuals with serious mental illness in community mental health residential treatment programs. This practice, Interprofessional Primary Care Outreach for People with Mental Illness (IPCOM), has trained hundreds of students to provide respectful care for people with mental illnes
Dr. Rebekah Fettkether
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Dr. Rebekah Fettkether is the Director, Clinical Education and Training at Special Olympics, Inc., where she oversees the professional training of health professionals and students in the U.S. and globally to reduce health disparities for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. She is a clinical pharmacist with extensive experience in higher education related to curriculum development, implementation, and evaluation. Dr. Fettkether holds a Doctor of Pharmacy from the University of Michigan and a Master of Public Health with a concentration in Health Behavior, Education, and Promotion from the University of South Carolina. She also completed a Community Care Pharmacy Practice Residency at the University of Iowa.
Dr. Marie Flores
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Dr. Marie Flores (she, her, ella) is a family medicine physician at Altamed in Pico Rivera, CA and also an epidemiologist and assistant researcher in the Department of Epidemiology at UCLA. She went to undergraduate at Davidson College, majoring in Spanish, got her masters and PhD in epidemiology at the UCLA School of Public Health, and went to medical school at the University of Utah. She completed her residency at the social medicine program at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, New York. Her professional interests include primary care in medically underserved communities, reproductive health and justice, and public health research in Latino populations. She currently lives in the Los Angeles area with her husband, son, and two dogs, and was featured in the 2021 LA Times article about pregnancy and disability that appeared on the front page of the Sunday paper:
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-09-30/how-modern-medicine-neglects-disabled-mothers.
Dr. Matthew Holder
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Dr. Matthew Holder is recognized as an international leader in the care of individuals with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (IDD).
He began working on what would result in Developmental Medicine, becoming a recognized medical expert soon after starting his career. In 2002, he took over the American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry (AADMD). Since then, the AADMD has set the curriculum and standards that guide medical students, residents and fellowship-level physicians to better treat and understand patients with IDD. Medical schools and residency programs around the world have implemented curriculum changes based on the work done by Dr. Holder and the AADMD.
In 2005 Dr. Holder became Global Medical Advisor for the Special Olympics. Dr. Holder has trained thousands of healthcare providers in addressing the health needs of athletes with IDD. He also assists the American Medical Association and the American Dental Association in developing and passing resolutions that improve the lives and healthcare of IDD patients.
Dr. Holder, alongside colleague Dr. Henry Hood, designed and developed a unique, interdisciplinary patient care and teaching model that meets the health needs of adults with IDD living in the community – the first of its kind in the nation. Today the Lee Specialty Clinic exists as a testament to their shared vision.
Dr. Holder is a graduate of the University of Louisville School of Medicine.
Dr. Judith Stych
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Throughout her nursing career, Dr. Judith Stych has specialized in supporting individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) across the lifespan. Her experience includes positions as coordinator of multi-disciplinary ambulatory clinics for children with cerebral palsy and seizure disorders, community-based case manager for adults with IDD, and nurse clinician, nurse supervisor, and lead coordinator and instructor of a certified nursing assistant instructional program in an ICF/IDD for children, adolescents, and adults. A Certified Developmental Disabilities Nurse (CDDN) since 2005, Dr. Stych served as the Developmental Disabilities Nurses Association (DDNA) Vice-President from 2010-2013, President-elect from 2018-2020, and is currently President. For 11 years, she served as the volunteer Clinical Director for the Special Olympics Wisconsin Healthy Athletes Health Promotion program. Dr. Stych holds a DNP in Advanced Public Health Nursing from Rush University, Chicago, Illinois and is a member of Sigma Theta Tau. She is a nurse consultant for the Wisconsin Department of Health Services within its Medicaid waiver managed care program for frail elders and people with physical and/or intellectual/developmental disabilities.
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We look forward to announcing in February the projects supported through our most recent RFP that focused on projects fostering healthcare equity for women with I/DD.
If you are a clinician with experience in serving adults with I/DD (including clinicians with disabilities) and are interested in serving on our next iteration of the Clinical Review Committee, please check back in April when the application and additional information will be available.
Thank you to both our Self-Advocate Advisory Committee and our Clinical Review Committee!
To learn more about our Self-Advocate Advisory Committee, please visit: https://withfoundation.org/celebrating-national-philanthropy-day-2/. The Self-Advocate Advisory Committee application is available at: https://withfoundation.org/self-advocate-advisory-committee/