Kingston, RI – March 31, 2025 – A medical skilled devoted to the well being of among the most marginalized members of society will ship the opening speech in a symposium of the Division of Public Well being of the College of Rhode Island on April 7.
Dr. James O’Connell, assistant medical professor on the Harvard Medication School and President of Boston’s medical look after the homeless folks program, will talk about the challenges of offering medical care to populations of homeless folks of their speech, “continuity inside chaos: caring for individuals who reside chronically in shelters and streets.” The occasion is scheduled for April 7, at 5:30 pm within the 170 room of Avedisian Corridor on the Uri Kingston campus.
O’Connell, who obtained his medical diploma at Harvard College in 1982 and accomplished a residence in inside drugs on the Massachusetts Normal Hospital, has made a profession that advocated the well being of individuals with out bone. In 1985, full -time scientific work started with homeless folks as a founding physician of Boston Well being Look after the Homeless. He established the primary medical respite program in 1985, with 25 nested beds throughout the Lemuel Shattuck shelter in Boston, and designed and applied the primary computerized medical report for a homeless folks program. He then served as director of the Nationwide Program of the Homeless Household Program of the Robert Wooden Johnson Basis and the USA Housing and City Improvement Division.
O’Connell, editor of The medical care of homeless folks: a communicable illness handbook and customary issues in shelters and within the streetsHe’s a prolific author, whose articles have appeared within the New England Journal of Medicationhe Journal of the American Medical Affiliationhe American Journal of Public Well beingand several other different medical magazines. Your first e-book, Shadow tales: Reflections of a road physicianIt particulars 30 years of look after individuals who expertise the shortage of housing in Boston, and “gently illuminates humanity and uncooked braveness of those that battle to outlive and discover that means and hope whereas dwelling within the streets.” His work was the theme of the New York Instances, ROSPEROS SLEEPERIES: The pressing mission of Dr. Jim O’Connell to carry therapeutic to the homeless By the exceptional writer Tracy Kidder.
The Symposium on April 7 marks the start of the URI celebration of the Nationwide Public Well being Week, an initiative organized by the American Public Well being Affiliation to develop annual campaigns and sources that educate the general public, the political and professionals answerable for the essential significance of public well being, acknowledge public well being contributions and tackle key well being issues.
“We’ve a sequence of nice occasions for the Nationwide Week of Public Well being, organized by the Division in collaboration with the Division of Public Well being, in addition to the college and neighborhood companions, to advertise bodily and psychological well being,” mentioned Molly Greaney, professor and president of the Division of Public Well being. “Public well being graduates take part in profession associated occasions: the ‘train is Medication Membership’ leads the walks; Uri Well being Promotion is sponsoring effectively -being workshops; the School of Pharmacy is organizing a coaching of Narcan; and the School of Well being Sciences is supporting the coaching of CPR, amongst different initiatives.”