Dr. Christopher Brown

Nephrologist

Adena Regional Medical Center

Dr. Christopher Brown is a graduate of North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University with a degree in Biology Education. He obtained a Medical Degree and master ’s in public health from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His post graduate training was obtained at The Ohio State University Medical Center where he completed a residency in Internal Medicine followed by a fellowship in Nephrology at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.

Dr. Brown’s multidimensional career started in academic medicine as an Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University Medical Center. Shortly after starting this career, he would venture out on a most interesting career as a physician.

Dr. Brown has used his medical expertise in a variety of settings, including academia, rural and urban healthcare, public speaking and as a healthcare consultant.

Dr. Brown has a history of serving the community and is a leader at the local, state, and national levels. He is on the governing board of Lifeline of Ohio, Isabelle Ridgeway Foundation, Columbus Medical Association and Resurrecting Lives Foundation. He also serves on the Minority Advisory Board for Lifeline of Ohio and the Medical Advisory Board for the National Kidney Foundation. He is a faculty member for Made for Medicine, funded by Columbus Medical Association. Co-chair of the Public Policy committee for Columbus Medical Association. He also serves as a Councilor-at-large and an alternate delegate to the AMA for the Ohio State Medical Association. He is also a member of The Ohio Collective, a nonprofit think tank dedicated to addressing the needs of the African American community in Ohio.

He has received recognition in Tokyo for supporting grassroots effort to start a Children’s Hospice. His passion is engaging community members and organizations to promote healthy lifestyle.

He is a graduate of the African American Leadership Academy and the Columbus Medical Association’s Physician’s Leadership Academy. He is a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc and a single father of two daughters.

Currently he is a practicing nephrologist at Adena Regional Medical Center as well as the former Health Commissioner and current Medical Director for Ross County Health District. He is the CEO and Founder of Christopher Brown MD, LLC, www.TheDocBrown.com and PressureMD, www.PressureMD.com. He is also an investor in affordable housing as stable housing is a major component of good health. He also has invested in several AA startups in healthcare, Tech industry, and biotechnology. He is a partner in Statement Scrubs, https://statementscrubstore.com an African American owned business that focuses on providing scrubs for healthcare entities.

Jamar G. Williams M.D.

Founding Physician

Capital City Medical Associates Central Ohio Primary Care

Jamar G. Williams, M.D., works to bring patient care to thousands of African Americans yearly. His dedication and support to providing exceptional medical care is what drives and motivates his passion to serve the central Ohio community. Dr. Williams believes that the best approach to delivering health is through education and prevention which he strives to provide to his patients every day in his practice and through his community involvement.

Through his drive and passion to provide the African American community with the best medical care, he created the premier medical practice within the African American Community at COPC - Capital City Medical Associates.

Under Dr. Williams’ leadership, Capital City Medical Associates has expanded its commitment to serving the Black community. In 2001, he facilitated the construction of the Agler Road Ohio Health Medical Complex. He also has lent support to numerous community endeavors including central Ohio’s African American Male Wellness Walk. Dr. Williams is a Board Member of the African American Male Wellness Committee which has been an important instrument in organizing screening programs for prostate cancer, hypertension, and diabetes in African American men.

Capital City Medical Associates has been an important training site for new graduating physicians, nurse practitioners and other health-related occupations as these individuals launch their careers.

Prior to medical school, Dr. Williams attended Central State University in Wilberforce, Ohio completing a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry. Central State University is one of the oldest HBCU institutions in the country. During his undergraduate studies, Dr. Williams completed undergraduate summer coursework at Harvard University and the New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry

He went on to complete his medical degree in 1988 from Wright State University’s College of Medicine in Dayton, Ohio. Dr. Williams completed his residency training in Internal Medicine at the Mount Carmel Medical Center in 1992 and proceeded to establish his medical practice, Capital City Medical Associates in Columbus.

A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., Dr. Williams is a member of the oldest African American fraternity in the United States – Alpha Phi Alpha. The fraternity’s notable members include the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the late United States Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall, and Olympian Jesse Owens. Dr. Williams resides in Westerville/New Albany. He has two boys, Jamar Jr., and Justin, who is also an employee of COPC.

Dr. Williams is dedicated to providing ongoing health education and health care prevention to the Columbus community, understanding that health is our wealth, and we must invest in it to live our best life.

Dr. Chelsea Mooreland Founder

Life Cycle Direct Primary Care

Here in Central Ohio, a healthcare revolution is taking place under the visionary leadership of Dr. Chelsea Mooreland. In September 2021, Dr. Mooreland founded Life Cycle Direct Primary Care to transform the way healthcare is both delivered and experienced, especially for minority and disenfranchised members of our community. Through her unwavering commitment to culturally conscious medicine and a family-centered approach, Dr. Mooreland is redefining the doctor-patient relationship and forging a path towards a healthier and more unified future.

Mission: Putting Patients First At the core of Life Cycle Direct

Primary Care is a simple yet powerful mission: to prioritize the needs and well-being of patients and community above all else. Dr. Mooreland firmly believes that quality healthcare should be accessible, affordable, and built on trust and understanding. By adopting a Direct Primary Care (DPC) model, she has eliminated the barriers and constraints imposed by traditional fee-for-service systems, offering her patients unparalleled access to comprehensive care.

Under the DPC model, patients pay a monthly membership fee, granting them full access to their primary care physician’s expertise and services. This approach fosters a strong doctor-patient relationship built on trust, as patients are no longer bound by insurance restrictions or rushed and impersonal visits. With more time dedicated to each patient, the Life Cycle team can truly understand their unique health needs, develop personalized treatment plans, and provide continuous support throughout their healthcare journey. In addition to reduced cost services, the membership-based model allows for negotiation of greatly reduced cost labs and medications, further decreasing members out of pocket healthcare expenses so they can reallocate funds to other important aspects of wellness.

Vision: Revolutionizing Healthcare Delivery

In just 2 short years, Life Cycle DPC has grown to include two locations with the addition of Dr Samantha Jensen and the acquisition of the Bethel Rd office. Both Drs Mooreland and Jensen are board certified Family Doctors serving patients of all ages and with advanced training in Obstetrics to ensure families a seamless healthcare experience while expanding.

The Life Cycle family is diverse with a majority of its members identifying as Black/African American and Hispanic, and uninsured or underinsured. Members benefit from innovative services such as Centering Pregnancy which has shown to reduce health disparities in maternal and child health.

Mysheika W. Roberts, MD, MPH Health Commissioner

Columbus Public Health Department

As the first African American Health Commissioner in Columbus, Mysheika Roberts, MD, MPH is making transformational changes that impact the health of our community. She leads Columbus Public Health and a team of 500 professionals who are focused on innovative approaches that address the social determinants of health, gun violence, disease outbreaks, infant mortality, overdoses, health equity and more.

Health Commissioner Dr. Mysheika W. Roberts leads the organization and a team of more than 500 public health professionals who are focused on neighborhood-based approaches that address the social determinants of health from safe, affordable housing and education to jobs and gun violence in order to decrease the health disparities that exist.

Dr. Roberts has a prolific 20 year public health background at the local, state and national levels. Prior to her appointment as Health Commissioner, she was the Medical Director and Assistant Health Commissioner in December 2017, she was the Medical Director and assistant Health Commissioner at Columbus Public Health. She also built a solid public health foundation early in her career by investigated outbreaks for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and led an STD clinic and hepatitis prevention efforts at the Baltimore City Health Department.

Also, Dr. Roberts extends her service to the community beyond the walls of Columbus Public Health where she serves as a member of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee to the Director Health Equity Workgroup, the Lifeline of Ohio Minority Advisory Group, and OhioHealth’s Faith, Culture and Community Benefit Committee. She also has served as a mentor in OhioHealth’s Physician Diversity Scholars Program and is the immediate past chair of the Big Cities Health Coalition, a collaboration of health departments from the 35 largest cities in the country representing 65 million people.

A native of Los Angeles, she enjoys spending time with her husband Edward and their dogs Cosby and Rudy while exploring the diverse culture and experiences of Columbus the 14th largest city in the nation.

She earned a MD from the University of Maryland School of Medicine and MPH from the University of Michigan.

Dr. Ngozi Osuagwu Obstetrician-Gynecologist

Ngozi Osuagwu, MD is a passionate advocate for eliminating health disparities among women from diverse minority populations. Born in Nigeria, she moved to Brooklyn when she was 2 years old. Growing up, her parents pushed her to excel in academics and hoped that one day she would become a doctor.

After graduating high school, Osuagwu moved to Baltimore and began her undergraduate education at Johns Hopkins University. After changing her major four times, she eventually graduated with a degree in biology and was on track to attend medical school and fulfill her parents’ dreams.

Osuagwu remained focused and diligent, completing her first two years of medical school. During her third year she became especially close to one of her patients, whose health suddenly took a turn for the worse. The death of this patient caused a stirring inside and solidified her desire to become a physician.

As a champion of women’s health initiatives, an award-winning author and an inspiring keynote speaker, she uses her voice to promote preventive health care and share practical tips with women of all ages about sustaining a healthy lifestyle. This is truly evident in her books, Letters to My Sisters: Plain Truths and Straightforward Advice from a Gynecologist and newly released Sincerely, Your Gynecologist. Each book provides women with insightful, candid and often humorous advice on women’s health issues. She tackles common and sometimes taboo issues regarding women’s health including sexually transmitted diseases, menopause, contraceptives and pregnancy in the form of letters written by Osuagwu to her patients.

Dr. Osuagwu is board certified in Obstetrics and Gynecology and Integrative and Holistic Medicine, as well as a NAMS-Certified Menopause Practitioner. She currently serves as the Clinical Director of the Women’s Health Center at Ohio Health and a Clinical Professor at Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine.

In addition to her two books, Osuagwu has written hundreds of blog posts on her website www ngoziosuagwumd.com covering not only gynecological health topics but also topics such as diabetes, maintaining a healthy diet, exercising, men’s health, and stress management.

Dr. Osuagwu has been a resident of the New Albany area with her husband and three children since the mid 1990s and works to create places of belonging there and everywhere she goes.

Dr. Laura Espy-Bell Founder

The Columbus Black Physicians Network

Laura Espy-Bell, MD, MHA, FACEP is a board-certified Emergency physician who is committed to diversity in medicine and addressing health disparities. She is a graduate of Spelman College in Atlanta, GA where she received her Bachelor of Arts in Economics and a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where she received her Master of Healthcare Administration (MHA). Dr. Espy- Bell later completed a graduate fellowship in Healthcare Administration at Emory Healthcare in Atlanta, GA in 2006 prior to entering The Ohio State University College of Medicine where she completed her medical training and residency in Emergency Medicine.

As an Emergency physician with Mid-Ohio Emergency Services, Associate Medical Director of two OhioHealth Free Standing Emergency Departments in Reynoldsburg and Obetz, and Medical Director of Health & Equity at Grant Medical Center, she provides quality health care and collaborates with various organizations to better serve the community while addressing health disparities and improving equity.

Dr. Espy-Bell is the Founder of The Columbus Black Physician’s Network, created to promote networking, mentorship, and volunteerism among African American physicians. She has mentored countless physicians and students all the while living out her mantra “to lift as you climb.” She is persistent in her pursuit to save lives and continually shares her expertise.

Dr. Espy-Bell is well known as a regional public speaker and expert on healthcare topics, such as emergency care, the opioid epidemic, health disparities in the African American community, and the Covid-19 pandemic. Throughout 2020, Dr. Espy-Bell was featured in several statewide television commercials, radio interviews/ads, national and local webinars, sharing her expertise on emergency care and mitigation strategies to stop the spread of Covid-19 which ultimately saved lives.

Her current work is in collaboration with The Columbus Medical Association. She is the Founder of the “Made for Medicine” program, a pipeline initiative for African American students to gain exposure to various careers in medicine he then received her Master of Healthcare Administration (MHA) from. She hopes that this program will change the face of medicine and address the disparity of Black physicians across the country. Dr. Espy-Bell is committed to authentic leadership and investing in the next generation. She truly believes in allowing God “to use you for a purpose greater than yourself” and challenges others to do the same.

Dr. Espy-Bell was selected as one of the honorees for Columbus Business First - Top 40 Under 40 in 2018, Women in Economic Leadership Development (WELD) Honoree in 2018, Columbus CEO Future 50 Honoree in 2023, and a 2022 YWCA Woman of Achievement. Dr. Espy-Bell resides in Blacklick, OH with her husband Stephen and three children, Kendall, Jackson, and Ellis Bell.

Dr. Bignall has spent the last five years as a pediatric nephrologist at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, making a difference in the lives of young patients who have kidney disease. He has also become one of the country’s most well-respected advocates for diversity, equity and inclusion in children’s health care. Now Dr. Big-

Dr. Ray Bignall

Pediatric Nephrologist Nationwide Children’s Hospital

nall is bringing his leadership skills to a hospital role that has an impact on patients, his colleagues and the larger community: Chief Diversity and Health Equity Officer.

In this new role, Dr. Bignall leads Nationwide Children’s workforce inclusion efforts and champions initiatives that address food insecurity, housing instability and other social drivers of child health.

“As health care professionals, we must understand the challenges our patients face outside of these hospital walls and take a more active role in understanding the impact environments have on children’s health,”

Dr. Bignall said.

Dr. Bignall, a graduate of Howard University and Meharry Medical College, is an associate professor of Pediatrics at The Ohio State University College of Medicine and has served as a member of The White House Health Equity Roundtable. Dr. Bignall is a proud husband and father. His wife, Dr. Whitney Raglin Bignall, is the Associate Clinical Director of The On Our Sleeves Movement for Children’s Mental Health, and a pediatric primary care psychologist at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. Together, they are the proud parents of 6-month-old Liam.

Dr. Michelle Golla Associate Administrative Medical Director Nationwide Children’s Hospital

the Columbus School for Girls in 2000, Dr. Golla earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2004. She then attended The Ohio State University’s College of Medicine earning her medical degree in 2010.

For over 10 years, Dr. Michelle Golla of Central Ohio Primary Care’s Building Blocks Pediatrics has served central Ohio children and adolescents through medicine – striving to promote healthcare equity. From her local roots as a lifelong central Ohio resident, she has traveled the world bringing exceptional healthcare to kids. After graduating from

Dr. Golla takes pride in being a Black leader in the central Ohio community. It motivates her to be able to give back to people of color and empower them to become medical professionals.

Dr. Golla works to mentor minority high school and college students, medical school students, and pediatric residents to help pro- mote diversity in healthcare. Golla is an Associate Administrative Medical Director at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. Along with her clinical work, she travels internationally to Haiti and Ethiopia for mission trips. She has shared information and resources with global medical teams throughout her travels to encourage healthcare access and delivery. She is a proud mom to three boys, Elias, Quddus, and Zion. She also is married to her supportive husband Desalen.

She is an avid runner and participated in the Columbus Cap City Quarter Marathon earlier this year. She also enjoys traveling and riding her Vespa.