Dr. Michelle A. Gourdine is a primary care physician, health policy specialist and expert in preventive health and wellness.  As an author and speaker, she seeks to empower individuals to make better health choices for themselves, their families, and their communities.Throughout her medical career of nearly 20 years, she has felt compelled to not simply treat disease, but keep people from getting sick in the first place.  She noticed that people of color and poor people always seemed to get sicker and die younger, and grew weary of seeing people who look like her suffering the most from the consequences of poor health.  She wrote her new book, Reclaiming Our Health:  A Guide to African American Wellness (Yale University Press, April 2011), because African Americans are affected by obesity, high blood pressure, cancer, and other serious health conditions at far greater rates than other Americans.  Her book reveals the unique cultural factors that influence African American health, and provides motivation and practical steps for the readers to follow to live longer, happier, and more prosperous lives.  Her advice and book have been recently highlighted in the New York Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, USA Today and Essence Magazine.

She is a Board-certified Pediatrician who earned her medical degree at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.  She currently is Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and Senior Associate faculty at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and is the former Deputy Secretary of Health and Chief Public Health Physician for the state of Maryland, and former Health Commissioner for Baltimore County Maryland.

Invite Dr. Michelle to speak at your next event.  Go to www.michellegourdine.com and fill out the speaking engagement request form!