Dr Janice Levine and Dr Robert Kalyesubula.
October 22nd at 8:00 pm and will be a gala evening of food, music, games and prizes. The Lexington Depot.
“It’s amazing what can happen when you open your mind and lead with your heart. The universe, in gratitude, rewards you with possibilities you never could have conceived.”
Those words of wisdom come from Lexington Psychologist Janice Levine. Wisdom that grew from a unique experience she had at last year’s Connecting for Change (C4C) event sponsored by the Dalai Lama Center for Peace and Education as a part of the Vancouver Peace Summit.
Connecting for Change (C4C) was a three-day gathering of business, social sector, and philanthropic leaders to learn from each other about how they could create cross-sector collaborations to address pressing issues around the world. Representing MedWish International, Dr Levine was attending C4C on what she calls a “hunch”.
Her hunch paid off. At one of the C4C sessions, she met a doctor from Uganda, Robert Kalyesubula who was completing a Nephrology Fellowship at Yale Medical School, and learned about his efforts to develop a community based medical center that offered treatment to people living with HIV-AIDS, orphans, and vulnerable individuals in the Nakaseke District where he grew up.
An orphan himself, Dr. Kalyesubula devoted his life to giving back to the community that supported him, and was eager to connect with others who could help him find ways to develop their resources. If you’re familiar with MedWish International, you can understand why this pairing could be a fruitful one. MedWish donates medical supplies to individuals and organizations dedicated to providing care that directly lessens the burden of suffering people in under served areas.
Dr. Levine was so impressed with the inspiring work that Dr. Kalyesubula (known to his friends as “Dr. Robert”) had done to grow his community and enhance the lives of children and adults alike, that she decided to work with Dr. Robert to help grow the ACCESS program. When she returned to Boston, she convened a Board of professional physicians, health care workers, attorneys and students to help procure and send medical supplies to Nakaseke, and provide a range of resources needed to develop a fully sustainable community center.”
Through Dr Levine and Dr Kalyesubula’s C4C encounter, MedWish put together a container of donated medical supplies to be sent to Uganda. From here another “C4Cer”, Mary Tidlund, applied to the project what Dr Levine calls “her Midas touch” and arranged for the container to be shipped to the East African country. “Eighty-one villages and up to 40,000 people will benefit from the supplies,” she says.
The whole C4C experience has given Dr Levine a new concept of the prerequisites for change. “I know now that it’s not about credentials or qualifications,” she says. “But rather about daring to dream and putting faith in the possible.”
