What Leading Healthcare & Travel Press Are Saying…

The DISCOVERY CHANNEL: The @discovery.ca program which featured …the “Pharmacy from the Rainforest” workshop in the Amazon….was one of the highlights of the season. In addition, the response from colleagues and viewers has been very enthusiastic. I was very pleased. It was a real pleasure to work on this project. Do forward details about Africa as soon as they become available, and don’t hesitate to contact me regarding any other stories that might be of interest to our audience. Louise MacLeod, Producer

ADVANCE for Physicians: These expeditions provide medical CEUs with a difference. Scheduled in exotic locations such as South Africa, Galapagos and Belize, caregivers learn new skills in a natural environment…fortunate group[s] of clinicians will study dive medicine near [the] Great Barrier Reef in Australia. They will learn how to treat decompression sickness and coral injuries from an international faculty. Another group goes to South Africa to study international health issues… “We have the best faculty in the world,” Dr. Freedman says. “Because of the locations, we get the highest quality speakers.” The travel workshops [are described] as “unique”…small class sizes with famous faculty provide a strong learning experience. “It gives you an atmosphere where you can get very close to these people,” he says. “If people take a course in Chicago one weekend, they would sit in a big auditorium…they wouldn't get close to the speakers,” he explains. On an overseas workshop, participants can eat with the speakers and hike with them.

AMERICAN MEDICAL NEWS: Newsletter of the American Medical Association
These trips abroad offer more than CME credit. Physicians and other healthcare professionals earn continuing medical education credits by traveling to foreign countries and gaining cultural experience that they can translate into their practices. With 25% of the population currently belonging to a designated minority group, and a predicted 40% by the year 2030, training physicians to be "culturally competent" is fast becoming part of CME activities, medical school curricula and residency programs. AMA policy "encourages medical schools to offer electives in culturally competent healthcare". These programs help forward the goal of increasing awareness and acceptance of cultural differences between patient and provider.

MEN’S HEALTH: The [International] workshop that Mark Jenkins attended was “Pharmacy from the Rainforest,” but there are also workshops on travel medicine, oncology, international health, ecology, therapeutics and half a dozen more, all held in Costa Rica, the Amazon, Belize, Peru and Africa. They're staffed by the top scientists in the field, so you'll learn more than you can imagine.

DRUG TOPICS: The week-long Amazonian adventure…attracted…pharmacists, pharmacognosists, physicians, herbalists, nurses, educators, students and laymen, all interested in learning about the healing plants of the Peruvian rain forest…who couldn't resist the allure of the seven-day continuing education program in the Amazon Basin of Peru. Explorama Lodge, a structure made entirely of materials from the surrounding rain forest, served as the base camp for our expedition…[it] was the perfect setting to learn about the rain forest and its potential contribution to medical science.

WEEKEND TELEGRAPH, London: I traveled to attend a packed seminar on pharmacy, where chemists, academics and lay people participated in a series of field lectures and discussions. The topics ranged widely, from the medical history of the foxglove and the search for deodorant fungi to faith-healing and the recreational use of ayahuasca…Jungle conferencing manages without suits and ties …. Many lectures were conducted alfresco…[Program sponsors] take the view that a learning experience in the rainforest is likely to be of more value to foreign visitors than a mere holiday, and they may be right.

DISCOVERY TRAVEL CHANNEL: Our show will cover the gamut of stories, from hot deals to destination pieces to how to travel with toddlers and the like. But at the heart of the show is the belief that travel has the power to transform us and it is the journey, not the destination, that is key. Your expeditions embody these ideas beautifully. I look forward to working with you on developing a segment on your (healthcare) programs for our show. Margaret Hussey, Show Producer

esiLEDERLE Reporter: A series of [educational healthcare] workshops has been developed in areas of the world that provide the most stimulating backdrops. These weeklong, hands-on experiences, conducted in the midst of living rainforests and African savannahs provide participants with the unique opportunity to interact with researchers, field naturalists, and other conservation-minded travelers. Each program encompasses a broad spectrum of natural and cultural components. What is most interesting is… you can be an active participant in such biodiverse areas while earning continuing education credits from an accredited institution.

INTERNATIONAL PHARMACY Journal: [These] programme[s]…aim to promote new ways of thinking about healthcare and the vital link between nature’s unique ecosystems, ancient medicine and modern cures. Through direct interaction with traditional healers and scientific researchers, participants can gain a valuable insight into the source of medicine and healing and many diverse cultures.

UAB Insight: The study of tropical and travel medicine provides the critical link between didactic and experiential learning in the field that other programs lack, according to David O. Freedman, MD, director of UAB's Travelers Health Clinic. Health-care professionals who prepare patients for domestic or international travel or care for patients' post-travel illnesses will benefit from the annual CME course. “Personally experiencing the ambient conditions of a remote, tropical environment, combined with the academic content of the course, dramatically enhanced their ability to counsel travelers.”

NEWSLine for Pharmacists: There’s a whole different world out there, waiting for pharmacists who want to get out from behind the counter for awhile and see where many of the drugs come from. They can walk through the trees of the Amazon rainforest on a canopy walkway suspended 110 feet above the ground—a system of aerial footpaths and stairways. They can examine a maze of forests, lagoons, and islands on the Caribbean coast. They can take ethnobotanical safaris on the African Savannah. “Seeing these places is an education for pharmacists about the value of the ecosystems within underdeveloped areas—ecosystems that might provide new drugs to combat hard-to-fight diseases.” Exotic adventure, fantastic discoveries, new bonds of friendship, and realizations that will change the way you look at pharmacy and healthcare…these are but a few of the qualities reflected in the experiences of participants in these remarkable expeditions

TEXAS PHARMACY: In remote rainforest lodgings fifty miles from the Amazon port city of Iquitos, Peru, pharmacists, scientists, doctors, university presidents and student researchers united for a precedent-setting lesson in healing…Pharmacy from the Rainforest…enabled participants to learn about origins of modern drugs while in the rainforest—where the substances for many pharmaceuticals have their basis…pharmacists received a year’s worth of continuing education credit for the experience.

WE’VE EARNED THEIR TRUST
What Participants are saying…

“Thanks for a great adventure! The Amazon Pharmacy Workshop was tops. I learned so much and had a ball. Everything was well run and comfortable. I’m back to work today feeling rested and refreshed. Thanks for all the TLC that you put into this program to make it such a great success.”

- Elizabeth Keyes, R.Ph. - Director of Education, The American Pharmaceutical Association, Washington, D.C.

“The trip improved my practice of travel medicine. A lot of healthcare professionals counseling patients have never been on a trip to the tropics themselves. After a stint in the rainforest with hands-on experience, I have better ideas in how to counsel my patients.”

- Brian Terry, M.D. Pasadena, CA.

“ I am writing to tell you of the most memorable and fulfilling experience my daughter and I had attending the Kenya Healthcare Safari. This was indeed a program not only well planned and exciting, but was visionary in its scope of perfectly synchronizing health professional interests along with the remarkable sight-seeing natural wonders.”

- Dan Wagner - Pharm D., M.B.A. President Danaura Enterprises & Student Rainforest Fund
Wildwood, PA

“I write from the perspective of one who has developed programs, managed organizations, and taught in a graduate administration program. The total experience was so beautifully designed and flawlessly executed that it should be written up as a case study in management excellence. Please accept my heartfelt thanks for the vision that created this institution and for staffing it so effectively. I look forward to going on another healthcare expedition with your organization.”

- Barbara C. Perrow, Ph.D., Los Angeles, CA.

“We learned a lot about natural pharmaceuticals in the Amazon, but the trip was just as exciting for what we learned about other cultures, the beauty of nature, and the relationships we developed with other people. My first (healthcare) trip was so great, that I signed up for the next year to go to Costa Rica, and took my wife on that one. Now we are both set to go again to Kenya. It’s an unbelievable experience!”

- Jack Klee, R.Ph. Retail Pharmacy Owner – Crown Point, Indiana

“In one week's time, with all the outstanding faculty, guides and superb accommodations, I felt I was able to enter more deeply into an experience that might have taken months or even years to achieve on my own.”

- Michael Tierra, M.D. Ben Lomand, CA.

“We are creating a medical forum that combines two worlds of knowledge with a common goal to care for all people. This includes not only the traditional treatment of illnesses such as parasites, skin disorders, and things that we already know how to treat, but through these professional exchanges we also hope to find new and important weapons in the age old battle against disease.”

- Jose Cabanillas, M.D. Surgeon raised in the Amazon Basin

“This was a precedent-setting workshop and a tremendous opportunity to expand the business. The synergy of this group was explosive!”

- Libby Harvey - President, Alpha Labs, Petaluma, CA

"CME Courses that emphasize communication strategies are very valuable to physicians. Immersion programs where doctors interact with populations in countries that don't have enough health care resources, make it very real. It is quite dramatic to hear a lecture on botanicals in the middle of the AMAZON jungle where you see people using herbs rather than listening to one on a cruise ship or in a conference room. "

- Nancy Bennett, CME Director for HARVARD Medical School
Cambridge, MA

"When the doctor saw me...(she) told me that if I had been there the day before I would have saved a baby's life. Everything we bring on these trips saves lives. It makes you feel like your are contributing"

- Mary Hardy, M.D., Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles
KENYA Rural Village /Clinic Set-up

"We were part time students, part-time tourists. I did some piranha fishing and saw a rare jaguarundi in the wild. It was a very renewing experience because you see things you would never see and help people who wouldn't normally receive good health care.

- James Redmon, MD Family Physician
Louisville, KY

We are proud to assure the ongoing success of developing the best programs and faculty for the healthcare professional and consumer market through the guidance of our esteemed HealthQuest Travel Series Advisory Board Members. See sidebar.

Richard Blackwell, Ph.D. M.D.
Director of Research & Diagnostics - Professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology
Department of OBGYN
UAB School of Medicine

Mark Blumenthal
Founder & Executive Director
American Botanical Council

Linda L. Casebeer, Ph.D.
Associate Director/Division of Continuing Medical Education
UAB School of Medicine

Christopher Cullander, Ph.D.
Associate Dean & US Coordinator, US-EC Pharmobility Project
UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA San Francisco/School of Pharmacy

Mary Hardy, M.D.
Medical Director/Integrative Medicine CEDARS-SINAI Medical Center

Gustavo Heudebert, M.D.
Associate Professor of Medicine & Public Health
UAB School of Medicine

Elizabeth Keyes, R.Ph.
Director Strategic Alliances and Industry Relations AMERICAN PHARMACEUTICAL ASSOCIATION

Gary J. Martin Ph.D. FLS
Director of The Global Diversity Foundation
President of the Society for Economic Botany
University of Kent, UK & Marrakech, Morocco

D. William Schlott, M.D.
Medical Director-Global Access Programs
JOHNS-HOPKINS Medical Center

Kathleen Squires, M.D.
Associate Professor of Medicine
USC Keck School of Medicine
Researcher Women's Health & Aids/Medical Director
LAC & USC Medical Center