Jennifer L. Trilk, PhD, FACSM, DipACLM

Role: EIMG® Program Director

Jennifer Trilk, PhD, FACSM, DipACLM is a Professor at University of South Carolina School of Medicine Greenville and Director of the Lifestyle Medicine Core Curriculum which comprehensively trains medical students in nutrition, physical activity/exercise, behavior change, student/patient self-care, and resiliency to prevent and treat the nation’s top chronic diseases such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and various forms of cancer.

Dr. Trilk also directs the Lifestyle Medicine Education Curriculum (LMEd), which provides open-access LM curricula to medical schools across the globe. In 2019, LMEd was awarded the U.S. President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition Community Leadership Award, Dr. Trilk’s second PCFSN award. She also founded and directs Exercise is Medicine Greenville®, a comprehensive 12-week medically-based exercise and lifestyle program for adults with chronic health conditions, and for which in 2019 she received the Exercise is Medicine Global Leadership Award from the American College of Sports Medicine. Both of these programs were recognized on September 28th, 2022 as part of the White House’s national strategy for their Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health.

Dr. Trilk has received national recognition by The Wall Street Journal, CNN, U.S. News and World Report, Chicago Tribune, Association of American Medical Colleges (Press Release 2017; Press Release 2018), and others. She also has been showcased internationally as an invited adjunct professor at the Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale (UPO) medical school in Novara, Italy in 2017, and recently at Tel Aviv Sackler Faculty School of Medicine, Israel in July 2022. She also is a frequent guest speaker for Physicians’ Association for Nutrition out of Berlin, Germany.

In 2017, Dr. Trilk presented the rational for Lifestyle Medicine training in medical school at a congressional briefing on Capitol Hill in conjunction with the American College of Preventive Medicine, was awarded her first U.S. President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition Community Leadership Award in 2014, and in 2013 was an invited speaker for the Bipartisan Policy Center: “Teaching Nutrition and Physical Activity in Medical School: Training Doctors for Prevention-Oriented Care.”

Dr. Trilk is a Fellow of the  American College of Sports Medicine, a Diplomate of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine, and a Fellow of the third class of the Aspen Global Leadership Network’s Health Innovators Fellowship Program.

Terri La Russo, DO

Role: EIMG® Chief Medical Officer

Dr. Terry La Russo is the interim Chair of Medicine at Prisma Health. She attended the University of New England College of Osteopathic Medicine and completed her residency in Internal Medicine with Greenville Health System in 2012. She received a Physician Executive MBA from The University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2019. Dr. La Russo has over 10 years of diverse experience in clinical, academic and leadership roles. She continues to serve as Vice Chair of Operations, Specialty & Hospitalist Medicine and she was the first program director of Prisma Health’s Hospitalist Fellowship in the Upstate. She is also the medical director of the new transplant intermediate care unit at Greenville Memorial Hospital. Additionally, she is a member of the Internal Medicine Residency Faculty and is a clinical professor at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine – Greenville.

Phyllis MacGilvray, MD, FAAFP, DipABLM

Role: EIMG® Co-Chief Medical Officer

Dr. Phyllis MacGilvray, MD, FAAFP serves as the Dean of the University of South Carolina School of Medicine Greenville (SOMG). Additionally, she is a clinical professor in the Department of Family Medicine at SOMG and serves as a Prisma Health Family Medicine physician. A compassionate leader in primary care and a medical education expert, Dr. MacGilvray is proud to lead the medical school in its next chapter. Dr. MacGilvray is the first medical school dean in the country board certified in lifestyle medicine, which focuses on the use of evidence-based lifestyle interventions to prevent, treat and reverse chronic diseases. She is committed to advancing efforts to help prepare future physicians dedicated to improving the health and wellness of communities, and striving for the highest standards in all we do to transform education, research, and patient care.

Peter Carek, MD, MS

Role: EIMG® Co-Chief Medical Officer

Peter J. Carek, MD, MS is currently the Chair of the Department of Family Medicine and a Professor with the University of South Carolina School of Medicine – Greenville. Dr. Carek attended medical school at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, SC where he also completed his family medicine residency training.  He completed a fellowship in sports medicine at the Ohio Physical Therapy and Sports Medicine Clinic and the University of Tennessee Medical Center in Knoxville. While at the University of Tennessee, he obtained a Master of Science in Human Performance and Sports Studies. He is a Fellow of the AAFP and a Diplomate of the ABFM.  Dr. Carek also has a CAQ in Primary Care Sports Medicine. Dr. Carek continues to practice family medicine and is actively involved in student and resident education.

Mark Stoutenberg, PhD, MSPH

Role: EIM Global Advisor

Mark Stoutenberg, PhD, MSPH is an Associate Professor in the College of Public Health at Temple University. Dr. Stoutenberg originally hails from Calgary, Alberta, Canada, moving to the United States to pursue a PhD in Exercise Physiology (2008) and Master of Science in Public Health (2011) from the University of Miami. Dr. Stoutenberg first worked as a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine (2008-2017), where he served on the national lead team of a multi-site, randomized control trial examining the augmentation of substance use treatment with exercise training programs. His research also included work involving breast cancer survivors, community-based lifestyle modification programs, and low-income Hispanic patients at community health centers throughout South Florida.

Dr. Stoutenberg moved on to serve as the inaugural Program Director of a Master of Public Health (MPH) program at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (2017-20), overseeing all aspects of the program development, including academic programming, initial accreditation, and formation of community partnerships. In this role, Dr. Stoutenberg worked closely with the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Health Department, the Tennessee Department of Health, and several local health-related organizations (YMCAs of Chattanooga, Chattanooga Area Food Bank, American Heart Association). Over the past three years at Temple University (2020-present), Dr. Stoutenberg has engaged in research examining clinic-community linkages through an implementation science lens, identifying how health systems can better connect patients to existing community resources to increase physical activity levels, improve dietary habits, and reduce the incidence of obesity and chronic disease, with a specific focus on enhancing clinical-community linkages in populations experiencing racial, ethnic, or geographic disparities.

Sam Franklin

Role: YMCA of Greenville EIMG® Site Director

Sam is the Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer for the YMCA of Greenville, and has served in key strategic leadership positions within the national YMCA movement for 32 years. His scope of impact includes oversight of a $21 million dollar organizational budget, as well as management of all YMCA service locations in Greenville County, YMCA Camp Greenville, and SC Youth in Government program. Sam is a key facilitator for the Y’s multiple capital growth initiatives, corporate partnership development projects, and membership/program mission delivery objectives.

Alain Litwin, MD

As a forward-thinking healthcare executive with over 20 years of experience leading innovation at the intersection of medicine, research, and technology, my career is defined by a deep commitment to transforming healthcare delivery through strategic vision, cutting-edge research, engaging diverse stakeholders, and technology-driven solutions. As Chief Scientific Officer at Prisma Health, South Carolina’s largest health system with 19 hospitals and over 300 ambulatory sites across South Carolina and Tennessee, I lead multidisciplinary teams in driving healthcare innovation. I am dedicated to steering research initiatives towards transformative outcomes, groundbreaking discoveries and commercialization. I am committed to advancing public health by overseeing the development and evaluation of innovative patient-centered models of care for chronic diseases including mental health and addiction. Our learning health system integrates research with our clinical operations through our enterprise-level clinical operating system (pulse program and clinical advancement program with 19 clinical councils). As Principal Investigator or Site-Principal Investigator, I have secured over $60 million in grant funding, and my work has informed national and international guidelines and has been published in over 160 high-impact journals, including JAMA, Annals of Internal Medicine, Lancet Gastroenterology and Hepatology, American Journal of Public Health, Journal of Hepatology, and Clinical Infectious Diseases. I am a Fellow of the fifth class of the Aspen Health Innovators Fellowship and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.

Christle Ross

CEO, Foothills Area YMCA

Christle Ross is the CEO of the Foothills Area YMCA, a position she has held for the past nine years. With a deep-rooted passion for the Y’s mission, she has served in various leadership roles across Pickens, York, and Oconee counties. Throughout her career, Christle has played a key role in launching five new YMCA locations, bringing her expertise in facility design, planning, program development, and staff leadership to each project. “Watching a YMCA grow from an idea to a thriving community resource is an incredible experience,” she says. “Knowing that it will positively impact generations to come is the greatest reward.”