Dr. Harry Brown, Dr. Jorge Mera, Whitney Essex

Harry J. Brown is a retired Captain in the U.S. Public Health Service. He spent over 26 years in uniform, and all of his career was spent in the Indian Health Service. He attended the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, Texas, and completed a residency in family medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, SC. Harry is board certified in family medicine. He served as the Chief Medical Officer for the Nashville Area from 2007 – 2014, and as Acting Chief Medical Officer for the Billings Area for 2015. He currently works as a hospitalist for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in Cherokee, NC, and as a medical epidemiologist for the United South and Eastern Tribes in Nashville, TN as part of their Tribal Epidemiology Center.

Jorge Mera, MD, FACP, is the Director of Infectious Diseases for Cherokee Nation Health Services (CNHS), the largest tribally operated health care system in the United States. He completed his fellowship in Infectious Diseases and Clinical Microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas and is Board Certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) in Infectious Diseases. During recent years Jorge’s efforts have been dedicated to organizing the Cherokee Nation HCV elimination program, as well as the HIV/HCV ECHO project. He is also the Director of the HIV clinic since 2012 and the Principal Investigator of the End the HIV Epidemic for the CNHS. He is a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine of the Oklahoma State University Health Science Center and a Fellow of the American College of Physicians.

Whitney Essex, MSN, FNP-BC, is a Family Nurse Practitioner for Cherokee Nation Health Services. Mrs. Essex works in the Infectious Diseases Department, where she is the coordinator for the Cherokee Nation Hepatitis C Elimination program. She assists in the maintenance of general infectious diseases clinical services, as well as the provision of medical care for patients accessing HIV, PrEP, Hepatitis C, and other infectious diseases-related services.