About us

About us

Dr Cliff Smith MBBS, FRACGP, DRANZCOG, Dip Obst RCOG

is a general practitioner with 13 years experience in PNG where he was involved in supervising in community health, medical administration and all manner of clinical work for a population of 40,000 rural people in the Western Highlands. During that time he worked as the Church/ Govt. Health Liaison Officer, as part of the Dept of Health Executive staff. He was commissioned by the PNG Department of Health to write a health care manual for Community health Workers (1st edition1986, 2^nd edition in 1996) which has been the standard textbook in community heath in PNG.

Since returning to Australia he has been working in general practice and then has worked part time as a staff worker in CMDFA form 1997 to 2008. When CMDFA established HealthServe Australia in 2004 he took up the role of its part time Executive Officer.

Dr Alan Gijsbers MBBS FRACP FAChAM DTM&H PGDipEPi
is a specialist physician in Addiction Medicine, Medical Director, Drug and Alcohol Liaison Unit, Royal Melbourne Hospital, Medical Director, Substance Withdrawal Unit, The Melbourne Clinic.
He was former Deputy Director, Department of Distance Education, CMC Vellore, South India, seconded by Interserve (Australia), Past Chairman of CMDFA., and currently State Chairman, ISCAST (Victoria), a forum for Christians in Science and Technology.
He has a special interest in evidence based medicine which started in CMC hospital Vellore where the dominant sources of knowledge were authoritative medical textbooks and clinicians.

Mr John Craik CFP (Ret), DipFP, DipLI, ANZIIF (Ret) Johnhas had a long career in insurance and financial planning and has been been prominent in numerous public and Christian community leadership roles. John is an Associate of Australian Insurance Institute (Retired), a Certified Financial Planner (Retired), a member of the Financial Planning Association of Australia (Retired). He has a Diploma in Life Insurance and the Diploma in Financial Planning from Deakin University. John is a past National President of the Association of Financial Advisers 1995-1996, as well as being a life member. Also a past Chairman Asia Pacific Life Insurance Council. 1997-1999. He has participated in many industry forums, particularly the formulation and introduction of the Code of Practice in the mid 90’s. Also was a member of the FPA Risk Committee (Ret) in 2007.

Dr. Michael Burke MBBS, BSc, MA, MSc (Clin Epi), MPH&TM, DRANZCOG, DCH, Dip Biblical Studies, FRACGP, FACTM, PhD, works in several fields of medicine and lives in Sydney, with his wife, Jean and three teenage sons. He continues to engage with the issues of the dignity of all made in the image of God and their right to health. He speaks two languages and likes twentieth century music. He is completing his PhD at the UNSW in gender and HIV issues based on his love and commitment to Tanzania and Tanzanians. He has worked in Tanzania for twelve years and continues to visit regularly.

Dr Owen Lewis

is a general practitioner with experience in rural South Australia and Nepal where he spent 13 years as a CMS missionary. Following a stint as foundation professor of family medicine in the BP Koirala Institute of Health Sciences in Dharan in eastern Nepal, Owen is currently based in Melbourne in the Nossal Institute of Health Sciences. During the time in Dharan, he became involved in a local disabled peoples organisation (DHERSEC) and continues in an advisory and fund raising role with them.

Lea Davis

Works as an Overseas Programme Officer for TEAR Australia managing TEAR's its AusAID-NGO Cooperation programme, heading up TEAR's Gender Equality Working Group, helping facilitate the roll out of gender equality policies and practice across the organisation and coordinating training for the overseas programme teams. She has 20 years of experience in international humanitarian aid work, and has overseen TEAR's development partner programmes in India, Burma, Cambodia, Thailand, Lao PDR, Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines and China. In Kenya she had a senior capacity building role in community health and nurse-midwife education.

Dr Peter Farrington

Peter was formerly Oral Surgeon and, Medical Supt. Manorom Christian Hospital Thailand then OMF International State director for Queensland; presently Tutor in Oral Surgery Queensland University

Dental School.and Dentist with Queensland Health. With a group of dentists in Queensland, he was one of the agents in prompting CMDFA to establish the organization of HealthServe Australia.

Dr Douglas Shaw MBBS (Hons), BA, MA, MTH, FRACGP, FAFPHM

completed his General Practice training in rural Queensland in 1987. After completing the Master in Tropical Health program, Doug moved to Cambodia to work with World Vision for 3 years, where he met, his wife Sally, a British nurse-midwife. Doug then completed a MA in Missiology in the UK and Public Health Medicine back in Australia. In 2001 the family moved back to Cambodia where Doug provided mother and child health and HIV and AIDS technical support to World Vision and other non-government organisations. Doug currently works as a Public Health Physician with the Communicable Disease Control Branch of SA Health and is the coodinator of the Intermed program, a 4 week intensive summer school in international health and development designed specifically for Christian health professionals.

r John Hagidimitriou
is a general practitioner working in Brisbane. he has his Master of Business administration and has interests in this field

Ms Barbara Lucas BAppSc (Phty), MEd, MPH, MAPA

is a physiotherapist and is Deputy Manager /Senior Physiotherapist -Paediatrics and Neonatology, Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney. Barbara trained at Sydney University (Cumberland College of Health Sciences - 1988), and has worked since in public hospitals ie RPAH, Brompton Hospital, London and RNSH. She has visited Fiji with a heart team (1997) and orthopaedic team (1998). She spent 8 months at the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre in Tanzania (2006), a major training institution for physiotherapists and other health workers in Africa.