UTN 2021 Speakers
Zoe Baer, BSN, RN, CEN - Clinical Nurse/Nurse Mentor, Emergency Department, University of Utah Health
Zoe Baer is currently serving as one of the Emergency Department Nursing Professional Development Practitioners at the University of Utah. She hails from North Carolina, where she obtained her nursing degree and began her nursing career at a regional health care center. She joined the University of Utah ED in 2018 and has worked as a bedside RN, nurse mentor, and currently in her role as ED Educator.
Megan Call, PhD - Associate Director, Resiliency Center, Office of Wellness and Integrative Health, University of Utah
Dr. Megan Call is a licensed counseling psychologist, an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and the Director of the Resiliency Center at University of Utah. She has research and clinical interests in promoting resilience and well-being among health care professionals, with a specific focus on embracing vulnerability and discomfort, incorporating informal mindfulness into everyday practice, improving communication and relationship skills among teams, and addressing systematic change.
Allie Evans, BSN, BSPH, RN, CEN - Nursing Professional Development Practitioner, University of Utah Health
Allie is serving as one of the two Nursing Professional Development Practitioners in the Emergency Department at the University of Utah Hospital. She started her nursing career in the University of Utah ED 5 years ago, and recently transitioned into her current role. Allie has specific interests in promoting education through interdisciplinary collaboration. In her spare time, she enjoys volunteering as a whitewater rafting guide and land steward in Southern Utah.
Megan Fix, MD - University of Utah School of Medicine
Dr. Megan Fix, MD is an Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine at the University of Utah School of Medicine. She serves as the Director of Education for emergency medicine as well as the faculty director of student mentoring as well as the course director for the Clinical Method Curriculum in the school of medicine. In addition to her academic positions, Dr. Fix is heavily involved in medical education on multiple levels. She teaches on a number of national and international EM educational courses, has been involved in leadership for Council of Residency Educators (CORD), is the Editor in Chief of the PEER online board preparation question bank, and is one of the Associate Editors of the EM:RAP online textbook CorePendium. Dr. Fix has received several awards of recognition, including the “2020 ACEP National Emergency Medicine Faculty Teaching Award”. She is a proud alumna of Stanford School of Medicine and the Harvard Affiliated Emergency Medicine Residency Program. Dr. Fix’ professional goal is to improve medical education through enthusiasm and mentorship.
Michael Adam Long, MD - Medical Director of Trauma Outreach and Injury Prevention, Division of Trauma, Acute Care Surgery, and Surgical Critical Care, Intermountain Medical Center
Dr. Long was born and raised in Colorado Springs, CO. He studied medicine at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, TX and subsequently his General Surgery Residency at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX. Dr. Long completed a fellowship in Trauma, Acute Care Surgery, and Surgical Critical Care at the Oregon Health and Science University. He is a member of the EAST trauma society as well as the Chest Wall Injury Society. He is the medical director of Trauma Outreach and Injury Prevention at Intermountain Medical Center. Dr. Long is an outdoorsman at heart and tries to get outside with his spouse and two dogs to hike, ski, bike ride, and fish as much as possible.
Kevin M McCulley, BS - Director, Preparedness and Response, Utah Department of Health
I have served as the Director of Preparedness and Response for the Utah Department of Health since 2010. In this role, I am responsible for administration and management of public health, medical, and special pathogens preparedness and response programs. Over the past decade, Utah has enhanced our system readiness for a variety of threats, including earthquakes, mass casualty events, burn and pediatric medical surge, other natural disasters, and novel high-consequence pathogens. Since January of 2020, I have served in various leadership roles in Utah's COVID-19 response. Starting as the Incident Commander for the Utah Department of Health single agency command, I transitioned to the Unified Coordination Group leadership team under the State of Utah Unified Command structure, focusing on medical surge contingencies. In addition to serving the State of Utah, I provide disaster consulting services, and serve as an instructor at the DHS Center for Domestic Preparedness, and the Intermountain Center for Disaster Preparedness. In my spare time, our family enjoys exploring the mountains and deserts of the Western US, by foot, ski, or 4wd vehicle.
Amy Mikkelsen, MPH, CPH, CHES - Utah Department of Health
Amy holds her Master of Public Health degree from the University of Utah and has worked in public health at both the state and local level for almost 13 years, primarily in prevention and education. She has extensive experience collaborating with community partners and is currently a Primary Prevention Coordinator in the Violence and Injury Prevention Program at the Utah Department of Health.
In this role, Amy oversees staff and programming for all violence prevention contracts including sexual violence, domestic violence, child maltreatment and suicide. Amy is also a subject matter expert in suicide prevention and supports both statewide and local efforts to build capacity around comprehensive suicide prevention across Utah. Her goal is to create sustainable change to reduce violence in Utah, including suicide, and to shift the conversation around these issues.
Mark Shah, MD, FACEP - Utah Emergency Physicians; Summit, Salt Lake, Tooele Healthcare Coalition
Dr. Mark Shah has been a practicing emergency physician since finishing residency at the University of New Mexico in 2003. He has worked with Utah Emergency Physicians since 2006; staffing emergency departments for Intermountain Healthcare in the Salt Lake area. Mark has been involved in disaster medicine since 2001. He was the medical director for the New Mexico Disaster Medical Assistance Team (DMAT) and oversaw the care of thousands of people after Hurricanes Francis, Katrina, and Rita. Mark helped develop, and is currently a medical officer for the Utah DMAT, with whom he deployed to assist Texas after Hurricane Harvey. Other disaster deployments have included the earthquake in Haiti and a typhoon in the Philippines. Mark develops policy with the Utah Hospital Association and the Utah Department of Health, and chairs the Utah Crisis Standards of Care Working Group. He is also the medical director for Salt Lake, Summit, Tooele Healthcare Coalition. He teaches extensively in the area of disaster medicine and is adjunctive faculty with the University of Utah. He leads Intermountain system-wide preparedness activities as the Medical Director of Disaster Preparedness.
Dorita Ann Sondereker, RN, BSN, CEN, CFRN, TCRN - Regional Program Director of the StaRN/StarTECH education, HealthTrust Workforce Solutions
Doctoral Candidate Dorita Ann Sondereker, RN, BSN, CEN, CFRN, CMTE, TCRN was the administrative director for Emergency Services at Sunrise Hospital, a 690-bed acute care hospital and member facility of Hospital Corporation of America’s (HCA) Sunrise Health System in Las Vegas, NV, during the time of the Route 92 Festival Massacre.
Sondereker was responsible for a 78-bed adult emergency department, Level II trauma center, rapid response team, and 33-bed behavioral health unit that receives more than 177,000 annual visits making it the largest ER in the state of Nevada. Sunrise Hospital is the closest facility to the Las Vegas strip and plays host to more than 44,000 EMS offloads and more than 3000 annual trauma visits.
Formerly the Director of Emergency Services for Southern Hills Hospital & Medical Center, also in Las Vegas with HCA, Sondereker brings a world of experience to the field of nursing which began over thirty years ago. Her experience ranges from a burn specialist to critical care transport and flight nurse with Mercy Air, Air Methods.
Sondereker is close to completing her masters of science in nursing. She has earned many awards recognizing her excellence and contribution to the field of nursing which include Mount Mercy Distinguished Alumni Service Award, Who’s Who in American Colleges and Universities and was the recipient of the Mary Catherine McCauley Award.
Her nursing career is defined by with her passion and compassion and her penchant to act in service to her staff, fellow care team members and the broader Las Vegas community - which plays hosts to 42 million annual visitors.
Sondereker raises thoroughbred race horses with her husband John; loves golf, and barrel racing, western dressage and ranch pleasure with her two quarter horses. She currently is the regional program director of the StaRN/StarTECH education through HealthTrust Workforce Solutions, and is over Continental, Mountain and Far West divisions of HCA.