Abigail Batties, D.O.

Dr. Battjes earned her undergraduate degree in Chemistry from Hope College, Holland, MI. After receiving her Doctor of Osteopathy from A.T. Sill University, Kirskville College of Osteopathetic Medicine in Missouri, Dr. Battjes completed her postdoctoral training as a Family Medicine resident at Saint Joseph Regional Medical Center in Mishawaka, IN where she served as Chief Resident responsible for management and care of patients in the acute care setting, obstetric setting, emergency room, as well as nursing home patients. Dr. Battjes was the recipient of the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine Teacher’s Award Resident Teacher Award which recognizes the resident who has best demonstrated interest in and commitment to family medicine education

Dr. Battjes provides family medical care through the Saint Joseph Physician Network in South Bend and currently serves on their executive and recruitment committees. Currently Dr. Battjes is a preceptor for Indiana University School of Medicine – South Bend and the SJRMC Family Medicine Residency. She is a member of the American Academy of Family Physicians since 2010.

Katharine Callaghan, M.D., M.P.A.

Dr. Callaghan ‘12 is an Associate Director at Memorial Hospital’s Family Medicine Residency Program in South Bend. Since 2020, she has been an adjunct professor through the Hillebrand Center at Notre Dame.

After graduating from Notre Dame, Dr. Callaghan remained in South Bend for a year to work with two different non-profit organizations in the area. She then attended Vanderbilt University School of Medicine earning her Doctor of Medicine degree as well as a certificate in biomedical ethics in 2017. While a resident and fellow at Memorial Hospital in South Bend, she obtained her Master of Public Affairs degree at Indiana University. She is board certified in Family Medicine. Throughout her education, Dr. Callaghan received awards for academic excellence, leadership, and community involvement. 

The ways in which healthcare practitioners’ spiritual beliefs intersect with the practice of medicine, specifically in encounters with the sickness and suffering within themselves and that experienced in the story of their patients has been a particular interest of Dr. Callaghan.

Dr. Damitz ’89 currently serves as the Chief of the University of North Carolina Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Director of Aesthetic Surgery and a Professor of Surgery.  In addition, Dr. Damitz is active in the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS). She is also the representative to the American College of Surgeons National Accreditation Program for Breast Center, and a trustee of the Southeastern Society of Plastic Surgeons. In Fall 2020, Dr. Damitz was honored with the Ethel F. and James A. Valone, MD, Distinguished Professor of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. Her accomplishments now include this prestigious endowed professorship at UNC.

After graduating from Notre Dame, she earned her medical degree from Hahnemann University School of Medicine in 1993. She then completed her general surgery and plastic surgery residencies at UNC. She also completed a general plastic surgery fellowship with Charlotte Plastic Surgery, and a breast and aesthetic fellowship with Nashville Plastic Surgery.

As an adjunct professor for the Hillebrand Center at Notre Dame, Dr. Damitz offers clinic insights for student training and partners on common research interests for compassionate care in medicine. Her professional specialty areas include facial and body aesthetics, breast and oncologic reconstruction, general reconstructive surgery of the face and body, and facial trauma.

She also serves as the vice president of the ND Club of Eastern North Carolina.

Rachel Rose, MSN, RN-CPLC 

Rachel Rose earned her BSN in 1996 and MSN-Education in 2019 at Bethel University in Mishawaka, Indiana. From 1998 to 2017 Ms Rose worked as a Labor and Delivery nurse providing individualized holistic care with a deep knowledge of the complexities in the patient experience of pregnancy, and parenthood. Building on that work experience, she now advocates for patients, especially those with cultural needs or perinatal loss as the Perinatal Outreach Coordinator at the Saint Joseph Health System.  She is responsible for program coordination of support services in perinatal hospice, difficult diagnoses, and subsequent pregnancy after perinatal loss. Ms Rose has been a guest lecturer at the Hillebrand Center since 2012 and was appointed an adjunct professor in 2023.

In 2017, Ms. Rose completed her RNC-Perinatal Loss Care (PLC) certification through the Hospice and Palliative Nursing Association after serving as Perinatal Bereavement Coordinator for 16 years which included development of the first perinatal hospice program in the Michiana area. Her MSN research focused on ‘The lived experience of Certified Nurse Midwives in perinatal death care’.

Anton Salud, M.D., M.A.

Dr. Antonio deVilla Salud ‘92 is an intensivist/pulmonologist with Madison Medical Associates, LLC, at Ascension Columbia-St. Mary’s Hospital Milwaukee. He joins the Hillebrand Center in 2020 as an adjunct professor. After studying theology and pre-medicine at Notre Dame, Dr. Salud attended the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee where he was awarded his medical degree in1999 and an M.A. in biomedical ethics in 2003. He completed his residency in pulmonary and critical care at The University of Utah Affiliated Hospitals in Salt Lake City. Additionally, Dr. Salud received a UT Certificate in Quality Improvement/Quality Assurance Project: End-of-Life Issues in the ICU.

Dr. Salud’s interest in compassionate care has been expressed in the papers he’s presented at conferences and round-tables and in the research he has done during his educational and professional career. Since March 2020, he has delved into research for “COVID-19 Pandemic Disaster Preparedness Development for Critical Care through C3.”

Mark Sandock, M.D.

Dr. Sandock is a South Bend native who completed his medical education at the Indiana University School of Medicine after graduating from Miami University (Ohio). He started a solo practice of internal medicine in 1975, and was employed by Saint Joseph Physician Network in 1994 to establish their internal medicine practice. He worked there until his retirement in 2008.

After retiring from clinical practice, Dr. Sandock was hired as the first physician consultant to the administration of Elkhart General Hospital. Later, he worked as a physician consultant for Saint Joseph Regional Medical Center in Mishawaka and helped restructure the Physician Assistance Committee for disruptive/impaired physicians across their health system. He was heavily involved in implementing a provider burnout and suicide prevention pilot program. 

In 1986, Dr. Sandock helped establish the Sister Maura Brannick Health Center for indigent patients in South Bend and he served for five years as the first volunteer medical director. He remains an active volunteer physician for the health center. On behalf of the clinic, he and Sister Maura were honored with a “Point of Light Award” from President George H. W. Bush in 1991.

Dr. Sandock currently mentors students at the Indiana University School of Medicine in South Bend.

Stephen Trzeciak, M.D., M.P.H.

Dr. Trzeciak ’92 is a physician scientist, Chief of Medicine at Cooper University Health Care, and Professor and Chair of Medicine at Cooper Medical School of Rowan University in Camden, New Jersey.  Dr. Trzeciak is a specialist in intensive care medicine and a clinical researcher funded by the National Institutes of Health with more than 100 publications in the scientific literature, primarily in the field of resuscitation science.  Dr. Trzeciak’s publications have been featured in prominent medical journals, such as: Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), Circulation, and The New England Journal of Medicine.  His scientific program has been supported by research grants from the American Heart Association, the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, with Dr. Trzeciak serving in the role of Principal Investigator.

Currently, Dr. Trzeciak’s research is focused on a new field called “Compassionomics”, in which he is studying the scientific effects of compassion on patients, patient care, and those who care for patients.  He is an author of the best-selling book: Compassionomics: The Revolutionary Scientific Evidence that Caring Makes a Difference, which has been featured in numerous media outlets such as CNN, NPR, and The Washington Post.  For this work, Dr. Trzeciak was awarded the 2019 Influencers of Healthcare Award by The Philadelphia Inquirer.  Broadly, Dr. Trzeciak’s mission is to make healthcare more compassionate through science.

Dr. Dominic Vachon

Dr. Vachon is the John G. Sheedy M.D. Director of the Ruth M. Hillebrand Center for Compassionate Care in Medicine in the College of Science at the University of Notre Dame. He is also a professor of practice in the Preprofessional Studies Department, where he teaches courses in compassionate care in medicine, medical counseling skills, and spiritualties of caring in the helping professions. Dr. Vachon does research on the internal mental and emotional process of the clinician compassion mental state in patient care, clinician communication skills, mental performance in high stress clinical specialties, and innovations in medical training applying the science of compassion. For over 10 years, he was on the faculty of the St. Joseph Family Medicine Residency Program as the Director of Behavioral Medicine and Caring Science Training. He graduated from Notre Dame in 1980 with bachelor degrees in Psychology and Philosophy. He received an M.Div. from Notre Dame in 1985. In 1993, he received a Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology from Loyola University of Chicago. He has been a practicing psychologist and has been involved with training physicians, nurses, psychologists, and other helping professions throughout his career. He is author of the book, How Doctors Care: The Science of Compassionate and Balanced Caring in Medicine recently published by Cognella Press and a co-author of The Power & Pain of Nursing: Self-Care Practices to Protect & Replenish Compassion (2021). Last year he was invited to do the foreword to the book, Visionary Leadership in Healthcare: Excellence in Practice, Policy, and Ethics (2022). Dr. Vachon is a Certified Compassion Cultivation Training (CCT) Teacher with the Compassion Institute. He is also an Adjunct Clinical Assistant Professor of Family Medicine at the Indiana University School of Medicine-South Bend. Dr. Vachon has devoted the last 30 years of his professional career to supporting and training physicians, nurses, residents, medical students, premedical students, and other clinicians in patient communication skills as well as dealing with burnout and the recovery of compassionate care in the inner lives of clinicians. He provides continuing education and organizational consulting on integrating the science of compassion into healthcare practice.