The Orthodox Union’s Department of Community Engagement and the PUAH Institute will hold its second annual Jewish Medical Ethics Conference at New York City’s Fifth Avenue Synagogue, 5 East 62nd Street, Sunday November 3, 2013 from 9:15 a.m. until 3 p.m. This year’s conference will focus on Building Healthy Families: Fertility, Medicine, and Halacha.
Lectures, workshops, and roundtable discussions led by rabbinic and medical experts will include topics such as BRCA: Ethics and Genetic Testing; Fertility Preservation: Hope For the Future; and Physicians and Rabbis: Working Together and Helping Couples Build Families. Special sessions for mental health professionals, marital education teachers, and religious advisors on Jewish family purity will be featured as well.
In addition to the annual conference, the OU’s Department of Community Engagement creates initiatives with the mission of strengthening and invigorating Jewish family life through various programs and workshops on postive parenting; fortifying healthy marriages; caregiving for ailing and elderly family members; and providing educational opportunities for seniors. In last year’s successful inaugural OU-PUAH conference, more than two hundred rabbis, medical and mental health professionals, marriage educators, and the general public participated in discussions on the topic of intimacy.
Named after the biblical heroine in Exodus who served as a midwife to the Jews in spite of Pharaoh’s decree prohibiting Jewish birth in Egypt, the PUAH Institute provides counseling, referrals and support, free-of-charge, to all those seeking professional help. Professional PUAH supervisors, under the guidance of Rabbi Menachem Burstein, certify the genetic integrity of fertility treatments worldwide, with its offices based in Brooklyn and Jerusalem.
Rabbi Judah Isaacs, director of the Department of Community Engagement, explained: “The OU is proud to work together with PUAH, a world-renowned organization, to sponsor the Medical Ethics Conference. We are proud to bring together rabbis, religious authorities in Jewish family purity, medical professionals and the general community to learn about the intersection of medicine and halacha, in strengthening and sustaining our Jewish community.”
“For thousands of Jewish families, the name PUAH Institute evokes sentiments of appreciation for a life-altering experience of profound magnitude,” said Lea Davidson, PUAH Institute’s executive director. “PUAH Institute has been acclaimed for helping individuals and couples who desire to build Jewish families overcome the challenges of infertility through counseling and education services as well as ongoing guidance in areas of women’s health and wellness.”
The speakers of the conference include:
• Rabbi Elie Abadie, Founding Rabbi, Safra Synagogue
• Natan Bar-Chama, M.D., Male Reproductive Health, RMA of NY, Mt. Sinai
• Keith Berkowitz, M.D., Medical Director, Center for Balanced Health, NY
• Michael Glassner, M.D., Director, Mainline Fertility Center, Bryn Mawr, PA
• Richard Grazi, M.D., Director, Genesis Fertility & Reproductive Medicine, NY
• Sue Gross, M.D., Professor of Clinical Obstetrics & Gynecology and Women’s Health, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NY
• Lawrence Grunfeld, M.D., Co-Director of Reproductive Medicine Associates of NY
• Rabbi Yaakov Kermaier, Fifth Avenue Synagogue
• Joshua Klein, M.D., Medical Director, RMA of NY, Brooklyn Office
• Rabbi Elchanan Lewis, Assistant Director of Puah Institute
• Harry Lieman, M.D., Associate Professor and Director of the Division of Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility, Albert Einstein College of Medicine/Montefiore Medical Center
• Michelle Pfeifer, M.D., Cornell College of Medicine
• Edward Reichman, M.D., Professor of Clinical Epidemiology & Population Health, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, NY
• Peter Schlegel, M.D., Professor of Reproductive Medicine and Chairman of Urology, The Weil Medical College of Cornell University
• Richard Schanler, M.D., Director, Neonatal Services, Cohen Children’s Medical Center of NY and North Shore Long Island Jewish Health Systems
• Rabbi Richard Weiss, M.D., Rabbi, Young Israel of Hillcrest
• Rabbi Gideon Weitzman, Director, Puah Institute
• Rabbi Mordechai Willig, Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, Yeshiva University
For more information on free registration, call 212.613.8300 or visit the OU Department of Community Engagement’s website at www.oucommunity.org. Registration is requested, breakfast and lunch will be included.