Board of Directors

Sara Gallo

Executive Board President

Sara Gallo PA-C, MMS is a PA with 10+ years of primary care experience specializing in value-based care, telehealth, patient centered medical home, and population management. She operates as VP of Clinical Services and clinician for Colorado-based telemedicine practice Care on Location serving Colorado’s most underserved and marginalized populations all over the state mainly CO Medicaid members. She leads business development for clinical service lines, owns provider and patient experience/customer success, manages the healthcare provider team, and grows strategic partnerships. She has subject matter expertise for state and federal telemedicine policy and practice standards including optimizing medical scope and how to navigate the limitations of virtual care. She is a Director-At-Large for Colorado Academy of PAs and President Elect of PAs in Virtual Medicine and Telemedicine and co-leads both organization’s public affairs/social committees. She is passionate about developing telemedicine solutions that can be scaled as sustainable and affordable models to improve health equity, access to care, and patient /provider experience. Her mission is to improve the quality of healthcare delivery inclusive of all populations, empower the patient/provider relationship, and innovate the health care experience.

Mayra Martinez

Executive Board President-elect

Mayra O. Martínez, DScPAs, MS, MPAS, PA-C attended the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) where she received a Bachelor's of Science with a major in Biology and Math with a minor in Chemistry. She then received a Master's of Science in Mathematical Sciences and a Master's of Science in Physician Assistant Studies. She continued her studies and received a Doctorate of Science in Physician Assistant Studies from the Massachusetts College of Pharmacology and Health Sciences (MCPHS). She also has a background in teaching and taught at the mathematics department at UTRGV as well as high school science. She has been practicing medicine with a focus on rural medicine, family medicine, and pediatrics. She has been the lead PA for telemedicine for the last 3 years. She was the first elected President-Elect of the Rio Grande Valley PA Society and is the President-Elect of the Society for PAs in Pediatrics. She is also a part of several committees of TAPA and a member of AAPA.

Jessica Bhavsar

Executive Board Treasurer

Jessica Bhavsar, PA-C graduated with a MSPAS from the Medical University of South Carolina. She has been practicing as a PA for over 10 years in various specialties including emergency medicine, urgent care, gastroenterology, and most recently addiction medicine. For the past 3 years, Jessica has been practicing exclusively via telemedicine. In addition to her clinical work, Jessica serves as a clinical advisor to digital health startups. This enables her to contribute her expertise and insights to emerging companies in the digital health space. She is particularly passionate about fostering PA involvement in this field. She has also been an active member of both AAPA and PAVMT for several years.

Mercedes Dodge

Past Executive Board President

PA Dodge graduated from UC Davis in 2008, worked in primary care, women’s health, urgent care, pediatrics and psychiatry. Additionally, Mrs. Dodge holds a Specialty Certificate of Added Qualification (CAQ) in Psychiatry from the National Commission on Certification of Physician Assistants (NCCPA). Prior to being a PA, she worked in laboratory and clinical research and worked as an EMT. She has served several leadership roles including working on the California Academy of PAs, first as a student board member and then board member during her PA career in California. PA Dodge has served as President of San Diego Society of PAs for two terms. In her work, she has spearheaded and implemented several initiatives and process improvements. Some include leading behavioral health programs, developing Grand Rounds and CME sessions for 2 large organizations. Her passion is in working collaboratively with providers from a wide range of service lines, and promoting provider wellness in committees in my prior organizations. PA Dodge currently works as an independent contractor and provides telepsychiatry serving the Alaska population and provides telemedicine services in addiction medicine in Austin, Texas. She is passionate in providing support and education to her clients, and works as a Parenting Coach and Educator. In her free time she enjoys running, fishing, hiking with her 2 boys, husband and 2 dogs, and learning new sports, most recently golf, tennis, and skateboarding.

Desmond Watt

Founding President

Desmond Watt, PA-C, is a co-founder of PAs in Virtual Medicine and Telemedicine and founding president of the executive board. He has practiced in virtual care for over 6 years with a national independent primary care organization, and has spent a significant portion of that time in virtual care design, delivery and workflow optimization. He is a passionate advocate for the PA role in virtual care as a critical part of our healthcare future, and believes strongly that PAs must take a leadership position within the rapidly growing virtual care space.

During his tenure as PAVMT Board President, Desmond has spoken to large audiences of PA and healthcare executives, professionals, PA program faculty and students regarding telemedicine and PA advocacy and leadership within this field of care. He is also chair of the AAPA ad hoc committee on PAs in telemedicine, under the Board of Directors of AAPA, lead by President David Mittman.

Desmond makes his home in the suburbs of Chicago, Illinois, and is a 2012 graduate of the Midwestern University - Downers Grove PA program.

Sarah Purdy

Past Executive Board President

Sarah Purdy PA-C is a physician assistant graduate of University of Florida class of 2010. A military spouse traveling the county collecting state licenses led her to pursue telemedicine. Sarah has extensive experience in emergency medicine, primary care, urgent care, workers compensation/occupational medicine, psychiatry, and addiction medicine with X waiver of 275 patients for MAT. She is currently doing full time telemedicine for addiction medicine and full-time sole owner operator of a telemedicine psychiatry, primary care and urgent care practice opening during peak of pandemic. She was PAVMT first legislative co-chair (2019), president-elect (2020) and current president (2021). She helped to create PAVMT state by state telemedicine guide to help navigate the state by state regulation for PAs doing telemedicine. During the pandemic in 2020 she participated in some consulting PRN work advocating with telemedicine companies wanting to expand services to PAs. She is experienced with startup telemedicine companies on business strategy and expansion especially for creating PA jobs. Current and active member of the AAPA and state license in IL, CA, FL, WA , MA, VA, NC, AZ and pending numerous more. She is also a very proud mom to a 3 yr old son and 18 month oId daughter and wife to a US Navy Commander who is currently actively deployed.

Amanda Shelley

Director at Large - Midwest (Il, IN, IA, KS, MI, MN, MO, NE, ND, OH, SD, WI

Amanda Shelley, PA-C, is the immediate past-president of PAs in Virtual Medicine and Telemedicine. She has been delivering care exclusively via virtual means for over five years in primary care and now leads a team of PAs and NPs doing the same. She is passionate about telemedicine and the need for PAs to be included in the growth of telemedicine. Amanda has particular interest in legislative advocacy and has represented PAs in advocacy efforts at the state and national levels. She believes legislative change is key to PAs' success in the telemedicine realm. In Fall of 2019 Amanda spoke to the Federation of State Medical Boards about the need for PA license portability and she has also spoken at multiple PA programs and state CME conferences regarding telemedicine.

Amanda is an Arizona native and a graduate of A.T. Still University/Arizona School of Health Sciences Class of 2005.  Prior to her current position, Amanda had worked in pediatrics, urgent care and mobile geriatrics, seeing patients in assisted living and memory care facilities. She also teaches basic suturing, in-office procedures, and telemedicine courses at CME conferences.

Hina Mazharuddin

Executive Board Vice President

Hina Mazharuddin, PA-C is the Vice President for PA’s in Virtual Medicine and Telemedicine. She graduated from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX in 2009. She has worked in multiple areas of medicine that include Family Practice, Retail Health, Occupational Medicine/ Orthopedics, Pain Management, Aesthetic Medicine, Obesity Medicine and now Telemedicine. Since 2018, she has served as an advisor for various corporations, franchises, and private clinics to integrate telemedicine into their practices.

Hina presents at state and national conferences about telemedicine and leads our PAVMT Educational Pillar. She teaches PA students about telemedicine, serves as a guest lecturer to various PA programs and sister affiliations. She works behind the scenes with PA programs integrating Telehealth into PA didactic and clinical education. Her passion for education allows her to also serve as the mentor for the PA Student Directors, PA students and Pre-medical students.

Christopher Dietrich

Past Executive Board Treasurer

Christopher Dietrich is the current Board of Directors-Treasurer for PAs in Virtual Medicine and Telemedicine. He is a medical director with Orion Behavioral Health Network. Orion Behavioral Health Network is located at Eagle River, Alaska and serving greater Alaska. Mr. Dietrich is a lead advocate for virtual care adoption, by decreasing healthcare access disparities. He currently holds board seats with the: Alaska Collaborative for Telemedicine and Telehealth, Alaska Academy of Physician Assistants, and PAs in Virtual Medicine and Telemedicine.

Christi Dahlgren

Executive Board Secretary

Christi is the legislative co-chair for PAs in Virtual Medicine and Telemedicine. A Washington State native, she began her health career working as a nurse in the bone marrow transplantation and infectious disease group at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, WA. It was here where she had her first exposure to telemedicine and appreciated the accessibility and quality this could have on a larger scale.

Christi knew she would return to school and discovered the PA role aligned more with what she was looking for professionally. She is a graduate of the University of Washington MEDEX Northwest Physician Assistant Program in Seattle, WA. She has spent her PA career working as a hospitalist in a rural, underserved community and sees the significant need for PAs in communities as such. She finds herself providing primary and preventative care for her patients while managing their acute illness in the hospital. Christi became involved with the local PA association in Washington State (WAPA) early on in her career. She has met with state representatives and has discussed the necessity to modernize PA practice and licensing. She has become passionate about the evolving era of telemedicine and feels the utilization of PAs in this role will have a profound impact on healthcare.

Christi is licensed in California and Washington State. She has precepted PA students in the hospital. She is interested in pursuing a certificate in integrative medicine.She lives in Kirkland WA.

Michael Scott Mortensen

Director at Large - West (AK, AZ, CA, HI, ID, MO, NV, NM, OR, UT, WA, WY)

Tara Amini

Director at Large - South (AL, AR, DE, Fl, GA, KY, LA, MD, MS, NC, OK, SC, TN, VA, WV, TX)

Eric Le Clair

Director at Large (ME, NH, VT, MA, RI, CT, NJ, NY, PA, D.C.)

Jaime Engholdt

Employment/Entrepreneurship Committee Chair

Dipu Patel

CME Committee Chair

Lea Meine

Legislative Committee Chair