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Victor Chen, MD, MPH

Medical Ambassadors International

Dr. Victor Chen served as the Global Coordinator for Medical Ambassadors International (MAI) from 2015 to 2022 and has been involved in transformational development and community health work for 14 years. He currently still serves on the executive and global leadership teams for MAI. He and his family lived in Central Asia for 4 years where he served as the Director of Community Development and Health for an NGO working in the sectors of community development, preventive health, and disability. Before joining Medical Ambassadors, Victor worked as a family physician in a community health center and served on the teaching faculty of a family medicine residency program in California. He received his MPH from the University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health and his MD from the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine. Victor also serves on the board for Vine House Ministries in Modesto, CA; The Refuge Retreat Center in Shingletown, CA; and on the representative council for the Global CHE Network. Victor is married with two daughters, ages 11 and 13. They enjoy traveling, road trips, and being in the outdoors.

Flourishing by Design: Imagining Medical Missions for 2040

Our predecessors faithfully built institutions that have served for generations. Our challenge is different. We have inherited those institutions into a world they could scarcely have imagined. Population growth, urbanization, changing disease patterns, financial pressures, conflict, climate shocks, and technological change are reshaping healthcare across low- and middle-income countries.

Drawing on new data about the Christian health ecosystem, strategic consultations with global and African Christian health leaders, and field experience across Africa and Asia, this session explores what it will take for Christian health ministries to flourish by 2040.

Together we’ll imagine what it will take for Christian health ministries to flourish by 2040, strengthening resilient institutions, cultivating exceptional local leadership, and mobilizing a broader range of Christian expertise from medicine and nursing to governance, education, engineering, finance, data science, and technology.

How can Christian health ministries become indispensable partners in building resilient health systems that reflect the compassion and hope of Christ? The legacy of the next generation of medical missions will be measured not only by the number of missionaries sent, but by the resilience, flourishing, and Christ-centered witness of systems they strengthen.