FacebookTwitterPinterestLiza M. Swedarsky MDFounderChief Executive Officer Dr. Liza Swedarsky is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Health Vows. She is a board certified Obstetrician/Gynecologist and a Clinical Instructor at Harvard Medical School. She is a faculty member of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology in the Division of Urban Health at Brigham and Women’s and Faulkner Hospitals. She has dedicated her career to serving in Boston’s neighborhoods and community health centers since 2006 to guarantee women have access to convenient, advanced gynecologic care and the full spectrum of surgical services including laparoscopic and robotic surgery. Liza feels the service aspect of clinical care, “doctoring,” and patient interactions are key and foundational. She recognizes true transformation, self-care, and change begin in the mind. She teaches women to take charge of their unique journey in achieving optimal health and longevity and offers supportive spaces in her workshop series. She pioneered programming to eliminate health disparities and inequities recognizing women need mindfulness, self-empowerment, self-advocacy, and health education tools so they can better navigate complex health care systems and interactions with their doctors. She created and facilitates the Health Vows Program in order to Promote Health Equity and Conscious Living by targeting individual behavioral changes. The workshop series runs for seven consecutive weeks and empowers women to honor seven Health Vows. Her vision has been recently supported by the Mass League of Community Health Center’s Special Projects Grant in 2019. In January of 2021 she was awarded a Brigham Care Redesign Incubator and Startup Program (BCRISP) award in support of the Health Vows Program. Her passion for serving and educating women was inspired by her own upbringing raised in poverty, without Health or Dental Insurance, as a Native of South Bend, Indiana. She recalls what it was like to have more questions than answers and the importance of non-judgment. Dr. Swedarsky remembers how early interactions with physicians and health workers shaped her comfort level and her ability to be proactive. As the first person in her family to attend college, she was also the first to have health insurance, as it was required of every student who attended Northwestern University, her Alma Mater. Recognizing the importance of every patient interaction, after years of caring for One Patient At a Time, she was inspired to make an impact on a larger scale. Health Vows was born out of her desire to facilitate educational programs, workshops, and hold safe spaces that offer tools for women to be better self-advocates, live empowered lives, and improve their understanding of their health care needs. In the end she inspires women to make self honoring choices. She feels access to quality, relatable information regarding many topics women want to learn about is lacking and provides a trusted, unbiased perspective. Her true passion lives in her ability to inspire and and empower women to learn about their bodies in a theme of self-love and acceptance, not fear. She teaches knowledge and prevention is key. Her workshops also emphasize the importance of taking an active role in the patient-doctor relationship and she provides conscious tools to reframe distracting, negative thinking that often can take over one's experience. In her ideal world, disparities in healthcare and health outcomes would not exist and physicians would have time to educate their patients. Above all, Liza believes women must take the time to educate themselves and vow to live with the same intentions and commitment they give to all other aspects of their lives such as their marriages, relationships, churches, jobs, and any other area in life where unwritten vows exist. She knows honoring the seven Health Vows guarantees an abundant, conscious, joy filled, healthier, more present life...because she embodies them in her own!