Associate Professor of Social Work, University of Connecticut School of Social Work
Senior Managing Advisor & Founder, Be Advice – part of Vivium Zorggroep
Physician and Writer
Professor at the University of Pennsylvania and Co-Director of the Penn Memory Center
Director and Chair of Emergency Medicine, Chestnut Hill Hospital
Dr. Jenice Baker is the director and Chair of Emergency Medicine at Chestnut Hill Hospital in Philadelphia. She has practiced community emergency medicine for over a decade providing compassionate clinical care and was named Top Doc in 2018 and Top Emergency Medicine Specialist in 2020.
In addition to practicing clinically, Dr. Baker advocates for New Jersey Emergency Physicians. She is a fellow of the American College of Emergency Physicians (FACEP), and in 2015, was elected to the Board of Directors of the New Jersey ACEP Chapter and is currently the president-elect. Alongside advocacy, she is passionate about education and has given many presentations on various topics including women leadership and violence in the emergency department.
Dr. Baker is also a national speaker on provider bias and medical racism.
Dr. Jenice Baker M.D., received her bachelors and medical degrees from Cornell University, and Weill Cornell Medical College. Thereafter, she successfully completed a four-year Emergency Residency program at Cornell and Columbia's New York-Presbyterian Teaching hospitals.
Dr. Jenice Baker was born in Trinidad & Tobago and immigrated to Brooklyn, N.Y. as a young child. She is married to Rafiq Baker and resides in Voorhees, N.J. with their daughters.
Dr. Baker is a proud member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Incorporated, New Jersey Garden City Alumnae Chapter and Jack and Jill Incorporated, South Jersey Chapter.
Cofounder & CEO, Rendever, Inc
A passion for improving the lives of seniors has always been at the forefront of my career; it drove me to co-found Rendever in 2016 and a few years later, I was honored for the work we’ve accomplished by being included in the 2019 Forbes 30 Under 30 Consumer Technology list.
After my grandmother moved into a senior living community, my family saw the impact social isolation had on her and other residents firsthand, and we learned that this wasn’t a unique experience for families. Recent surveys have found over 20% of older adults to be socially isolated, and research has proven that social isolation is as detrimental to one’s health as smoking 15 cigarettes per day. I set out to create a solution to this issue and serve the older adult population, leading to the launch of Rendever – a virtual reality platform that combats social isolation among older adults through the power of shared experiences.
As a child in upstate New York, I grew up volunteering in a local senior living community, where I first saw the power that positive shared experiences could have on an otherwise lonely demographic, and went on to study cognitive decline in the aging population. While I also studied neuroprosthetics and contributed to the Walk Again Project (FIFA 2014), my neuroscience research was largely focused on the link between functional structural changes in the brain that happen as you age, and the associated deficits in economic-based decision making skills. After my grandmother moved into a senior living community, my family saw the impact social isolation had on her and other residents firsthand, and we learned that this wasn’t a unique experience for families. Recent surveys have found over 20% of older adults to be socially isolated, and research has proven that social isolation is as detrimental to one’s health as smoking 15 cigarettes per day. I set out to create a solution to this issue and serve the older adult population, leading to the launch of Rendever – a virtual reality platform that combats social isolation among older adults through the power of shared experiences. I’ve also led the development of a niche research-based social network, created a crowdfunding platform for ecological conservation, created the first major college scholarship program for students of martial arts, and architected a grassroots initiative focused on increasing healthcare access in populations-in-need, which was eventually recognized by the Obama administration. After having a negative personal experience moving his grandmother into a senior living community, he realized the severe impact of social isolation on seniors, and cofounded Rendever to use new virtual reality technology to build communities and increase resident engagement through the power of shared experiences.
Professor/Chair of Rehabilitation Medicine, Rowan School of Osteopathic Medicine-NeuroMusculoskeletal Institute