Biography

Dr. Ellison graduated from the University of Nebraska in Lincoln in 1993 and from the University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Medicine in 1997. She graduated from the Truman Medical Center/UMKC Emergency Medicine residency program in June 2000 and has been a faculty at Truman Medical Center for over 20 years.

She is a practicing emergency physician, core faculty for the EM residency, medical education researcher, teacher, and administrator. She is the current Associate Dean for Learning Initiatives at the UMKC School of Medicine and was appointed in 2017. In this role she is responsible for Service Learning for the School of Medicine and leads efforts to develop and implement Interprofessional Education curriculum and assessment across the UMKC Health Sciences professional programs in dentistry, medicine, nursing, and pharmacy. She also served as Associate Dean and Chair to the Council on Curriculum at the UMKC School of Medicine from 2010 to 2017. Her research interests include social determinants of health, health equity, service learning, curriculum development and management, Interprofessional Education and simulation in medical education. She is currently focusing on establishing service learning and community engagement activities in the UMKC school of medicine and partnering with other UMKC professional schools to collaborate to best engage our campus with the community to meet our Kansas City agencies and patients in need. She has established funding for “Our Health Kansas City Eastside” project to improve access for diabetes, hypertension and cancer screening and prevention, contraceptive planning and improved access to care. She is the faculty sponsor for the UMKC Walk with a Doc© program.

She is passionate about helping others. She has successfully established ways to merge campus and community in expanding Covid-19 vaccinations to under-represented minorities, to educate on vaccine hesitancy, to establish a community garden on the Children’s Mercy Hospital property with distribution of produce and education for patients and has opened a Food Pantry for food insecure professional students, to name a few passion projects. Serving others through community engagement has allowed her to define her why and to engage other professionals and students to aid patients to improve their health and wellbeing.

Dr. Ellison received the Louise Arnold Award in Medical Education Research in 2016, was promoted to professor in 2015, has presented internationally with a curriculum to implement the Entrustable Professional Activities at UMKC School of Medicine at the AMEE conference in Barcelona, Spain in 2016. She received the Research in Medical Education (RIME) award for her poster presented at the Central Group on Educational Affairs conference in 2007, a letter of Recognition from the Drug Enforcement Agency for Project X-Out Lecture: Ecstasy and Club Drugs in 2003, and she was appointed Fellow of American College of Emergency Medicine October 2003.

Dr. Ellison stays busy at home with her husband, 3 active daughters, and their dogs, Sonny and Steve. Her interests include: travel, yoga, paddleboarding, hiking, golf, and gardening.