Doctor in the trenches witnesses strange ways faith responds to human suffering

Author: Kresta in the Afternoon Published on: January 18, 2017 Published in: Spiritual Experience & Disciplines

Dr. Tim Flanigan reflects on experiences treating AIDS and Ebola patients.

Dr. Timothy Flanigan works in a field that brings him so close to human suffering that, as he puts it, it’s “cheek to jowl.”

As a Brown Medical School professor with a specialty in infectious diseases, Dr. Flanigan has spent much of his career working with HIV patients and, more recently, Ebola patients in Liberia. Besides his medical career, Dr. Flanigan is also the father of five children and a Catholic deacon in Tiverton, Rhode Island.

“It is very interesting. Being a Catholic deacon has made it easier for me,” said Dr. Flanigan. “My role is to be supportive of my patients. It’s not to evangelize them, but to help them realize that faith can be a help to them.”

Dr. Flanigan came to Brown Medical School in 1991 to help establish a network of primary care for HIV-infected individuals with a particular focus on women, substance abusers and individuals leaving prison. He developed the HIV Core Program at the State Prison to provide care for HIV-infected individuals and link them to community based resources upon release.