Biography
Dr. Jarski is a Fellow and Diplomat of the American Association of Integrative Medicine. While completing his Master's degree at Michigan State University, Dr. Jarski was also a Fellow in the Office of Medical Education Research and Development. Before coming to Oakland University, he was a full-time faculty at Johns Hopkins, Emory University and the University of Florida. As a certified physician assistant, he has taken post-graduate training in general surgery and has extensive clinical experience with patients having life-challenging illnesses such as multiple trauma and cancer.
Dr. Jarski has completed sabbatical work with Dr. Dean Ornish's Heart Disease Reversal Program at the University of California-San Francisco Preventive Medicine Research Institute where he has also staffed residential retreats. Most recently he worked with Dr. Ornish and his staff to study the role of connectedness and community among people with cancer.
He has completed specialized training in behavioral medicine at the Mind-Body Medical Institute of the Harvard Medical School, Mindfulness-Based Stress Management through the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Phase II advanced training with Dr. Bernie Siegel and the ECaP (Exceptional Cancer Patients) psychotherapy staff in New Haven, CT, and he is formally trained in Interactive Guided Imagery. In 1994, Dr. Jarski was selected from a distinguished group of international scholars to participate in the Academy of Consciousness Studies at Princeton University. He received a major research grant from the Michigan Department of Public Health to devise ways to improve stress management techniques in clinical settings, and he has been a grant project reviewer in three study sections of the National Institutes of Health including the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
Dr. Jarski has been named Favorite OU Faculty and nominated for the Teacher-of-the-Year Award.
Degrees
PhD, Medical Education, University of Iowa
MA, Medical Education and Educational Psychology, Michigan State University
BS, Medical Science (Physician Assistant Program), Alderson-Broaddus College
BS, Medical Technology, Michigan State University
Interests
Dr. Jarski's expertise is education for health and healing, from the curricular level--where students consciously learn, to the cellular level--where the body learns to heal itself.
In addition to research and teaching classes, he conducts stress management and imagery sessions for patients and clients at a Detroit-area pain management specialty clinic. He also supervises the research projects and theses of exercise science students and physicians-in-training at two area hospitals affiliated with OU. Dr. Jarski serves as a referee and editorial board member of several professional journals, he has published numerous scientific journal articles and book chapters, presents regularly at national, state and community conferences and seminars, and he is a hospice volunteer. Most recently, he has had peer-reviewed publications pertaining to complementary and alternative medicine in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Alternative Therapies and the American Journal of Health Promotion.
Dr. Jarski plays bagpipes and studies the Scottish and Celtic musical cultures. He enjoys exercise especially in the context of rock climbing, hiking, canoeing and scuba diving.