Medical Matters Weekly Features Telemed Expert
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/ Categories: NEWS, 2021, Medical Matters

Medical Matters Weekly Features Telemed Expert

BENNINGTON—March 19, 2021—Southwestern Vermont Health Care’s (SVHC) Medical Matters Weekly with Dr. Trey Dobson, a weekly interactive, multiplatform medical-themed talk show, will feature Kevin Curtis, MD, as a guest on its March 24 show. Dr. Curtis the medical director of Connected Care and the Center for Telehealth at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Health and an associate professor of Emergency Medicine at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. The two will discuss telemedicine before, during, and after the pandemic and the future of medicine.

The show is produced with cooperation from Catamount Access Television (CAT-TV) and airs live at 2 p.m. on Wednesdays. Viewers can see Medical Matters Weekly live on Facebook at facebook.com/svmedicalcenter and facebook.com/CATTVBennington. Those viewing on Facebook will be able to contribute questions through the chat function.

Dr. Curtis received his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Clarkson University in 1984 and worked as an aerospace engineer for McDonnell Douglas Astronautics. In 1991, he obtained his MD from the Georgetown University School of Medicine and served in the Navy as a lieutenant commander and general medical officer. Dr. Curtis completed his Emergency Medicine Residency in 1998 at the George Washington University Medical Center followed by an Emergency Medicine Foundation Research Fellowship.

Prior to coming to Dartmouth-Hitchcock (D-H) in 2002, Dr. Curtis was member of the Emergency Medicine faculty at the University of Pennsylvania, splitting time between clinical practice and research on mechanisms of cerebral ischemia after cardiac arrest. Dr. Curtis cofounded the D-H Emergency Medicine Residency Program and served as its initial program director. In 2013, he received his master’s in Health Care Delivery Science from the Tuck School of Business and the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. While at Dartmouth-Hitchcock, Kevin has also served as the Emergency Medicine research director, the assistant medical director of Emergency Services, and the medical director of TeleEmergency.

The program’s host, Trey Dobson, MD, is an Emergency Medicine physician with Dartmouth-Hitchcock Health and serves as Chief Medical Officer for Southwestern Vermont Medical Center in Bennington, Vermont.  He is an Instructor of Emergency Medicine at Dartmouth Geisel School of Medicine and a member of the Board of Trustees of Dartmouth-Hitchcock. He is past president of the Vermont Medical Society and currently sits on the Governance Council and performs medical practice peer review for the Vermont Program for Quality in Health Care. He obtained a Masters in Geology from the University of Wyoming and his Medical Degree at The University of Tennessee. Dr. Dobson completed his residency in Emergency Medicine at the University of Virginia.

After the program, the video will be available on area public access television stations. On CAT-TV, viewers will find the show on channel 1075 at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, 1:30 p.m. Monday, 8:30 a.m. Tuesday, 7:30 a.m. Wednesday, 7:30 p.m. Thursday, 7:30 a.m. Friday, and 7 p.m. Saturday. Videos and podcasts are on svhealthcare.org/MedicalMatters, as well as Youtube and on many podcast-hosting platforms, respectively.

Upcoming episodes will feature the following guests:

  • March 31: Stephen Leffler, MD, an emergency medicine physician and president and chief operating officer at the University of Vermont Medical Center.
  • April 7: David Veltre, MD, a hand and upper extremity specialist at SVMC Orthopedics in Bennington.
  • April 14: Vermont Commissioner of Health Dr. Mark Levine

To contribute questions in advance of each week’s show, please e-mail wellness@svhealthcare.org or post to Facebook with #SVHCMedicalMattersWeekly.

About SVHC Medical Matters Weekly:
Medical Matters Weekly is an interactive, mulitplatform guest-driven talk show hosted by Dr. Trey Dobson. It provides a behind-the-scenes perspective on healthcare, including topics like behavioral health, food insecurity, equitable care, and the opioid crisis. The show is produced in partnership with Catamount Access Television (CAT-TV) and is broadcast on CAT-TV, Greater Northshire Access Television, Facebook Live, YouTube, and podcast platforms.

About SVHC:
Southwestern Vermont Health Care (SVHC) is a comprehensive, preeminent, health care system providing exceptional, convenient, and affordable care to the communities of Bennington and Windham Counties of Vermont, eastern Rensselaer and Washington Counties of New York, and northern Berkshire County in Massachusetts. SVHC includes Southwestern Vermont Medical Center (SVMC), Southwestern Vermont Regional Cancer Center, the Centers for Living and Rehabilitation, and the SVHC Foundation. SVMC includes 25 primary and specialty care practices.

SVMC has earned several prominent distinctions. Most recently, SVMC received the American Hospital Association’s Rural Healthcare Leadership Award for transformational change in efforts toward healthcare reform and its fifth consecutive designation within the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s (ANCC) Magnet Recognition Program®. It ranked fourth in the nation for healthcare value by the Lown Institute Hospitals Index in 2020 and is one of Vermont’s Best Places to Work. SVMC earned an ‘A’ for hospital safety from the Leapfrog Group for two years in a row. During the pandemic, SVMC and both its skilled nursing facilities, the Centers for Living and Rehabilitation in Bennington, and the Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation at Hoosick Falls, earned perfect scores on a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services evaluation meant to determine the ability to prevent transmission of COVID-19 and other infections.

Southwestern Vermont Medical Center provides exceptional care without discriminating on the basis of an individual’s age, race, ethnicity, religion, culture, language, physical or mental disability, socioeconomic status, sex, sexual orientation, or gender identity or expression. Language assistance services, free of charge, are available at 1-800-367-9559.

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OB/GYN Care in a New Age

I am a strong believer in preventive care. Our patients are healthiest and OB/GYN physicians are most successful when we see each other at least annually and as soon as concerns arise. While this hasn't always been possible throughout the pandemic, I am happy to report that it is slowly getting easier to provide and receive care in the ways we had been used to, with a few adjustments for added safety.

I am especially concerned about patients who may have delayed care. While some concerns can safely wait a short while, putting off care in other situations may worsen the condition or the outcome. I encourage both new and returning patients to call the office to discuss resuming regular care and discussing any concerns that may have come up.

Here's what you can expect, including some of the innovative ways we are meeting patients' needs safely.

When you call the office, the receptionists will schedule an appointment for you. An easy telehealth option is great for reviewing results, developing care plans, providing contraceptive and fertility counseling, and consulting about weight management. For these purposes, the receptionist will likely recommend a televisit. It is very easy to connect and so convenient; while we love seeing you in person, we have to wonder why we haven’t been using telehealth appointments all along! Complete information about telehealth visits can be found here.

As you might expect, OB/GYN care often requires a physical examination, so many of our patient visits—including those for patients needing annual exams, testing, and therapeutic appointments—are still happening in person and in the office. The receptionists are working to stagger visits to decrease the number of people in the office at any one time.

Those coming to the office in person will notice a check-in station at the entrance to the Medical Office Building. The attendant will ask you a few questions about any symptoms you have and lend you a cloth face covering to use, if you don't have one. Wearing the mask over both your mouth and nose for your entire visit is required. For your safety and theirs, you will notice that all staff are wearing masks, too, along with either goggles or a shield. Hopefully you can still tell that we are all smiling, even under our masks!

If an outpatient elective surgical procedure is a part of your care plan, your OB/GYN and other staff will walk you through the process. A few changes, including COVID-19 testing in advance and intensified monitoring after the procedure, increases patient safety.

For those expecting to deliver a baby at SVMC, we are focused on maintaining all of the wonderful things our patients have come to expect from their experiences on the Women's and Children’s unit. Caring medical staff and nurses, individualized attention, and compassionate support are all in abundant supply.

Like when coming to the office, growing families will notice the check-in at the hospital's main entrance and staff wearing protective equipment. Our visitor’s policy indicates only one support person. We recognize that this is so challenging, and we are working to provide all of the support we can to bring your birth experience safely in line with what you had hoped, right down to the cheering support squad provided by a family via video chat during a delivery I attended earlier this week.

In the case that a family has had any exposure to COVID-19, the Women's and Children’s Unit has its own negative-pressure room. Extensive infection-prevention policies—consistent across all of the medical professionals involved with care for growing families, including OB/GYNs, pediatricians, midwives, and nurses—keep moms, babies, families, and staff safe. In fact, SVMC recently got a perfect score on a rigorous survey specifically designed to judge our infection-prevention measures.

Our ongoing commitment—pandemic or no pandemic, no matter your OB/GYN need—is to work through your concerns and deliver safe, individualized, and effective care for you. We hope that new and returning patients will call on us to help them maintain or regain their health. We are open, ready, and safe to provide the care you need.

Kimberley Sampson, MD, is the medical director of OB/GYN at Southwestern Vermont Medical Center.

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