Southern Ohio Medical Center

SOMC Provides Sports Physicals For 576 Athletes

June 30, 2006 » Wheelersburg student athlete Adam Wamsley (left) was one of hundreds of area athletes who received sports physicals from physicians including Dr. Justin Greenlee (right) when Southern Ohio Medical Center physicians and volunteers provided sports physicals to 576 area student athletes June 17 in the Outpatient Rehabilitation Center on the SOMC South Campus. In addition to 20 SOMC employees volunteering their time, physicians who helped included Dr. Greenlee, Dr. Rita Roberts, Dr. John Oehler, Dr. Terry Johnson, Dr. George Pettit, Dr. Eric Hoff, Dr. Phil Roberts and Dr. Scott Howard. For any area student athletes who were unable to attend, the SOMC Urgent Care Center, 8770 Ohio River Road, Wheelersburg, offers sports physicals for $40. No appointment is necessary and the Urgent Care Center is open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. every day. Call (740) 574-9090 for more information.

Friends Present $100,000 To Hospice House

June 29, 2006 » Ruth Ann Logan (center, left), treasurer of the Friends of SOMC, presents a donation of $100,000 to Teresa Ruby, director of Hospice of Southern Ohio, a part of Southern Ohio Medical Center, for the new Inpatient Hospice House. The donation was made during a luncheon at the Friends Community Center in mid-June. The funds were acquired through contributions from all the SOMC volunteers supporting Friends’ projects such as Snack Bar, Gift Shop, Nearly New Shop, Uniform Shop, Friends’ Community Center, HOLLYDAYS and contributions from the various guild fund-raisers. The Inpatient Hospice House, scheduled to open in early 2007 on SOMC’s East Campus, will be a facility providing an environment of care for the terminally ill and their families.

SOMC Helping Local Workers Improve Health

June 28, 2006 » Southern Ohio Medical Center is helping workers at three industrial businesses improve their health and lower health care costs after receiving a grant from the State of Ohio’s Healthy Ohioans program.

SOMC received a grant for $23,373 to conduct health risk assessments and provide regular education for workers at Jacobs Engineering, Mitchellace and M&J Industries.

"SOMC is using the grant to deploy a program to screen and educate workers at these three major industrial facilities," SOMC Wellness Specialist Regina Tipton says. "In mid-June we started performing health risk assessments on more than 120 employees among the three sites. We screen for heart disease, diabetes, as well as obesity, exercise, lifestyles and other factors."

Tipton said the program includes at least two more assessments of the participants’ fitness over the next year in addition to monthly presentations.

"The program will continue with monthly educational sessions for one year, as well as a mid-year screening around December or January, and an end-of-year assessment by June of next year," she said.

Nineteen Healthy Ohioans Worksite Wellness Partnership Grants were awarded to hospitals statewide, with diverse partners including manufacturers, educational institutions, service providers and municipalities.

"The goal of the program is to help lower insurance and health care costs by educating workers and helping them proactively take care of their health and address the controllable factors that put them at risk," Tipton said.

Promise Guild Supports Hospice

June 28, 2006 » The Promise Guild of Southern Ohio Medical Center recently presented a donation of $3,000 to the Inpatient Hospice House campaign. The funds, which were raised through the guild’s various programs, will support the forthcoming Inpatient Hospice House, a facility on SOMC’s East Campus that will provide an environment of care for the terminally ill and their families. Shown are (from left) Guild members Joyce Payton, Marilyn Mercer, Guild President Barb Hemming, Sheila Riggs of Hospice of Southern Ohio, and Guild members Joan Romero and Sherrill Day.

Dever Elected To OPE Board

June 28, 2006 » Mary Beth Dever, MBA, Administrative Director of Physician Services for Southern Ohio Medical Center, has been elected to the Board of Trustees of the Ohio Partnership for Excellence (OPE).

The OPE is a non-profit organization that uses the Malcolm Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence to help organizations see improved results. The OPE recognizes organizational performance with the Ohio Partnership for Excellence Award. Applicant organizations submit a self-assessment addressing items in the criteria and receive a site visit by trained, volunteer examiners. These examiners come from all sectors and regions of Ohio and are trained in the criteria to help applicant organizations identify their strengths and opportunities for improvement. After the completion of these assessments, the organization is awarded one of four levels: Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Platinum.

Dever has worked at SOMC for 17 years. She received her undergraduate degree from the Pennsylvania State University in telecommunications. She received her master’s in business administration from Ohio University.

National Cancer Survivors Day Celebration 2006

June 26, 2006 » Southern Ohio Medical Center, along with local medical oncologists and radiation oncologists, hosted the National Cancer Survivors Day Celebration on Sunday, June 4 at the SOMC Friends Center. The event drew record attendance with more than 500 survivors and family members. Kameron Shepherd (pictured) received the Youngest Cancer Survivor Award; he is a three-year survivor at the age of six.

Reinhardt Employee Health Coordinator

June 26, 2006 » Peggie Reinhardt has been selected as the Employee Health Coordinator at Southern Ohio Medical Center, Penny Cooper, director of Risk Management & Safety at SOMC, announced.

Reinhardt has been employed by SOMC for 13 years in the Emergency Services Department. In her new role, she has the responsibility for any employee health issues.

SOMC employs more than 2,000 full- and part-time people and was recently selected the third Best Place To Work in the State of Ohio. The award was presented by the Ohio Chamber of Commerce and the Society for Human Resource Management.

Crohn's Support Group Celebrates First Anniversary

June 14, 2006 » A support group for individuals with Crohn's Disease and ulcerative colitis meets on the third Tuesday of each month at 6:30 p.m. in the SOMC Education Building, Room 4, on the Main Campus of Southern Ohio Medical Center. The next scheduled meeting is on Tuesday, June 20. Crohn's disease is a form of inflammatory bowel disease. The support group will focus discussion on participants who have a doctor's diagnosis of Crohn's Disease or ulcerative colitis. This is the first anniversary of the group who will be celebrating their successes. The local group is supported by the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation of America. Call Angel Farmer, group facilitator, at 259-5080 for additional information.

Wheeler Elected To OSMA Council

June 8, 2006 » Wayne B. Wheeler, MD, JD, FACEP, FACLM, FACMQ, CHCQM, FAIHQ, a physician at Southern Ohio Medical Center (SOMC) and Medical Director of Life Ambulance, was elected Ninth District Councilor of the 15,000-member Ohio State Medical Association (OSMA) during the 159th annual meeting of the OSMA House of Delegates May 20-22 in Cleveland.

Dr. Wheeler will serve a two-year term representing the southeastern Ohio region from Gallipolis to Portsmouth and can succeed himself two times. He has served OSMA in the past 10 years as chairman of the Task Force on Legislation, as the OSMA, representative to the State Nursing Board formulary task force; as a physician member of the Ohio Department of Insurance Medical Malpractice Commission, as the representative on the Ohio Patient Safety Institute; as a Resolutions Committee chairman and as the Parliamentarian during this years meeting of the annual House of Delegates meeting.

"OSMA is dedicated to preserving access to health care for all patients in Ohio and assisting physicians in their efforts to serve patients better," Dr. Wheeler said.

"Among current issues OSMA is working to help address are the enormous problems that exist with the reimbursement formula within the Medicare and Medicaid programs; seeing that the uninsured patient has access to medical care; the fair implementation of pay-for-performance for physicians by the federal government and the continuing medical liability insurance crisis in the state."

"Thanks, in part to the efforts of the OSMA, the medical liability insurance problems facing physicians in Ohio has improved," according to Dr. Wheeler. "The fact that new companies are coming into Ohio suggests that the efforts of OSMA and others to stabilize the medical liability insurance market has met with some success. However, there is still continued pressure on physicians in Ohio from runaway inflation in medical liability insurance costs."

Dr. Wheeler is a graduate of the College of Medicine, University of Illinois and earned a Medicinae Doctor (MD) in 1980 and his post graduate training at the University of Tennessee Center for the Health Sciences in Memphis, Tennessee in 1981-1982. In addition he holds a Juris Doctor (JD) from the University of Illinois (1974), a Masters in Business Administration (MBA), University of Illinois (1981), a Masters of Public Health in Occupational Medicine from the Medical College of Wisconsin (2003), and a Bachelor of Science Degree (BS), University of Illinois (1966) in mathematics and passed the Uniform CPA examination in Illinois in 1975.

Dr. Wheeler completed a mini-residency in Occupational Medicine at the University of Cincinnati, College of Medicine, in 1996 and is a certified Medical Review Officer by the American Association of Medical Review Officers. He is Chairman of the Southern Ohio Medical Center Ethics Committee and Institutional Review Board and Chairman of the By-laws Committee of the SOMC Medical Staff. He is the Medical Director for External Governmental Relations at SOMC.

SOMC Maternity Among Nation’s Top For Five Years

June 7, 2006 » The Maternity Department of Southern Ohio Medical Center celebrated five years of sustaining patient satisfaction scores among the top 10 percent in the nation on Press-Ganey surveys. The Maternity Relationships and Service teams worked on the celebration, preparing special dinners and decorations for all three shifts June 6-7 in the department. Press-Ganey is one of the world’s leading surveyors of patient satisfaction among healthcare facilities and compares scores to hundreds of facilities in the United States, Canada and elsewhere. Pictured preparing for the evening shift’s celebration are members of the Maternity Relationships Team.

Three SOMC Peds Nurses PALS Recertified

June 6, 2006 » Malissa Warrick, Nurse Manager of Pediatrics at Southern Ohio Medical Center, has announced that staff members Peggy Pollitt, RN, Alice Gardner, RN and Karen Golden, RN have renewed their certification in Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS). The certification reflects an ongoing knowledge and skill set to recognize infants and children at risk for cardiopulmonary arrest, resuscitate and stabilize those children in respiratory failure, shock or cardiopulmonary arrest, and help develop strategies to prevent such arrest in children.

Cancer Study Targets Appalachian Women

June 5, 2006 » Women throughout Ohio's 29-county Appalachian region will help researchers from The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center answer questions about the incidence of cervical cancer in southern and eastern Ohio. Researchers from the OSU Comprehensive Cancer Center are working with health care administrators and clinicians in 14 Ohio Appalachia counties, identifying women who may be eligible to enroll in the five-year study. Only patients who have received medical care in local health clinics within the last two years will be considered for participation.

Dr. Electra Paskett, Director of the Center for Population Health and Health Disparities at Ohio State and Associate Director for Population Sciences in the OSU Comprehensive Cancer Center, says Ohio's Appalachian area has some of the highest rates of cervical cancer and death from cervical cancer in the country. She says the study, called the CARE Project (Community Awareness, Resources and Education), will identify environmental, health and lifestyle factors that may contribute to the development of cervical cancer in Ohio Appalachia.

Paskett, the lead investigator and director of the first phase of the project, says cervical cancer appears to be especially problematic among young, white women in Appalachia, with some studies suggesting that they develop the disease at twice the rate of their counterparts in other parts of the country.

More than 500 baseline interviews have been conducted throughout Appalachia Ohio. To date, more than 100 women have been eligible and agreed to participate in further projects after their baseline interview. In the Cervical Cancer Education Project women are randomized to either intervention or control treatment. Women in the intervention group receive two educational visits from a lay health advisor (LHA) about women's health and cancer screening. Women in the control group receive a mailing about women's health and cancer screening. In the Smoking Cessation Project, women randomized to the intervention receive medication and seven educational sessions with an LHA about how to quit tobacco. Women in the control group receive a mailing about quitting tobacco. One year after a woman enrolls in either program she participates in a follow-up interview similar to the baseline interview. The Correlates of Abnormal Pap Smears in Appalachia Project recently began collecting data. In this project women agree to participate at the time of their scheduled Pap smear. Women with abnormal Pap test results and some women with normal results will complete an interview. A goal of this project is to identify any factor(s) that may contribute to the cervical cancer disparity among Appalachian women.

Angelos Promoted at OU-COM

June 1, 2006 » Dr. Terry Johnson, Assistant Dean for Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine, is proud to announce that William J. Angelos, M.D., has been promoted to the rank of Clinical Professor in the Department of Family Medicine at the college.

Dr. Angelos is Medical Director of Emergency Services at Southern Ohio Medical Center, as well as Chief of Staff. His appointment as a clinical faculty member of the Centers for Osteopathic Research and Education (CORE) has been renewed for the college’s 2006-2009 triennium.

SOMC Urgent Care Celebrates 10 Years

June 1, 2006 » The staff of SOMC Urgent Care welcomed visitors during an open house celebrating the 10th anniversary of the facility’s operation Sunday, May 21 at 8770 Ohio River Road, Wheelersburg. The Urgent Care Center is open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. every day except Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day, providing treatment for minor illness and injuries such as coughs, colds, flu, sore throats, ear aches, vomiting and similar illnesses. Shown are staff members (front l-r) Sherry Foster, Diane Ruby-Dillow, Mary Campbell, and Scrubs the Health Hound; back (l-r): Carol Harr, Anita Chaffin, Amy Russell, and Mary Kate Dilts-Skaggs. For more information about the Urgent Care call (740) 574-9090.

SOMC Supports Notre Dame Academic Program

June 1, 2006 » Southern Ohio Medical Center recently presented a donation for academic programs to Notre Dame Schools. Shown are SOMC's Beverly Stringer (front, right) with instructor Michael Haskins (top left) and some students who participate in one of the academic programs at Notre Dame High School.