Coastal Healthcare Connect
Vol. 01 No. 04 | August 2019
PBMC BREAKS GROUND FOR HEALTH CENTER
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eremonial shovels in hand, Pen Bay Medical Center (PBMC) officials last week broke ground for a new 41,513-square-foot health center designed to meet the needs of the growing population in our Midcoast communities. More than 75 hospital officials, employees, political leaders and community members attended the event. The $16 million building will sit on the PBMC campus just off Anchor Drive between the hospital and the Sussman House. “Just a few years ago, we faced a pressing shortage of primary care physicians,” Mark Fourre, MD, president of Pen Bay Medical Center and Waldo County General Hospital, told those in attendance. The hospital responded by hiring more than 40 physicians, with a focus on primary care and pediatrics. “Our challenge now is to house these new physicians—and our existing physicians—in a space that empowers them to provide the best care possible for our patients.” More than just housing new physicians, the Health Center has been designed to make it easier for physicians to communicate with each other.“I can’t emphasize enough how important this is,” Fourre said. “The informal and collegial communication among providers is essential to bringing our patients the best care possible.”
“This building will improve the health care we bring to the community by making it easier for physicians and staff to collaborate and connect patients with the wellness, prevention and specialty services they need,” said Mark Eggena, MD, chief medical officer at PBMC and co-chair of the capital campaign committee. Other speakers included Richard Petersen, president of MaineHealth; Lee Woodward, chairman of the board for Coastal Healthcare Alliance; and Ann Bresnahan, co-chair of the capital campaign committee. The event highlighted local corporate donors, including Viking Lumber, Camden National Bank and Allen Agency. Other early donors include The First National Bank, Spectrum Health and CedarWorks. Early foundation contributors include the Sunshine Lady Foundation, the Libra Foundation, the Davis Family Foundation and the Fisher
Foundation. The new Health Center will be a two story stand-alone building. In addition to a community room, the first floor will house the pediatrics, audiology and speech pathology, and ear, nose and throat practices, as well as pediatric physical and occupational therapy. The Health Center will also provide space where specialists from the Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital at Maine Medical Center can meet with patients in Rockport, reducing the need for children with special health needs to travel to Portland. The second floor will house the internal medicine, family medicine and psychiatry practices, as well as the Integrated Medicated Assisted Treatment (IMAT) practice for treating opioid use disorder. Construction will start in late Continued on page 4
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Provider Profile
Susan Hage, DO Physiatrist H
these are things we’ve always focused on.
ow does a modern dancer become a physician? What inspires a person to relocate to Maine during their very first visit? And how has physiatry accumulated so many hip monikers? These are the questions Susan Hage, DO, has faced for much of her career. Raised in Detroit and a graduate of Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine, Dr. Hage joined Waldo County General Hospital in 2015 and now sees patients there and at Pen Bay Medical Center. For more about Dr. Hage, call 207-548-2475.
What inspired you to practice medicine? I have many family members who are physicians, so the idea was instilled early on. I know it sounds hokey, but I was about 4 years old when I said I wanted to be a doctor. In college, my first choice was to be a clinical child psychologist. In the end, I earned two bachelor’s degrees, one in psychology and one in dance. Dance? I’ve danced since I was 13 years old. When I was in medical school, I was in a professional modern dance company. During my residency, I was an oncall physician for the Atlanta Ballet and took classes there. When I was a physician working in a Michigan hospital, a PR person for the hospital came by and said, ‘Hey, I hear you have a background in dance.’ He was also the director of a local community theater, and he asked if I would choreograph a musical for them. So I choreographed musicals while I was a practicing physician. Was there an internal debate about what path you would take, dance or medicine? A huge debate! In my last year of college, my professors pushed me to pursue a career as a professional dancer. Then the acceptance letter for medical school came in. There was about a month of going back and forth. In the end, even though I believe both make the world a better place, I thought I could make a bigger impact in medicine.
* * * How do you approach new patients? I try to understand them, from their activity level to their psychosocial well-being to their nutrition. Selfcare is the baseline – taking care of your body as a physical structure through posture, biomechanics, stretching and strength training. In many cases, medications and injections provide relief for three hours or three months, but they’re not cures. The thing that makes a lasting difference is when you’re working with the mind and the body, with injections layered in as necessary. By the time folks come to see me, they’ve been living with pain chronically. So there is often an emotional component. We talk about relaxation, meditation, journaling, and prayer, whatever resonates for the patient.
Does dance inform your medical practice? I think I understand anatomy and biomechanics on a deeper level because of my dancing. Having been an athlete and an artist who uses her body as an instrument, I’ve had my share of sports injuries. So when my patients tell me what’s bothering them, I understand what they’re feeling. Why Maine? I wanted to try a different way of life. I had a friend in my residency who said, ‘Why don’t you think about coming up to Maine?’ My husband and I came up to take a look over Easter. I saw the Camden Hills. I saw the ocean. When I saw the Camden Opera House, as a dancer I just said, ‘I think I’m home.’ We bought a house the very next day!
Does the term ‘holistic practitioner’ apply to what you do? I would say so. I treat the whole person. And I think that’s really the physiatrist’s approach. I think what physiatrists have always done is now being given hip names, like lifestyle medicine, like integrative medicine, like holistic medicine, like self-care, but 2
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PBMC Receives AFIB AWARD
Chamber Musicians Perform at WCGH The Cassatt String Quartet played for patients, staff and community members gathered in the cafe at Waldo County General Hospital on Wedensday, July 17. Although the Cassatt usually performs as a quartet, it was joined by an additional musician this time. Acclaimed as one of America’s outstanding ensembles, the Manhattan based quartet has performed throughout North America, Europe and the Far East. It has performed in London for the Sapphire Jubilee Celebration of Queen Elizabeth II, the Beijing Modern Music Festival, New York’s Alice Tully Hall and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the Tanglewood Music Theater, the Kennedy Center and Library of Congress in Washington, DC, the Theatre des Champs in Paris and Maeda Hall in Tokyo.
Symposium for Older Adults to Focus on Isolation Experts have called social isolation among older adults a silent epidemic, with millions suffering its effects worldwide. But is loneliness an inevitable consequence of growing older? Or can it be prevented? Quarry Hill, Penobscot Shores, MaineHealth Care at Home, and AARP Maine have joined forces to address this urgent concern by organizing “Looking at Loneliness Through a New Lens,” an
educational symposium geared toward interested adults age 50-plus. The program is scheduled for Wednesday, August 21, from 9 a.m. to noon at the Penobscot Bay YMCA in Rockport. Reaching beyond the stigma sometimes associated with aloneness, the multimedia, panelfacilitated presentation, will shed light on the growing problem of loneliness: how to recognize it, how to prevent it, and what to
do about it once it takes hold. The morning will include plenty of time to share perspectives, ask questions, learn about resources available locally and collect literature to take home. Admission, including a buffet-style continental breakfast, will be free, but prior registration is required by contacting Quarry Hill at 3016116 or at qhinfo@ pbmc.org. Information is also available at www. quarryhill.org. 3
Pen Bay Medical Center (PBMC) has received the American Heart Association’s Get With The Guidelines®-AFIB Silver Quality Achievement Award for implementing specific quality improvement measures outlined by the American Heart Association guidelines for the management of patients with atrial fibrillation. The guidelines assist health care professionals provide the most up-todate, research-based guidelines for patients with atrial fibrillation, an irregular heartbeat that can lead to stroke and other complications. PBMC earned the award for meeting specific quality achievement measures at a set level for a designated period. These measures include providing appropriate medications and aggressive risk reduction therapies. “PBMC is dedicated to improving the quality of care for our patients with atrial fibrillation by implementing the the guidelines of the AFIB initiative,” said PBMC Chief Medical Officer Mark Eggena, MD. “The tools provided help us track and measure our success in meeting evidencedbased clinical guidelines developed to improve patient outcomes.”
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MaineHealth Access to Care has launched the Patient Assistance Line, a new resource available to help all providers and patients within our health system. The Patient Assistance Line helps connect patients with appropriate departments and/or community resources such as MaineCare and Free Care applications, free or low-cost medications, housing and transportation resources, emergency food pantries, and more. If you have a patient who needs help, call 1-833-MHHELP1 (1-833-644-3571) or email patientassistline@mainehealth.org to speak with the team.
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July and the building will be ready for occupancy late in the summer of 2020. Hebert Construction LLC, of Lewiston, will serve as construction manager. The architect, SMRT Inc., has designed many health care spaces, including the Dorothy Walker Bush Pavilion at Southern Maine Health Care in Biddeford and the emergency department at Holyoke Medical Center in Massachusetts. Hospital officials praised early donors whose generous gifts helped raise 70 percent of the total cost of the building, enough to
begin construction. Ann Bresnahan, the co-chair of the capital campaign, said early participation by major donors sends a message that this building is a priority for our communities. “But even as we celebrate this milestone, it is important to remember that we still need to raise a significant amount of money to complete this important project,” Bresnahan said. “This summer we will continue conversations with neighbors and friends to ensure that we achieve our fundraising goals.”
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Coastal Healthcare Alliance 118 Northport Ave | P.O. Box 287 | Belfast, Maine 04915
MaineHealth Launches Patient Assistance Line
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