Dr. Heather Mewes

Hillsdale Hospital Primary Care

by Elyse Apel

Dr. Heather Mewes always knew that she wanted to be a doctor.

“It allows me to both help people and problem solve,” Dr. Mewes explains. “We learn in medical school that if somebody comes in with X, Y and Z, then they must have this problem. Medicine is so much more than that, though.”

She says that, as a doctor, she had to learn how to listen to patients and learn about their day-to-day life.

“Then, I can fuse what I learned in textbooks with what they are experiencing in their own lives,” Dr. Mewes says.

Recently joining the staff at Hillsdale Hospital as the Primary Care Medical Director, Dr. Mewes now combines patient care with administrative work, bettering the local medical community. While she continues to see patients at Hillsdale Health & Wellness and at Reading Health Clinic, Dr. Mewes also provides leadership for the team of providers serving in primary care roles throughout the hospital.

“I see patients from about eight to four most days, sometimes longer, depending on the day,” Dr. Mewes explains. “And then there’s the administrative work behind the scenes that we are trying to do to improve access to patient care and improve the patient experience.”

She says that she enjoys both the variety in her days, but also in her patient care.

“Because I’m in family medicine, I see newborns all the way up to the oldest of the old. I love getting to work with families,” Dr. Mewes says. “It allows me to see the little kids and their parents, maybe they even bring their grandparents to see me. That just helps me to practice medicine even better, because you start to notice certain patterns in families and are able to relate to them on a different level.”

Dr. Mewes first joined the team at Hillsdale Hospital in August 2024, which allowed her to move back to the Hillsdale area. A graduate of Reading High School, she then studied pre-med at Hillsdale College.

“Between shadowing and working with local doctors in the community, I ended up deciding to go on to medical school,” she says.

She attended Michigan State University’s College of Osteopathic Medicine where she completed her Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine (DO). She then spent a number of years in private practice in Wyandotte, where she started in 2019.

“I knew that I needed to broaden my horizon,” Dr. Mewes explains. “That allowed me to expand my skill set and now be able to offer even more to our patients.”

She returned to Hillsdale again in 2016 to complete an internship at Hillsdale Hospital before starting her family medicine residency at Garden City Hospital Family Medicine.

I wanted to feel out the waters of what it would be like to practice medicine in a small town,” Dr. Mewes says. “I enjoy having that close knit community, where I often run into patients while out.

As the Primary Care Medical Director, Dr. Mewes says her priority is to help patients gain access to care.

“Prior to me coming down, patients were waiting upwards of four weeks in some cases to get in to see their primary care. And, unfortunately, with the way insurance works nowadays, you have to have that primary care in order to get to any kind of specialist,” she explains. “So, improving access to care has been big on my agenda from the beginning.”

Now a few months into the position, Dr. Mewes says the team she works with has been a great help in already making a difference for patients.

“I walked into a very wonderful team of doctors and nurse practitioners, so we are just learning to work together and create these opportunities for patients.”

She says that working at both Hillsdale Health & Wellness and at Reading Health Clinic has allowed her to have a better understanding of each community’s unique needs.

“As the director, I wanted to be very involved and very handson, so that I can understand the pulse of each one of our local clinics and how we can be improving,” Dr. Mewes explains.

In her free time, Dr. Mewes enjoys spending time with her puppies.

“I have two standard poodles,” she says. “Basically anybody that knows me knows about the doggos, who actually come from the Hillsdale area.”

Located on Carleton Road in the Kroger Plaza, Hillsdale Health & Wellness is open for walk-in appointments Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., and primary care appointments Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Reading Health Clinic is open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Same-day sick visits are also available, depending on scheduling.

To schedule an appointment with Mewes, call Hillsdale Health & Wellness at (517) 437-7040 or Reading Health Clinic at (517) 283-1772. For more information about Hillsdale Hospital’s primary care services, visit www.hillsdalehospital.com/primarycare.