Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital considers medical applicants, reappointments

ALBANY — The end of the year at Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital brings a batch of reappointments and privilege expirations.

This year’s batch was reflected in the most recent report to come before the hospital’s Professional Affairs Committee on Monday. Medical staff, including physicians and their affiliate staff members, undergo reappointment every two years — with one-half doing it one year, and the other half doing it the next.

The credentials report before the committee on Monday included the resignations and retirements of 46 physicians. Almost all of them were physicians who are allowing their privileges to expire at the end of January. Twenty-nine of them were locum tenens staff, which means they were temporarily filling in for someone else, while two were telemedicine physicians, two were consulting pediatricians and the others were active staff representing the specialties of medicine: OB-GYN, physical medicine, psychiatry, family medicine, emergency medicine, gastroenterology and orthopedic surgery.

The one retirement is surgeon/urologist Dr. James Hattaway, who has requested to be moved to emeritus staff. Gastroenterologists Drs. Matthew Grundfast and Steven Yang are resigning this month. Much of the 25 affiliate staff, or mid-level providers, include those who are resigning or have allowed their privileges to expire in the specialties of anesthesiology, general surgery, ophthalmology, orthopedic surgery, emergency medicine, family medicine, psychiatry, OB-GYN, pediatrics and oral surgery, and dentistry.

One hundred seventy-one physicians are seeking reappointments representing the specialties of anesthesiology, adult critical care, family medicine, OB-GYN, pathology, pediatrics, radiology, medicine, radiation oncology, surgery, cardiovascular, vascular, general surgery, neurosurgery, ophthalmology, oral surgery and dentistry, orthopedics, otolaryngology, plastic surgery and urology.

Also, 107 affiliate staff members are undergoing reappointment. They are in specialties including anesthesiology, medicine, cardiac/vascular/thoracic surgery, pediatrics, emergency medicine, family medicine, urology/surgery, podiatry, radiology/radiation oncology, orthopedics/surgery, critical care medicine, general surgery/surgery, neurosurgery, otolaryngology/surgery, OB-GYN, plastic surgery, wound care and oral surgery/dentistry/surgery.

Mary Helen Dykes, chairwoman of the Professional Affairs Committee, said that the existing medical staff were drug-tested as part of the reappointment process, per a policy now in effect at the hospital.

At the same time, several physicians and affiliate staff members are looking to join Phoebe’s staff. Three physicians — Drs. Frederick James Anderson, Paryssa Khadem and Randall McGill — are looking to join virtual radiologic telemedicine. Four affiliate staff members, Melissa Almond, Tanell Johnson, Yoonha Kim and Thomas Tyner, are also coming under the required physician sponsorship.

Almond is coming in under Dr. Phillip Poulos, Johnson is coming in under Dr. Francis Kwarteng, Kim is coming to work with Dr. Deirdre Lawson and Tyner is coming in for Dr. Richard Bowe. Meanwhile, Dori Stempinski is looking to change sponsorships from Dr. Gandhiji Ychili to Dr. Maria Black Morgan.

The credentials report to come before the committee went before Phoebe’s Medical Executive Committee on Dec. 5 and the Credentials Committee on Nov. 27. It is expected to go before the full hospital board for final approval.

The medical staff at Phoebe primarily takes on the role of looking into a physician applicants’ qualifications, in turn making a recommendation to the Professional Affairs Committee before the hospital’s full board makes a final decision.

Jennifer Parks