By Ariana Rawls Fine   With current statistics showing one in 36 children having autism spectrum disorder (ASD), the need for more in-depth, interdisciplinary services continues to rise, especially for those who have exhausted available community care and are in acute behavioral crisis. Serving Connecticut residents for over 80 years, Hospital for Special Care answered the call by opening its outpatient center in 2012 and then the inpatient unit in 2015 in New Britain. As the center, expertise and need grew, the hospital created an 18,000-square-foot, $13 million inpatient unit with 20 be ..read more

By Kim Lucey Millen  /  Photography by STAN GODLEWSKI   Angela Yuan, M.D., still remembers the patients she and the team from Saint Francis Hospital served in Bolivia. Working in a hospital with no air conditioning, except for the operating rooms, they helped dozens of women with gynecological conditions, some of them very serious and extremely uncomfortable. That visit in April of 2015 was her first mission trip with the team from Saint Francis, and Dr. Yuan was a fourth-year medical student at the time. The experience helped shape her professionally, guiding her toward a speci ..read more

Written by Steven Blackburn / Photography by Tina Encarnacion, UConn Health   Dustin Walters, M.D., has been quickly expanding the thoracic surgical care program at UConn Health despite only having recently arrived from Tufts Medical Center in Boston. Although not an uncommon specialty, thoracic care isn’t usually provided as comprehensively outside major cities. However, with Dr. Walters’ arrival, this advanced level of care is now offered at UConn John Dempsey Hospital in Farmington. “It’s one of the more technically challenging surgical specialties,” said Dr. Walters, who originally se ..read more

Written by Margaret M. Burke   Charlotte Hungerford Hospital offers exceptional behavioral health services to meet the needs of the community, including programs for adults and children. In addition to partial hospitalization programs, Charlotte Hungerford Hospital offers intensive outpatient programs, group and individual therapy, and transition groups for patients leaving the hospital. “One of the challenges in the field of psychiatry is having adequate access at all different levels from inpatient treatment beds to outpatient providers and therapists,” said Clifford Kye, DO, interim me ..read more

Written by Margaret M. Burke   Charlotte Hungerford Hospital, in partnership with Hartford HealthCare’s Ayer Neuroscience Institute, is expected to open a new Hartford HealthCare HealthCenter in the coming months. It will be located at 1914 East Main Street in Torrington. The building, formerly a Bed, Bath & Beyond, has been extensively renovated to ultimately provide 23,500 square feet for outpatient medical subspecialty care. It is conveniently located in a shopping plaza just off of Route 8 and has plenty of free parking. The center will open in phases. The first phase, which encom ..read more

Written by Alix Boyle. Photography courtesy of Middlesex Health Patients who live along the shoreline have long enjoyed using the services at Middlesex Health’s Shoreline Medical Center in Westbrook, including the emergency department, radiology and oncology. Now, along with receiving world-class care right in their own neighborhood, patients can access a greater array of services, thanks to a recently completed expansion. “When we built the Shoreline Medical Center years ago, we had reserved some space on the second floor for some potential future use,” said Dr. David Cosentino, chief medical ..read more

By Kim lucey Millen  /  Photography by STAN GODLEWSKI   It’s something we all do every day but rarely talk about: going to the bathroom. Well, most of us rarely talk about it. As a urologist, and part of the Men’s Health Institute team at Trinity Health Of New England, Abe D’Amato, M.D., talks about it all day long. And he said patients should too, especially if they’re experiencing issues affecting their quality of life, such as frequently having to urinate, incontinence, erectile dysfunction or the extreme pain of kidney stones. “No matter what it is, I guarantee your doctor h ..read more

By Steven Blackburn Dr. Danielle Luciano didn’t just contribute to the successful passage of a one-of-a-kind bill that’s made Connecticut the first state to fully fund endometriosis research for just any reason. She was motivated by her patients. Dr. Luciano and UConn Health, in partnership with The Jackson Laboratory, will soon be operating the first fully state-funded endometriosis biorepository due to that bill. “After about the 900th time of diagnosing a patient with an incurable disease like endometriosis and being asked, ‘How come this is my first hearing about this?’ or ‘Why didn’t some ..read more

Written by Margaret M. Burke Photography courtesy of Middlesex Health   Did you fly to an exotic vacation destination or visit friends and family this past summer? When was the last time you sent or received a long-distance package with a quick turnaround? Ever thought about what it takes to assure you have a healthy pilot at the controls to make all this happen? Middlesex Health has a longstanding history of over 20 years helping to keep the skies safe by providing aviation medical exams for pilots. “This is one of those behind-the-scenes moments that is underappreciated in terms of keep ..read more

By Steven Blackburn  /  Photography by STAN GODLEWSKI   It is often said that to work in an emergency department, you must be adaptable, quick on your feet and agile, able to care for any person who arrives, regardless of age or ailment. Jennifer Martin, M.D., chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine at Saint Francis Hospital in Hartford, embodies that adaptability. She went from being a collegiate swimmer to a breast cancer research assistant to a medical student in New York City before finding her way to Connecticut, where she now leads a busy emergency department while r ..read more