The Paul W. Seavey Comprehensive Internal Medicine Clinic is a special place. Stellar clinicians provide personalized patient care while pursuing research and teaching future doctors and nurses about the intricacies and importance of internal medicine. The O. Wayne Rollins Foundation was integral in launching the Seavey Clinic in 2013. Now the foundation has made a gift that expands the clinic — and its emphasis on academic internal medicine — to at least two additional sites.
“The Rollins family’s amazing generosity and encouragement allowed us to create the Seavey Clinic a decade ago,” says David L. Roberts, MD, professor of medicine, Charles F. Evans Chair, and Rollins Director of the Seavey Clinic. “This most recent gift will enable us to use what we've learned to support the careers of even more internal medicine faculty members, as well as their patients and trainees, through the extension of the Seavey Clinic structure and model. It will also provide tremendous benefit to the Division of General Internal Medicine as a whole for generations to come.”
Ted Johnson, MD, MPH, is the Paul W. Seavey Chair and chief of the Division of General Internal Medicine. “I deeply appreciate the Rollins Foundation’s generosity as well as their unwavering faith in our ability to use their contributions to elevate the clinical, educational and research endeavors of the academic general internal medical group,” he says.
The gift funds 14 additional Rollins Distinguished Clinicians, bringing the total to 18, and expands the existing Seavey Clinic model to sites at Emory University Hospital Midtown and 1525 Clifton Road. The multisite expansion is known collectively as the Academic Internal Medicine Center.
The infusion of support will “allow these faculty members the time and opportunity to develop their careers through teaching and pursuing academic activities that are part of their positions as faculty members within the university — in addition to seeing patients,” says David S. Stephens, MD, vice president for research in the Robert W. Woodruff Health Sciences Center and chair of the Emory School of Medicine’s Department of Medicine.
“The Academic Internal Medicine Center is a natural progression of what’s been done under the Seavey Clinic umbrella for a number of years, and it will allow us to include clinicians based in other parts of our internal medicine group, such as the Midtown site,” Stephens notes.
The Seavey Clinic was established to support academic internal medicine in general and the faculty practice at 1365 Clifton Road in particular. Thanks to generous support from the Rollins Foundation and other benefactors, the clinic’s physicians — who are all School of Medicine faculty — enjoy protected time to build relationships with their patients, providing a level of care that is rare today. They also are allotted time for their own professional development and for teaching.
“We have medical students, nursing students and pharmacy students in our system,” Roberts says. “We also have existing medical resident clinics in internal medicine at both the Midtown and 1525 Clifton sites. All these groups of learners will profit from the expansion.”
Pouring resources into the teaching, research and practice of general internal medicine will also serve as a retention tool for the clinicians who receive Rollins Distinguished Scholar designations.
“We’ll be able not only to attract but to retain the brightest and the best in internal medicine with the support that is provided through the endowment,” Stephens said.
The Rollins family’s relationship with the Seavey Clinic and its namesake, Dr. Paul W. Seavey, spans generations.
“My grandfather was a patient of Dr. Seavey’s, and we consider him the epitome of what an Emory physician should be,” says Amy R. Kreisler, executive director of the O. Wayne Rollins Foundation. “We are happy to support the expansion of the Seavey Clinic under Dr. Roberts' leadership because we want future doctors who train there to embody the same level of integrity and devotion to care displayed by Dr. Seavey and Dr. Roberts.”
Emory intends to establish the new clinic locations within the next two years, with the potential to expand further as need and finances allow.
To provide support or request additional information, contact Vicki Riedel, assistant vice president for Advancement, at vriedel@emory.edu or 404.358.2201.