Dr. Adam Duckett stands in an exam room at his previous Auburn Memorial Medical Services practice at Health Central.
Dr. Adam Duckett stands in his new practice, Duckett Family Medicine, opening in October at 13 N. Fulton St. in Auburn.
An exam room at Duckett Family Medicine, opening in October at 13 N. Fulton St. in Auburn.
Painting at Duckett Family Medicine, opening in October at 13 N. Fulton St. in Auburn.
If the COVID-19 pandemic never happened, Dr. Adam Duckett would still be opening his own practice.
But it might not have been opening Oct. 12 — and the exam rooms might not have been so big.
Duckett, the Cayuga County coroner and chief medical officer of East Hill Medical Center, has left his Auburn Community Hospital practice to open Duckett Family Medicine on North Fulton Street.
East Hill is partnering with Duckett to open the practice. Speaking to The Citizen on Wednesday, he said he was encouraged to take the step while sharing his thoughts with the federally qualified health center's CEO, Keith Cutler. East Hill then helped Duckett find the space for the practice, and hired a contractor to build it out the way the physician wanted.
The space features four exam rooms, double the number Duckett had at his previous practice at Health Central. The rooms are also much larger, he said, which will accommodate the parents, spouses and other guests who often accompany patients. The COVID-19 pandemic has made people wary of waiting rooms, he said, so he wanted his practice to make them "a thing of the past."
Duckett Family Medicine also has a modern look, with natural light and wooden floors. The increased space affords him other features he didn't have at Health Central, including a dedicated patient bathroom and bariatric tables for patients who have difficulty sitting atop conventional ones. And, in another sign of the way COVID-19 has changed health care, each room is equipped for telemedicine. With the assistance of his staff, the physician will be able to move efficiently from room to room, from an in-person visit in one to a virtual visit in another.
That "flow," as Duckett called it, was one of his biggest priorities as he transitioned from his Auburn Memorial Medical Services practice to his own.
"I was looking for ways to practice medicine the way I want to practice," he said. "A lot of times when you're working with a large organization, a physician's individuality can be lost in the process. It's important for the patients' satisfaction, as well as mine and the staff's, for me to have more decision-making ability in terms of how the practice flows and operates."
Duckett was seeing up to 30 patients a day at his previous practice, he said. He'll continue seeing all of them at his new one, he noted, and is accepting new patients as well.
The physical will also continue seeing patients at East Hill, many of whom are in recovery from addiction. The center follows the patient-centered medical home model of care, which coordinates treatment through the primary care physician so it's fully responsive to the patient's needs. With its access to federal funding, East Hill continues to grow into a more accessible source of health care to the community, Cutler said. It's open until 8 four nights a week, giving people an alternative to urgent care or the emergency room. Eventually, Duckett said, he'd like to see it open every day.
Cutler said East Hill is excited to work with Duckett on his practice, and called him "an amazing example of the old-fashioned town physician."
"It's rare to come across a physician who's so incredibly dedicated to not only his patients, but the community he lives in," Cutler said.
Duckett has practiced medicine in Auburn since graduating from his residency at St. Joseph's Hospital in Syracuse in 2010. He spent a few years as a hospitalist before going into family medicine. He's found "a lot of job satisfaction" in that, he said, but over the years, the physician realized there was more he could do to satisfy both his professional ambitions and his patients.
And the world's biggest public health crisis in decades has only highlighted the importance of that even more, Duckett said.
"I want to give patients a better experience," he said. "They come for the medical care, but they also come because they want to feel like they're in a nice, safe, clean place."
Lake Life Editor David Wilcox can be reached at (315) 282-2245 or david.wilcox@lee.net. Follow him on Twitter @drwilcox.
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