Led by its mission to provide assistance to those in need and to help support the community, the Service League of Greenville recently supported the ECU School of Dental Medicine with a $25,000 gift toward patient care funds and the Smiles for Veterans program.
In 2023, the Service League of Greenville established the Laughinghouse Patient Care Fund in the School of Dental Medicine to support dental care needs for Pitt County residents. The recent gift invests an additional $20,000 into the Laughinghouse Fund and directs $5,000 for the upcoming dental care day for veterans scheduled for December 7 at Ross Hall.
“The Service League sees the Patient Care Fund as a way to partner with the School of Dental Medicine to provide assistance to those who are in need of dental services,” said League President Cassie Causey.
The Service League of Greenville is known for its decades of support for health care initiatives and the education of health care providers. In 2018, the organization showed its commitment to health care education through endowed scholarships for students enrolled in the ECU School of Dental Medicine, the College of Allied Health, the College of Nursing, and the Brody School of Medicine.
The Service League of Greenville Scholarship Endowment has funded more than $105,000 in scholarships to students and will continue to provide scholarship support at the Brody School of Medicine, the School of Dental Medicine and the College of Allied Health. In spring 2024, the League created an endowment in the College of Nursing to establish the Service League of Greenville Nursing Scholars. This million-dollar gift will provide full tuition and fees for the academic year in which students receive the award.
During the dental school presentation, League President Cassie Causey and Becki Orr, Laughinghouse Chair, met dental students Riley Girdharry and Peyton Piscorik, recipients of the Service League scholarship.
“Meeting these two dedicated dental students brings to fruition the mission of the Service League and the vision of Dr. Laughinghouse to focus on philanthropy, assisting those in need and improving the health of the residents of Pitt County,” said Orr. “It is gratifying to know that we are providing dental services to patients who are receiving assistance from the Laughinghouse Patient Care Fund.”
Recipient Girdharry said that caring for patients through the Laughinghouse Patient Care Fund will enhance his clinical experiences. “It brings me much joy to know that ECU’s School of Dental Medicine has provided means to support Pitt County residents and other demographics in the area,” he added. “My time to start treating patients is quickly approaching and I couldn’t be more excited to utilize the Patient Care Fund and aid the members of the community. I want to thank the Service League of Greenville for supporting me towards a goal of upholding the School of Dental Medicine’s mission and allowing me to give back to the community that gave me so much.”
The ECU Health Cancer Center is bringing the spirit of the season to those who need it most by creating a pop-up gift shop for cancer patients.
Rylann Leng was diagnosed with a rare genetic disease three years ago, and like many others at the ECU Cancer Center, she won’t have the opportunity to spend the holidays in the comfort of her own home surrounded by family and friends. “I actually got sick around christmas time three years ago and so I didnt get to celebrate or be with my family we were in and out of the hospital at that time so christmas is a pretty big thing for me and I am a college student so I work on a really short budget and its hard to manage class, treatment and still feel ok at the end of it so this has been amazing I can shop for my siblings – I am a sibling of nine,” Leng said.
But with the support of nurses and community donations, a simple yet heartfelt idea has come to life—a pop-up holiday gift shop, designed to bring a little light to patients. “Most of our cancer patients are either not feeling well enough to go shop for Christmas gifts or their immune systems are so compromised that they don’t need to be out in the community in large crowds where they could catch any little bug or germ so we started this program six years ago,” nurse, Kelly Trout said.
The ECU Health Cancer Center is ensuring that some of the most courageous individuals, those battling cancer, feel the warmth of the season in their own way. “I didnt think this would impact me as much as it did but it has truly made this holiday less stressful and a lot better and more enjoyable to look forward to,” Leng said.
Thanks to donations from the community and the dedication of nurses, this special store is filled with gifts that patients can pick up free of charge for their loved ones. “With the burden of going through cancer treatments and such like that they don’t want patients having to worry about paying their medical bills on top of their mortgage rent and groceries,” Trout said.
While nothing can replace the comfort of home during the holidays, the cancer center’s efforts bring a glimmer of joy and a reminder of hope this Christmas season.
The ECU School of Dental Medicine hosted the ‘Smiles for Veterans’ event on Saturday to provide free dental care for veterans. Army veteran Mitchel Hudson says, “It means a lot to have this. A lot of people don’t have these services and I’m glad veterans do because they deserve it.” Dental students and faculty had the opportunity to work directly with patients to provide services.
Aleacia Lee graduated ECU in May 2024 and was able to work with the veterans as an AEGD Resident. “Usually with these events, I was doing assisting or something like that. But now actually doing the care for the veteran, it’s really special. I got a big smile after my patient left today,” Lee says.
Founder and Chairman of Smiles for Veterans David McCracken says the group relies on donations and grants to be able to give back to veterans in need. “The amount of money we get, and I think this is the thing I’m most pleased with, is every single dollar, 100%, goes to some veteran’s mouth,” McCracken says.
As a veteran himself, Dean of ECU School of Dental Medicine Greg Chadwick says its vital to provide dental services to veterans that need it. He says, “We enjoy having this school because of the people that have served in the armed services in years past and given us the opportunities to enjoy the freedoms that we enjoy.” Chadwick says this event was the first in Pitt County but certainly won’t be the last.
ECU says close to 30 veterans were helped during the event, and more than 400 total have been cared for through the program since 2018, receiving more $220,000 dollars worth of care.
East Carolina University leaders broke ground Thursday on a planned seven-story, 195,000-square-foot Center for Medical Education Building financed by the state of North Carolina. The project promises to make space for much larger incoming classes by the end of the decade. It is financed with $265 million from the state of North Carolina.
The groundbreaking took place during the two-day meeting of the ECU Board of Trustees. Remarks were made by ECU Chancellor Philip G. Rogers and Dr. Michael Waldrum, dean of the medical school and CEO of ECU Health, along with University of North Carolina System President Peter Hans and fourth-year medical school student Shantell McLaggan.
Years in the planning, the project moved closer to reality in 2021 when the North Carolina legislature approved and the governor signed into law a state budget that earmarked $265 million for the new center.
The chancellor thanked state leaders, members of the ECU Board of Trustees and the UNC System, Brody School and ECU Health leadership and department chairs, alumni and donors, faculty and students. He also thanked the design team and construction contractors and said the day was a celebration of the start of a journey that will impact countless families in eastern North Carolina and beyond.
“There is a shortage of primary care doctors in our country that’s acute for rural Americans. East Carolina University stands in the breach, training today’s medical students who will choose to practice primary care in underserved areas tomorrow,” said Rogers. “We thank our state’s elected leaders and the people of North Carolina for their trust in our commitment to improve rural health and well-being. We pledge to steward this public investment in service of our medical students – the next generation of highly trained physicians giving patients throughout our state life-saving help and hope.”
Last year, the president of the American Medical Association spoke out against the nationwide physician shortage that’s left more than 83 million people in the U.S. without sufficient access to a primary care physician. Rural communities are hit hardest.
The Brody School of Medicine is among the nation’s top schools for graduates who choose to practice primary care in medically underserved areas in the state. It is No. 2 in the nation for graduates who choose to practice family medicine.
“The Brody School of Medicine and ECU Health have a great culture, which is foundational to our important rural mission,” said Waldrum. “The Center for Medical Education Building will directly support the mission by providing a state-of-the-art environment in which medical students can train right here in one of the largest rural regions in the nation. It is incredibly exciting to know we will have a modern facility intentionally designed to ensure our students, faculty and staff can continue to benefit from a high-quality medical education experience that supports them and our state.”
When it opens in 2027, the Center for Medical Education Building will provide state-of-the-art classrooms, anatomy labs and simulation technology integrated with flexible spaces, collaboration rooms, small group student spaces and green infrastructure. Sections of the building will be designed as living rooms for four blended cohorts of medical school students. Common spaces will serve as a “home” for students to study, gather and recharge.
“This facility is 100% designed with students in mind,” said Dr. Jason Higginson, the school’s executive dean. “Recruiting the most promising future doctors means pledging the highest quality medical education and facilities. We see that pledge coming to life here in these renderings.”
“Medical school is so rigorous. Success depends both on labs and hands-on learning environments along with quiet and comfortable spaces that host hours and hours of quiet study. Our students need all of it before they begin treating patients in clinical settings. They have it here at the Brody School of Medicine.”
In more than a half century of training eastern North Carolina physicians, ECU has bestowed more than 3,500 degrees in medicine. Expansion will allow the school to admit more incoming students – from fewer than 100 this year to as many as 120 after expansion.
Construction will begin at the northeast corner of the medical school footprint starting in March. The Center for Medical Education Building will open during the 2027-2028 academic year.
ECU’s Brody School of Medicine is the only medical school serving Eastern North Carolina, and is set to expand after receiving a $265 million from the NC General Assembly signed by Gov. Roy Cooper in 2021.
Construction for the new 195,000 square-foot facility will begin in March 2025 and will finish during the 2027 – 2028 academic year.
“It’s a monumental day for our community,” ECU Chancellor Phillip Rogers said in his speech. “It’s a day of celebration for the future of medical education in our region.”
The seven-story building will be connected to the existing medical school and will feature two large learning studios seating up to 500 people in a banquet-style setting which can also transform into meeting spaces, seating up to 136 in each studio.
It will also feature one large instructional lab classroom for neurology, pathology, and immunology and spaces for simulation and standardized patient programs.
Shantell Mclaggan, a fourth-year medical student at ECU says the expansion is necessary for the future of medicine.
“Medicine is always changing,” she said. “Things are always changing, we are constantly learning. Even after I graduate, I will still be learning. With us just expanding and the fact that ECU and Brody School of Medicine takes care of the Eastern 29 counties of North Carolina, it’s long overdue for us to have a bigger space so that we can better serve our patients.”
University officials say this development will invest in the future of medicine and medical providers in North Carolina.
“ECU and Brody are the primary source of physicians in Eastern North Carolina,” Jason Higginson, Executive Dean of the Brody School of Medicine said. “We know that we educate the physician workforce out here. So having the ability to educate more physicians, will lead to better health outcomes here in Eastern North Carolina.”
According to university officials, the new educational space will further raise enrollment capacity from 86 seats to 120 seats in the medical school.
Dental health capabilities got a boost at East Carolina University School of Dental Medicine’s community service learning center (CSLC) in Ahoskie through a gift from the Roanoke Chowan Foundation (RCF).
The first-time $39,000 gift from RCF – through the ECU Health Foundation – has allowed the school to secure equipment and resources to offer moderate sedation at the CSLC. Additionally, funds will be used to purchase a new Primescan Connect camera, which will update digital dentistry capabilities, and for nitrous carts, to help with care for pediatric patients.
“This state-of-the-art equipment provides our students and residents with vital exposure to digital dentistry,” said Dr. Greg Chadwick, dean. “This equipment also will help keep patients out of the local hospital operating room for dental surgery, while providing excellent educational opportunities for our students and residents.”
The alignment of ECU’s medical and health sciences and ECU Health helped establish a new relationship with RCF. ECU Health Roanoke Chowan Hospital is one of the health system’s nine hospitals. The foundation became an independent entity from the hospital after alignment.
“Our foundation has a long partnership of supporting the Ahoskie dental clinic through the Roanoke-Chowan Community Health Clinic. The alignment with ECU Health and the ECU Health Foundation provided an opportunity to grow our assistance by giving to the School of Dental Medicine directly,” said Wendy Vann, with RCF. “The school, in turn, can enhance the services they are able to provide in our community.”
Since 1985, the foundation has provided more than $17 million to address health and wellness in the Roanoke-Chowan area, including Bertie, Gates, Halifax and Hertford counties.
Roanoke Chowan Foundation’s gift for the Ahoskie CSLC was made to the ECU Health Foundation, the philanthropic arm supporting ECU Health and ECU’s health sciences campus.
“This gift, supporting the Ahoskie CSLC, highlights the alignment of the health system with the region we serve and our shared purpose to improve the overall health, education and well-being of eastern North Carolina,” said Scott Senatore, Chief Philanthropy Officer, ECU Health Foundation. “The Roanoke Chowan Foundation is a dedicated community partner, and we appreciate their commitment to the CSLC in Ahoskie.”
Access East is a 501(c)(3) that strives to improve health access to, and coordination of, quality care in eastern North Carolina. Access East serves as an important part of the ECU Health system of care, offering support for under- and uninsured individuals and helping navigate the health care system through service lines such as Access East Care Management, HealthAssist, ACA Navigators and Health Opportunities Pilot.
Out in the field
One such facet of their service comes through the Farmworker Program, which works not only to help enroll members of the ENC H-2A (temporary visa) farmworker community in low-cost insurance, but also to direct them to available community health care options, and to provide emergency medical training like wound care or cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). In just under two months, the program has reached more than 2,000 farm workers.
Juan Allen, a community coordinator and Affordable Care Act (ACA) navigator for the program, plays a key role in helping the farmworker community receive the services and care it needs. “I’ve been with Access East for seven or eight years,” Juan said. “I was born and raised in El Salvador on a farm, which is what got me interested in doing this work.” The goal of the program, he said, is to help members of the migrant farming community prevent injuries and illness. “Last year we lost four farm workers to heat stroke, and someone else passed away because no one in the field knew CPR,” he explained.
“So, we go out to the farms and do CPR training, heat exhaustion and heat stroke education, Stop the Bleed training, education about tobacco sickness and anything else they need.” Juan said there is also skin cancer education and screenings, dental cleanings, mental health support and vaccines. “During COVID, we were coordinating vaccines, so that with providers’ help, we got 80-100 people vaccinated per day.”
Juan has also trained as an instructor for the Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) trainings, which is an evidence-based, early-intervention course that, virtually or in-person, uses community-specific scenarios, activities and videos to teach people the skills they need to recognize and respond to mental health and substance use challenges. The ECU Health Foundation awarded funding to Safe Communities Coalition, a non-profit that works alongside the Eastern Carolina Injury Prevention Program (ECIPP) to prevent injuries. “Juan has reached a population (farmworkers) that we have struggled to reach, yet we knew desperately needed the education,” said Sue Anne Pilgreen, the executive director for the Safe Communities Coalition, the manager of the ECIPP and the manager of the Pediatric Asthma Program. “This past fiscal year, we have trained a total of 196 people in MFHA, and 92% felt like they could recognize someone who was suicidal after completing the class.”
“Juan is one of the hardest workers I know,” said Shantell Cheek, the director of Access East. “He has a passion to really help those who are underserved, and he is a true link between Access East, ECU Health and the Farmworker Program.” Wherever there is a need, she said, Access East and the Farmworker Program is there.
The program, which initially was established to help H-2A workers get visas and enroll in the ACA, has grown significantly. “We still do the ACA enrollment,” Cheek said. “But Juan provides care coordination, and different entities like the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services and the North Carolina Growers Association partner with us. We now help these individuals get medications they need, assist them when they go to the hospital and are being discharged, set up with primary care providers and provide the education like CPR and skin cancer. And it’s not just the migrant workers; it’s their families too. Wherever there is a need, anywhere across the state, they call Juan.”
Partnering with the Brody School of Medicine
She emphasized that Juan tirelessly creates partnerships with regional and community organizations. Shantell also highlighted Access East’s, and Juan’s, ongoing collaboration with East Carolina University’s Brody School of Medicine. “During their first or second year of medical school, students can select a project to work on and Juan’s name often comes up when they mention an interest in the communities we serve.”
Deanna Torres, a second-year medical school student at the Brody School of Medicine, worked with Juan this past summer as a part of a project required of the school’s four Distinction tracks. Deanna opted to apply for the Service-learning track, which is what led her to Access East. The other tracks include Health System Transformation and Leadership, Medical Education and Teaching and Research.
Deanna said she has always had a passion for grassroots community service. “I’m undecided on my specialty right now, but I know I want to help underserved, minority populations.” Deanna grew up participating in a variety of community service activities, including a medical mission to Honduras and a Benedictine Volunteer Corps trip to the Rosebud Indian Reservation in Mission, South Dakota. Once she entered medical school, Deanna continued her journey in service by joining the Service-learning track. “It isn’t required to join a track,” Deanna explained. “But when I was applying to medical schools, the Service-learning track was a major factor in deciding to come here.”
Students in the Service-learning track work extensively with medically-underserved, marginalized and rural populations during their medical school career. They attend a lecture series specific to that track, but they are also required to participate in a service-learning internship during the summer after their first year of medical school. “We select an organization to partner with, and then we create a longitudinal service-learning project aligned with that organization,” Deanna said. While the internship only lasts a summer, the students’ work on their projects continues until they graduate.
Making a difference
With Juan as her mentor, Deanna said she gained an insider’s perspective on a migrant farmworker’s daily life. “I saw how migrant farmworkers are processed after entering the country. I saw how farms are laid out, and I got to see their living conditions, which aren’t always great. I’ve lived in North Carolina my whole life, and I didn’t know how many farmworkers we have in this region or what their needs were.” This exposure led Deanna to her project’s focus, which is “Increasing Mental Health Services to Hispanic Migrant Farmworkers in Pitt County.” The migrant workers, she discovered, often struggle with mental health issues, like depression. “They leave their home country and their families, work in the heat and have no car or independence, and that can be challenging. I want to advocate for the lack of awareness and communication about mental health in the Hispanic community,” Deanna said.
Juan has been instrumental in helping Deanna make the connections and partnerships necessary to work on her project. “He’s a popular man,” she laughed. “Any time I mention Access East, everyone knows him.” Deanna said she appreciated Juan being willing to mentor her, despite his busy schedule. “As a medical student, it can feel daunting to reach out because everyone is busy, but he was always available and offered me resources, took me to the farms and provided logistics. He knows all about these things.”
Dr. Jennifer Crotty, a pediatrician and an associate professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the Brody School of Medicine, as well as the director of the Service-learning distinction track, facilitates connections between students in the Service-learning track and community partners. “The track primarily focuses on local impact and grassroots efforts,” Dr. Crotty said. Of how she came to direct this specific track, she cited her background in pediatrics. “I realized that to have healthy children, we need healthy families and communities,” she said. “That’s why we want to do this advocacy work.” Access East has been a significant partner in this work. “Access East addresses the things we know need to be addressed. When students work with them, they see the time and energy and resources it takes to do medicine in these rural communities.” While she has never met Juan personally, she knows her students get a great experience when they work with him. “He always finds a place for our students, and the students always say their experience was amazing.”
This work is valuable, Deanna said, because it puts a face and name to abstract medical concepts students learn in school. “It puts a story to what you’re learning,” she said. “It shows us that a patient isn’t just one disease, but they are dimensional, and it helps us be better physicians who treat in a holistic manner. This community needs us to advocate for them.” Dr. Crotty agreed, saying that having students participate in these service learning partnerships through ECU Health make them better physicians, no matter what specialty they choose. “They take the knowledge they gained through service learning to wherever they’re going. I love that someone in their surgery residency is thinking about whether their patient has enough food at home. We graduate good doctors because our students are exposed to these types of things, and they know how to handle it.” Juan said that ultimately, this work gives migrant farmworkers a voice. “They’re only here for eight months and they don’t know their rights,” he said. “Access East is vital to reach out to farm workers so we can be a go-between them and the health system.”
It’s not just in October, which serves as Breast Cancer Awareness Month, that you can find the ECU Health Cancer Care Outreach team making connections in the community.
Jennifer Lewis, outreach coordinator for cancer care at ECU Health Medical Center, said she spends much of her time reaching out to community partners, talking to groups in Pitt County and beyond, and connecting with ECU Health patients and families. However, she said, the most rewarding part of her job is the monthly free breast clinic she helps run.
The clinic, for women in Pitt County age 40 and older who are low income and do not have health insurance, provides screening mammograms while sharing other resources available for health care in the area with those participating in the screening.
Lewis said she is grateful to help with the program and is proud of the impact it has on Pitt County.
“Patients don’t see a bill because of donations to the Cancer Center and the ECU Health Foundation, and that’s just an amazing thing we get to offer,” Lewis said. “We start with a breast exam by a provider to check for obvious abnormalities. Then they have their 3D mammogram, so they get state of the art imaging just like anyone else would get and they don’t get lesser quality. If they have an area that is of suspicion, we can do a diagnostic mammogram and if the radiologist looks at those images and feels like there’s some more concern about something, next would be an ultrasound of that area of suspicion. The program that we have here pays for all that.”
She shared that while ECU Health Beaufort Hospital and Outer Banks Health currently have their own programs outside of Greenville and Pitt County, other hospitals across ECU Health’s system are working toward establishing the program as well.
Lewis said the partnerships and volunteerism associated with the program make it truly special. She and her team work closely with the Pitt County Health Department to help patients who need further care through the Breast and Cervical Cancer Control Program (BCCCP).
“We can’t do this without our partners, that’s for sure,” Lewis said. “We have such a great working relationship with the Pitt County Health Department and the mammography technicians, Patient Access Services, Language Access, Volunteer Services, radiology and ultrasound, and then our nurse residents who help out all work together so well. After patients are seen during the free clinic day, we have Access East on hand, too, to share information and resources about other services they can get access to. It’s such great teamwork all around that makes these events successful.”
The program sees so many patients throughout the year that they’ve recently added an extra clinic day twice a year, once in February and once in October, to help meet the needs of the community.
While Lewis is frequently in the community talking to groups and spreading awareness, October is especially important. She said she’ll spend much of the month meeting with community groups and in churches discussing risk factors, signs and symptoms and why screenings are important.
“This month is an intentional time set aside to speak about risk factors, family history, and signs and symptoms, because that’s the one time of the year that you can sit back and think, ‘OK, am I having any of these symptoms?’ Or ‘What is my family history? Because last year I didn’t have any, but this year my mother or sister has been diagnosed with it.’ It really creates that intention for people to have that moment sometime during the month,” Lewis said. “Whether it’s an ad on Facebook or hearing someone like me speak, it’s important to have that moment of reflection, remind yourself to get a mammogram and just put that in the forefront of women’s minds.”
She said if there’s one thing she could remind the community, it’s that anyone can be diagnosed with breast cancer. She noted that there are many myths, including that because someone is without family history, is otherwise healthy or is a male, that they cannot develop breast cancer. This is why she said it’s critical for everyone to be aware of signs and symptoms and receive screenings as recommended.
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Days after Hurricane Helene delivered devastation to western North Carolina, Dr. Jonathan Austin answered a phone call — and made good on a promise he made years earlier to serve his community and state.
Austin — a Lincolnton native and 2016 graduate of the East Carolina University School of Dental Medicine — loaded his Piper Arrow plane with much-needed supplies and took off for some of the most hard-hit areas after the storm. Austin’s plane skimmed the clear air above the stricken region, through mist and clouds that soon revealed rivers, lakes and streams swollen beyond their banks. He saw the unrecognizable wreckage of towns and communities and smears of red clay chewed from the mountains by mudslides. But when the wheels of the plane touched down at small regional airports, Austin was met with open hearts and hands, grateful and compassionate people ready to help their communities rebuild.
During his numerous trips delivering supplies, Austin observed the beauty and breaking point of nature — but he also witnessed the strength and spirit of humanity. When he received a phone call imploring him to help deliver post-storm supplies to the damaged region, Austin, who practices at Austin Dentistry in Lincolnton, didn’t hesitate. He first flew into the Jackson County Airport near Sylva on the evening of Sept. 29 and made several more trips during the days following the hurricane, carrying in-demand items from food and distilled water to diapers, insulin and manual breast-milk pumps.
Austin balanced those flights with continuing to provide oral health care to his patients — using his education and life experiences from dental school, the military and dental practice to touch the lives of people whose paths he crossed in the storm’s aftermath. “You know, everybody was kind of helping everybody, and everybody was asking about everybody,” Austin said of the supply flight experience. “There’s people that I think I will probably talk to for the rest of our lives.” Answering the call came naturally to Austin.
A 2004 graduate of West Lincoln High School, he attended Appalachian State University for a time before enlisting in the U.S. Marine Corps and serving two deployments in Iraq. He returned to Appalachian State and earned a bachelor’s degree in cell and molecular biology with a minor in chemistry. After earning his Doctor of Dental Medicine degree from ECU, he fulfilled a personal promise to return to practice in his hometown. “I had always known I wanted to return to my hometown to practice, which lines up with the mission of the dental school,” Austin said, referring to the school’s efforts to educate dentist leaders for North Carolina’s most rural and underserved communities.
Over the years, Austin has kept volunteerism high on his list of priorities, completing eight to 10 hours of service a week, on average. He volunteers with the North Carolina Missions of Mercy, Baptist Dental Bus and Give Kids a Smile. He is a member of the American Dental Association, North Carolina Dental Society, Academy of General Dentistry and the Denver/Lake Norman Rotary Club. He also flew search and rescue during a several-year stint with the Civil Air Patrol. “I was always sort of programmed for this,” Austin said.
“I had always known I wanted to return to my hometown to practice, which lines up with the mission of the dental school,” Austin said, referring to the school’s efforts to educate dentist leaders for North Carolina’s most rural and underserved communities.
Over the years, Austin has kept volunteerism high on his list of priorities, completing eight to 10 hours of service a week, on average. He volunteers with the North Carolina Missions of Mercy, Baptist Dental Bus and Give Kids a Smile. He is a member of the American Dental Association, North Carolina Dental Society, Academy of General Dentistry and the Denver/Lake Norman Rotary Club. He also flew search and rescue during a several-year stint with the Civil Air Patrol. “I was always sort of programmed for this,” Austin said. When it came to coordination and communication, Austin had to wing it.
His first few flights were shrouded in fog and mist, the airport runways closed because of flooding. When the clouds cleared, though, Austin was able to see the true nature of Hurricane Helene’s destruction. He saw a mobile home park compacted into a mountainside; he could make out cars tossed aside like toys. Mud caked broken asphalt and pooled in the lower points, drying and cracking in the sun. “It was just debris,” he said. “It looked like somebody had just flooded everything. It was pretty crazy. The area was just devastated, seeing it from that view.”
For this crisis response, Austin and those helping load supplies on his plane had to ensure balance and weight measurements were precise, being careful not to overload the plane and dividing the supplies into multiple trips. He flew into counties including Jackson and Ashe, flying only briefly over Asheville, one of the hardest hit cities. For the first few days, the airports didn’t even have power, much less assurance that someone would be there to guide the plane in and unload supplies. “We were just worried if there was going to be anybody in the airport, and we hadn’t heard any reports out of it,” he said. “We had to land on the taxiway first, because the runway was flooded.”
But as word spread through the affected communities, volunteers showed up in droves to help unload the supplies and deploy them where needed. Austin said the experience was an opportunity for him to respond with his resources, skills and desire to serve, companied with his overseas deployments. “I’ve seen some things, if that makes sense. It’s similar to when I was overseas to a certain extent,” he said. “You’re sort of programmed for this kind of response and this kind of service to other people.”
Austin said he and many of his dental school classmates stay in touch, from bonding activities like hunting and fishing to working in tandem to benefit their communities. “We’re not afraid to get our hands dirty,” he said. “Several of us in our class knew we would return to our hometowns to practice dentistry and help our communities. With this, I just tried to do what needed to be done.”
Healthy snacks, well-being resources, a mindful walking trail and more were all on display at ECU Health Medical Center’s new Resident Well-Being Zone as part of a recent pop-up event hosted by ECU Health’s Well-Being team.
Resident physicians from across the Medical Center were invited to the pop-up event as a way of showcasing the new space, intentionally designed to support their well-being as they continue in their journey in medical education.
The pop-up event, according to Dr. Christina Bowen, ECU Health’s chief well-being officer, is an important way of ensuring residents are aware of the resources available to them at ECU Health.
“We are thrilled to have a resident well-being zone and to be able to offer something unique and purposeful to our resident physicians, who play such an important role here at ECU Health Medical Center,” said Dr. Christina Bowen, Chief Well-being officer at ECU Health. “The pop-up events are a fun way to get our resident physicians engaged in well-being and mindfulness which we know will benefit them during their time here at ECU Health. Our team is excited to be able to host well-being events throughout the year.”
Located on the sixth floor of the Eddie and Jo Allison Smith Cancer Center at ECU Health Medical Center, the Resident Well-Being Zone officially opened in August after years of thoughtful design and funding provided by the ECU Health Foundation. The space is filled with all the essentials a resident may need: exercise equipment, charting space, healthy snacks, coffee, even a ping-pong table and more.
Dr. Cole Carter, a fourth-year physical medicine and rehabilitation resident, said the pop-up event and the space itself have proven to be a welcome asset in the resident experience at ECU Health.
“I think it’s great,” Dr. Carter said, noting that his favorite part of the space is the ping-pong table. “It’s a great place to check out when you need a break from the busy schedule. You can get a great view of Greenville and just take time to relax. I try to come up here once a month or so. This is a great asset for our residents and for those who may be looking for a residency program.”
Dr. Mary Catherine Turner, interim associate dean of Graduate Medical Education, understands first-hand the value of a Resident Well-Being Zone. She said she was fortunate to have one during her time as a resident physician, and it helped her take a break, refresh her mind and get re-engaged in the mission-driven work of providing high-quality health care. Now, she is excited that current and future resident physicians get to experience a similar benefit as they care for patients and continue to learn at one of the busiest academic medical centers in the nation.
“A space like this is important for residents,” Dr. Turner said. “Residents need a place where they can go and disconnect from their work for a little bit and reconnect with themselves. And importantly this is a place where residents can congregate together. I think there’s a lot that can be said for building a community, and this allows them the space to do that.”