MALONE — An experienced general surgeon with longstanding ties to the North Country and a broad surgical skill set joins the medical staff of University of Vermont Health Network – Alice Hyde Medical Center, adding local access to and expertise in surgical services for patients in Malone and surrounding communities.
Lori DeFreest, MD, PhD, FACS will practice out of Alice Hyde’s General Surgery clinic, which is located on the second floor of the hospital at 133 Park Street, Malone, as well as the General Surgery offices at UVM Health Network – CVPH in Plattsburgh. Her practice will include a variety of laparoscopic and open surgeries, with a focus on outpatient and ambulatory procedures in Malone.
It’s an arrangement DeFreest, who has spent the last decade as an Acute Care Surgeon at Albany Med Health System in Albany, New York, said was important to her when making the decision to join Alice Hyde.
She was impressed by the patient-centered focus of Alice Hyde’s Hospitalist program, which provides acute inpatient care on the hospital’s Medical-Surgical Unit, and the health system’s connectivity, which has been leveraged at Alice Hyde through a shared provider model that brings a large team of Emergency Department physicians from across the Network together to provide high quality emergency care in Malone.
“It gives me the ability to provide care and follow patients to the place that’s most appropriate for their needs,” DeFreest said. “So, if a patient in Malone requires a more advanced procedure, I can provide pre-operative care in Malone, follow them to CVPH to perform the surgery, and then they can come back to Alice Hyde for their follow-up care.”
DeFreest has wide-ranging experience. Before embarking on her medical career, she worked as a laboratory technician with the NYS Department of Health, for many years as an analytical chemist, as well as an adjunct professor at Clinton Community College and SUNY Plattsburgh, before returning to Albany and earning first her PhD and then her medical degree in 2009.
She went on to complete her residency in General Surgery and fellowship in Surgical Critical Care and Trauma Surgery at Albany Medical Center in 2015, then remained to practice in Albany Med’s Division of Acute Care Surgery as an assistant professor.
She is board certified in general surgery and surgical critical care; a fellow of the American College of Surgeons; and a member of the Society of Critical Care Medicine, Eastern Association for the Surgery of Trauma and Association of Academic Surgeons.
Despite her long tenure in Albany, DeFreest said she’s always considered the North Country, where her family has kept a home since the early 1990s. Excited to return, she’s an avid hiker and kayaker with an abiding love for the Adirondacks.
“It feels natural for me to go back to the place where I spent so much time,” she said.
“It was always my plan, and I’m pleased that I found the right opportunity.”
DeFreest said she’s excited to collaborate with Alice Hyde’s Hospitalist and Emergency Department teams on patient-centered care and partnerships focused on reducing the need for patients to travel for care.
“We’re going to be focused on making it easier for patients to get the care they need in one place,” she said.
“Keeping patients’ care in the community is important, and I bring many years of experience dealing with the sickest patients presenting with surgical problems.”
DeFreest, who joins the medical staffs at both hospitals this month, said she also taps into her years of work as an educator when caring for patients, and will be partnering with Alice Hyde’s primary care medical staff to better understand and meet the specific needs of their patient population.
“It’s really important to me that patients understand what’s happening to them,” she said.
“I try to meet them where their knowledge base is and explain what is happening so they’re well-informed and can be a partner in their care.”