October 23, 2024
By Kevin LaTorre
NCAFP Communications and Membership Manager
Dr. Bessey works as a family physician at Chatuge Family Practice in Hayesville.
We spotlight NCAFP members who make unique impacts on their patients and communities. If you or one of your colleagues is providing a unique service, contact us so we can consider spotlighting you or your colleague!
She grew up in Pitt County outside Greenville, where her close family friend was a family physician there. “I had the opportunity to shadow Dr. Tommy Ellis throughout high school and saw firsthand his community involvement, the close relationships with his patients, and how much of a difference he made in their lives,” Dr. Bessey says. “Seeing this sparked my interest and began my journey to becoming a family doctor. I pursued other specialties during medical school but was always drawn back to the variety and scope of Family Medicine.”
What she experienced while shadowing Dr. Ellis is the comprehensive, continuing care that family physicians give through long-term relationships with their patients. “It’s awesome,” Dr. Bessey says. “The relationships you create and the scope of the specialty, it is a unique dynamic.”
After completing her undergraduate degree at Appalachian State University, she returned home to Greenville to complete medical school at East Carolina University (ECU). Here she continued to find great mentors in Family Medicine. “I feel honored to have gone to ECU for my medical training” she says. “I had great mentors there that continued to foster my passions and embodied the future doctor I aspired to be. ECU’s mission is to train rural family physicians who serve the state of North Carolina. Within my first month of school, I was plugged in with a rural primary care provider and continued this experience monthly,” Dr. Bessey recalls. “What a great break from the classroom!”
One other support that Dr. Bessey found on her path into Family Medicine was the hands-on experience offered by NCAFP programs, which she began attending while at ECU. “I was part of the Family Medicine Interest Group,” Dr. Bessey says, “and [then-NCAFP staff member] Tracie Hazelett would visit and talk about the opportunities for Family Medicine within North Carolina. Tracie’s mentorship and my experiences through the NCAFP played a large role in confirming my path towards family medicine. I learned that the specialty has a lot of support in the state. I attended the NCAFP Winter Conference and Family Medicine Day all four years of medical school, which gave me even more exposure to what Family Medicine offers.”
And long before her eventual residency at the Mountain Area Health Education Center (MAHEC) at Hendersonville, Dr. Bessey’s involvement with the NCAFP’s summer externships sealed the deal. “I participated in the western program and stayed with one of the Hendersonville residents for a week, Dr. Caitlin Sullivan,” she says. “I didn’t know this then, but this would be my first introduction to a few of my future attendings, like Dr. Andrew Morris and Dr. Bryan Hodge. Again, seeing how they were embedded in their communities and the impact they had on their patients is what continued to grow my love for Family Medicine. They were volunteering at community outreach events and identifying specific community needs (one of these was substance abuse in Henderson County, for which they provided more opportunities to receive medically assisted treatment). They were providing medical care to a vulnerable population that possibly wouldn’t otherwise have access to care.”
Thanks to that summer and her other NCAFP experiences, Dr. Bessey already knew many of the residency program directors before interviewing with residencies during the first virtual interview season in 2020. “I know I wanted a full-scope, rural Family Medicine training, and I was blessed to be able to end up back at the MAHEC Hendersonville program for residency. Now that I’ve just finished residency, I’m glad I was there: those three years confirmed that I wanted to practice in a rural area and stay in a rural area. My residency training definitely equipped me to continue that mission and serve in all the ways I need to.”
At the Chatuge Family Practice, she and her fellow family physicians already provide full-scope care for children and adults which are expected and necessary for Family Medicine in a rural community. “In these kinds of places, your family doctor really has to be a jack-of-all-trades,” Dr. Bessey says. “Since specialists are not readily available, you are the one starting the workup and managing many complex medical diagnoses.” Currently there are no providers offering prenatal care in Clay or Macon County. That bothers Dr. Bessey, she says: “Rural western North Carolina is becoming an OB desert as more critical access hospitals stop providing OB care. Most people will deliver either 40 minutes away in Georgia or will find themselves driving to Asheville as they anticipate their delivery date.” Bessey is participating in the MAHEC Rural Fellowship Program this year, where she hopes to provide Advanced Life Support in Obstetrics (ALSO) training to local EMS providers or other health care professionals who may encounter a delivery in route to the closest hospital.
Since she has come to Chatuge Family Practice, Dr. Bessey has been able to expand some of the women’s health care which she deeply cares about, like IUD placements and endometrial biopsies. “We’ve been able to advocate more for women’s health care,” Dr. Bessey says. “Hayesville is a hidden mountain gem that is growing quickly. Younger families are moving to the area and I am excited to be able to offer these simple, in office procedures without having to refer out to specialist with limited availability.”
“Its biggest selling point is that you can make your career whatever you want it to be,” she says. “Your career can grow with you, as your passions and interest may change at various stages of life. I am fortunate to be at a practice that has supported my passions and made this possible. Our practice manager truly cares about our individual special interest, which allows our clinic to provide better comprehensive care.”
Dr. Bessey also offers her interest and advice to the medical students who shadow at the Chatuge Family Practice, who come from all over the state’s medical schools. “The only way that physicians find out about these rural settings is by having clinical experience there,” Dr. Bessey says about their training and about her own experiences as a student. “You don’t just happen upon them. I encourage medical students to find mentors whose day to day resembles exactly what they want in the future. For me, that was being involved and serving the people that live in my community.”