Meet Dr. Carl Petersen, DO, he is the Chief of Mental Health Services at CHKD, and is dual board certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology in general and child and adolescent psychiatry.
I'm Carl Peterson, chief of the Mental health service line at Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters. When I came to see HKD to interview, it became very apparent to me that there was an energy that was pervasive and frankly palpable throughout the hospital. And that would be expected certainly among the leadership in the hospital who was trying to recruit me. But in fact, I found that throughout all of the different surface lines of the hospital, in different areas of medicine, surgery and among the nurses and the text and other support staff as well. And then I when I started considering the job even more, I noticed that that's that energy also existed outside the walls of the hospital. And indeed it was really throughout the community. And so the support for the this initiative to build a new hospital uh, to serve the mental health needs of Children. Our community was frankly uh, really impressive to me. And it's the reason I chose to come to see educate E. C. H. K. D. Is a very special place. It's been a leading medical facility, certainly in our community for decades. But what makes it a really special places that people uh people here are committed to the healthcare obviously of Children. And um there's a commitment also to academic research. Whether our affiliation with Eastern Virginia Medical School, there is a commitment to high quality care, as evidenced by our involvement and a clinically integrated network with other leading academic institutions in our state, such as the University of Virginia. And uh my colleagues were building a very robust group of highly trained child psychiatrist from other leading academic institutions. And we are excited to build not only the hospital but establish a continuum of care outside the hospital facility. But throughout our community, the hospital in in itself is incredibly exciting. Obviously, to build a 14 story, 60 beds. State of the art facility is it's just a remarkable opportunity for us to make a significant impact the mental health care needs of Children, our community. But it really extends beyond that. This really only the symbol of of what we're doing. We're really, we're really going to embed our child mental health providers in in an integrated model with our pediatricians in the community. And we're going to provide the full continuum of care. So we're gonna have a partial hospitalization program in the hospital, but we're also gonna have intensive outpatient programs in the community. We're gonna build robust academic programs as well with a child, adolescent psychiatry fellowship program expected to come online and 2022 or 2023. And we fully anticipate also having a triple board here at our hospital. Our hospital is going to be unique in nature throughout the state, in our region, because we're gonna be able to take care of Children with complex medical and psychiatric needs. And uh, currently, the current state of affairs in this part of Virginia and throughout our state, many times, Children need to go outside our region are outside the state to get that quality, uh, and level of care necessary to meet their needs. Once our hospitals open, we're going to be able to keep Children, our community and in our state, right here in Virginia, working as a child psychiatrist at the Children's Hospital, King's Daughters. You'll actually be employed by Children's specialty group. And the reason why that's important is that it's an incredibly unique opportunity for child and adolescent psychiatrist to be employed in a private practice model, yet be working in an academic institution within a community based hospital system, being part of the private practice. And making partner in that practice gives you opportunities to benefit financially from equity in the practice to help your long term financial success. I've been very fortunate to live in Hampton roads for the past 10 years. We live in coastal Virginia with the beautiful beaches in Virginia beach and northern north Carolina on the outer banks of north Carolina, just a short drive away. Uh additionally, I'm a history buff and Virginia in this area of Virginia has an incredible cultural and historical sites to visit and to really immerse yourself. And there's not a weekend that goes by when I have time off for vacation time that I really find a need to go anywhere else. We're just a couple hours ride from Washington D. C. And uh we have a fantastic airport where you can get anywhere in the country. So I feel like this is, this is a great place to start a career, to build a career. And it's got a fairly low cost of living relative to other places. So for myself and my family, this has just been a wonderful find and we very much enjoy living in Hampton Roads.
