“Women are the cornerstone of the family,” says Christina Smith-Winfield, MD, a gynecologist and obstetrician who provides care at the Emory Women’s Center at Decatur. “If we take good care of ourselves, that means our children, our family members, our partners also take good care of themselves.”
At Emory Healthcare, women’s health services cover a spectrum of needs a woman may have throughout her life – from birth control or family planning to regular cancer screenings or mental health evaluation. For Smith-Winfield and other providers at Emory Healthcare, developing a relationship is the most important aspect of caring for a patient. “I get to have a lifelong partnership and relationship with all of my patients,” she says.
John Horton, MD, division director for General Obstetrics and Gynecology, agreed. At age 17, he got a job at a local hospital, first as an orderly and later working as a surgical scrub tech. In medical school, his experience with OBGYN helped him find his passion – and he’s been practicing since 2008. “I get to be with patients for their entire lives,” he says. “I could still be a part of surgical services, and I could be a part of some of the largest moments of any patient’s life – and that sense of impact on a person and being there for those moments and those changes is really important for me.”
For Charisma Manley, MD, who practices maternal-fetal medicine at Emory Perinatal Center at Decatur, her patients are also the most important part of her career. She graduated medical school in 2013 and commented on the impact of her training, “I’ll never forget in medical school being told that you will be able to determine what is going on with your patient just by listening to them.”
