STEPHEN GENEREAUX

The continuity of caring for a patient from birth through adulthood is one of the hallmarks of family medicine that drew Genereaux, Vermont’s 2018 Family Physician of the Year, to the specialty. He’s been working at this community clinic for 25 years, a job that’s granted him “front row seats to the highs and lows in people’s lives.”

As an undergraduate, Genereaux glimpsed two contrasting views of healthcare through summer internships: first, he shadowed an orthopedist at a large hospital in New York City; later, he worked with Brewster Martin, MD, a family physician with a solo practice in rural Chelsea, Vermont. “Brewster was a classic country doctor,” Genereaux says. “Seeing the breadth and variety in his practice, and the way he fit into the community, spurred my interest in family medicine.”

That interest grew during his time at Dartmouth Medical School, especially after a third-year family medicine rotation in Augusta, Maine. Following residency, Genereaux spent four years at a public health center in Bethel, Alaska. Then he stumbled on the opportunity to work at Little Rivers.

Little Rivers is a Federally Qualified Health Center, providing primary care to all residents in the region, regardless of ability to pay. In addition to physicians and nurses, its staff includes behavioral health clinicians and care coordinators who help patients maintain their health and well-being. The clinic also welcomes first- and second-year Geisel students completing their On Doctoring course, as well as third- and fourth-year students on their family medicine rotations. “Watching us do what we do and our role in the community—that’s something you don’t usually get taught in med school,” says Genereaux.

It’s their role in the community that inspired Genereaux and his colleagues to begin the MAT program. “Three years ago we had three overdose deaths among local residents,” he says. “People have realized that the recovering population is us—our cousins, our aunts, our nephews.”

Living and working among underserved, rural neighbors, Genereaux is committed to eliminating barriers to care. Along with Geisel students, he visits seasonal agricultural workers at their farms. In the future, he wants to explore more ways to take healthcare services out of the clinic and into the community, like doing blood-pressure checks at the town dump.

“Family physicians aren’t just doctors,” Genereaux says. “We have to be leaders and role models.” He stresses that the caregivers at Little Rivers are “accessible, approachable, available, and accountable”