Nebraska Medicine is expanding its emergency medicine department

The ER at the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, NE

Nebraska medicine announced plans on Wednesday to begin a $2.2 million expansion of Nebraska Medical Center's current emergency department, starting on January 3rd.

Dr. Michael Wadman, chairman of the emergency medicine department at the
University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, NE

The expansion is intended to accommodate an anticipated increase in patient volume as Omaha's population ages.

The medical center will add seven private exam rooms, extra workstations, and complete minor upgrades to eight existing critical-care emergency department rooms at the Nebraska Medical Center emergency department. The medical center also plans to add two emergency room doctors and several nurses to its existing staff.

Existing administrative office spaces, a staff lounge, and a conference room in the current facilities will be demolished to make room for the expansion.

Existing patient care areas will not be affected during construction, and the expansion construction project is expected to wrap up by early June.

"The timing is right," said newly appointed University of Nebraska Medical Center's emergency medicine chairman Dr. Michael Wadman, M.D. “The ED expansion will allow us to accommodate an anticipated increase in patient volume over the next several years. Our mission is to provide timely, high quality emergency care for all of our patients, and this project will provide the space we need.”

Officials designate Omaha, NE as possible flashpoint for the next impending zombie apocalypse

Government officials have designated Omaha as a dumping ground for taking people infected with BSL-4 agents

An emergency medical drill took place on Friday, designating the City of Omaha as one of only a handful of cities across the nation willing to accept multiple patients infected with the world's most deadly contagious infectious diseases.

Nebraska Medicine's willingness to take in more than one patient at a time infected
with a BSL-4 agent is taking a big risk of losing containment of the contagion

It sounds like a science fiction fantasy scenario of the beginning of the next zombie apocalypse as seen on TV shows like The Walking Dead, but as one of only a handful of bio-safety level 4 (BSL-4) containment centers around the world willing to take in more than one patient infected with the world's most deadly infectious diseases at a time, Omaha may be a likely potential flash point or hot zone for the spread of the next global pandemic of epic proportions.

Only two years ago, Omaha's Nebraska Medicine was on the front lines taking in and treating patients from West Africa infected with the deadly Ebola virus during the worst outbreak of the virus in recorded history. Three patients diagnosed with the virus were brought into Omaha, and two survived. Luckily for us, the virus didn't break containment.

Jury says 'Creighton killer,' Dr. Anthony Garcia, eligible for death penalty

Dr. Anthony Garcia is eligible for the death penalty for his crimes

Update 11/9/16:

A historic election that swept underdog Presidential candidate Donald Trump into office, also overwhelmingly reinstated the death penalty in the State of Nebraska yesterday, nullifying a previous repeal of the death penalty in 2015 by the state legislature.

Much like the Trexit rebuke that swept across the state and the nation, the Rust Belt carried the initiative by a 4 to 1 margin outside Lincoln and Omaha.

That means the Supreme Court will assemble a three-judge panel to determine if Dr. Anthony Garcia will receive the death penalty, expected some months down the line, for committing two double-murders in the "Creighton murders" from 2008 and 2013.

Original Article:

A Douglas County jury reconvened for only 45 minutes today to determine if there were aggravating factors in Dr. Anthony J. Garcia's murder case to make him eligible for the death penalty.

Jury finds Dr. Anthony Garcia guilty on four counts of first-degree murder

Dr. Anthony Garcia was found guilty on four counts of first-degree murder by
a jury today at 1:30 p.m. and first death penalty phase hearing will start Friday

Of late, we have not been reporting a lot of positive and uplifting stories from the medical field in the Omaha area as we had originally intended when we first created this blog back in 2013.

The sordid stories of intrigue, controversy, and scandals coming out of the medical profession in Omaha in recent months simply haven't fit that bill for what we intended to highlight as the best aspects of the medical profession, especially for the community in a quiet and squeaky-clean Mid-Western town, like Omaha, Nebraska, nestled in the heartland of America.

Frankly, some of these disturbing stories reported in recent months have simply been black eyes on the medical profession in the Omaha metro area, but for better or worse, the it is what it is, and we still have to report on it.

Dr. Travis Teetor named Young Physician of the Year by Nebraska Medical Association

Dr. Travis Teetor named NMA's Young Physician of the Year

Anesthesiologist, Dr. Travis Teetor, M.D., of Boys Town National Research Hospital, was named the 2016 Nebraska Medical Association's (NMA) Young Physician of the Year.

Dr. Teetor was nominated by the Metro Omaha Medical Society and awarded on September 16, for his contributions to the medical profession in the Nebraska area.

Dr. Teetor continues to be an active advocating force in the medical field, sharing his knowledge of medicine and advocating his views on public health with patients, peers, and community health organizations.

He obtained his Bachelor of Science in Education with degrees in both Exercise Science and Athletic Training from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, graduated medical school and completed his residency training at University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC.)

Dr. Teetor is board certified in both anesthesiology and pediatric anesthesiology.

Nebraska Medicine holds drill for an inevitable disaster scenario in Omaha: a mass shooting event

Actors posing as mass casualty victims at the Doubletree Hotel help out in a frightening drill for Nebraska Medicine

Nebraska Medicine held a drill to prepare for a growing, frightening, and very real phenomenon that's happening all across the nation, an act of terrorism, which even a quiet Mid-Western town, like Omaha, isn't immune to these days.

The drill was held to prepare Omaha for another worst
case scenario

Hundreds of doctors, nurses, and staff from Nebraska Medicine attended a seminar and practice drill at the Doubletree Hotel to simulate exactly such an event on Friday to prepare for such a worst-case scenario.

The possibility is very real these days, even in Omaha, because it's happened before even in a city as quiet and serene as Omaha, Nebraska.

In 2007, one such event occurred at the von Maur Mall where an active shooter left nine people dead in a deadly shooting spree.

"Doing a drill is the best way to prepare everyone for the real-life event," said trauma program coordinator Ashley Emmel. Those who attended went through scenarios that showed the real-life struggles that could one day be back on their doorsteps.

"There wasn't a lot of practicing," said Emmel. "This is what it would look like. Of course, the victims will be praying and screaming and asking you to help them."

The drill was organized by Emmel and is a reminder to everyone to prepare for a new wave of very disturbing mass casualty events that is not only a recent national phenomena, but one that has become more and more a global one that could happen anywhere in the world.

As Madonna Rehab Hospitals holds grand opening of its new Omaha campus, controversy still swirls around new UNMC PM&R chairman's troubled past in Texas

A little over two years after breaking ground on Sept. 4, 2014, construction on Madonna Rehabilitation Hospitals new $93 million campus in Omaha is now officially completed, and the hospital is ready for business.

Madonna's grand opening celebration on Thursday kicked off with
only one glitch on Thursday: How will they address UNMC
founding PM&R chairman Dr. Samuel Bierner's (seen on
the left) scandalous past?

So hospital officials hosted a private grand opening event and ribbon-cutting ceremony Thursday for the Omaha metro area's first and only hospital dedicated entirely to rehab care at its newest location across from the Village Pointe Shopping Center at 17500 Burke Street, located just south of 175th and Dodge.

Self-guided tours were provided to former patients, Madonna staff, and state and local dignitaries who attended the grand opening event on Thursday morning.

Just before the ground breaking on the new facilities in 2014, Madonna Rehabilitation Specialty Hospital opened a 32-bed unit on the fourth floor of Nebraska Medicine-Bellevue to address the acute inpatient rehab needs of hospitalized patients with complex medical conditions who were ready to be discharged from the hospital but not quite ready to take care of themselves at home.

Madonna plans on merging the 32-bed unit at Bellevue into its new campus after the Omaha campus officially opens.

Texas Medical Board investigation about Kowalske, Bierner, Gabriel, Hudak, and Knapton by Michel Schwalbe

Dr. Amy McGaha named new chairwoman of Creighton's family medicine department

Dr. Amy McGaha of Creighton  University

On Friday, Creighton University School of Medicine's family medicine department promoted its residency program director, Dr. Amy McGaha, M.D., to the post of chairwoman of the department.

McGaha's appointment becomes effective October 1 and is subject to approval by the Creighton University Board of Regents.

She also serves on the regional board of CHI Health and the combined CUMC Bergan Medical Executive Committee.

Before coming to Creighton, McGaha previously served on the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine and as assistant director of medical education for the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) in Leawood, Kansas, the professional certification board for family physicians.

Prior to those appointments, Dr. McGaha provided inpatient and outpatient care for Freeman Health Systems in Missouri.

Dr. Michael Wadman named new chairman of UNMC's emergency medicine department

UNMC's new chairman of ER, Dr. Michael Wadman

Yesterday, the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) named Dr.Michael Wadman, M.D. as their new chairman of the medical center's emergency medicine department. 

According to university officials, Dr. Wadman has been a key figure in the UNMC/Nebraska Medicine emergency medicine program for more than 20 years.

The appointment, which is subject to approval by the University of Nebraska Board of Regents, was announced by Dr. Bradley Britigan, dean of the UNMC College of Medicine, and would become effective Oct. 15.

"Dr. Wadman was selected from a very competitive, highly talented pool of applicants," said Dr. Britigan. “He is an outstanding clinician who is also committed to achieving excellence in our education and research missions. At a time when major changes are taking place in emergency medicine in our community, his knowledge of the local emergency medicine environment is also a major plus."

Wadman joined UNMC's faculty back in 1994 as an assistant professor. He became an associate professor in 2004 and full professor in 2014. In 2003, he was the founding residency director of UNMC’s emergency medicine residency program, a role he served in for more than seven years.

Exclusive: UNMC's new chairman of PM&R has a dark, troubled history of Medicare fraud, patient endangerment, and medical board investigations

The September 2016 issue of Strictly Business featuring the new Madonna Rehab Hospital set to open in October 2016

Links and References have been updated!

Last February, we covered a story about the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) creating a new physical medicine & rehabilitation (PM&R) program at the Nebraska Medical Center.

UNMC's newly appointed founding chairman of their newly
created physical medicine & rehabilitation program, Samuel
Bierner, has a dark, shady, and very troubling history with
Medicare fraud, patient safety issues, and investigations
from the Texas Medical Board, according to the public
record, including Dallas' leading daily newspaper

PM&R, or physiatry as it is also known as, is a rather obscure and relatively unknown medical specialty that cares for patients with disabling conditions, including traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, strokes, neurological impairments, and musculoskeletal problems, who are medically stable, but otherwise have some therapeutic, equipment, or other prosthetic needs to take care of themselves after being discharged from the hospital.

In essence, it's a field of medicine that doesn't deal in urgent life or death matters like most other medical specialties, which may explain why it's relatively obscure and unknown to most people in the first place.

In that article, UNMC officials announced they had selected a Dallas-based physiatrist, Dr. Samuel Michael Bierner, as the new founding chairman of UNMC's new PM&R program in Omaha, Nebraska.

Bierner has more than 25 years experience in physiatry and had previously served as the residency director of the PM&R program at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas (UTSW) since 2005 and medical director of Parkland Memorial Hospital's PM&R department with what appeared to be a immaculate record; however, we were given an anonymous news tip that there was more than meets the eye to Dr. Bierner's past than he had revealed to UNMC officials when he landed the prestigious job to head their fledgling PM&R program back in February.

Unbeknownst to UNMC officials, the new chairman of their PM&R department was charged in 2012 by the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) in a federal court in the Northern District of Texas of conspiring with four other fellow UT Southwestern PM&R faculty members of defrauding federal and state programs with "thousands" of false billings to Medicare and Medicaid that endangered the lives of patients, and later, he made false statements to the medical board saying he was "exonerated of all the charges of fraud" when in fact he wasn't.

U.S.A., ex rel John Doe v. Parkland, Samuel Bierner, Karen Kowalske, Vincent Gabriel, Anne Hudak, and Susan... by Michel Schwalbe

New undergraduate college program puts UNO undergrads on affirmative action path to UNMC College of Medicine

Minority undergraduate students at UNO are being fast-tracked to UNMC College of Medicine,
but it's not an 'affirmative action program' according to UNO and UNMC officials.

The Urban Health Opportunities Program provides tuition, mentoring, and other benefits to undergraduate students at the University of Nebraska at Omaha who want to be doctors in Omaha, especially in the underserved northeast and southeast areas of Omaha.

Undergrads enrolled in the Urban Health Opportunities Program at UNO
are mentored and fast-tracked into UNMC College of Medicine as a way
to avoid the label of being part of an 'affirmative action program'

Those who satisfy program requirements will get into medical school at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. The program is a way to increase diversity among doctors in the region.

While program officials say this isn’t affirmative action, it is nonetheless an effort to introduce more minorities into the medical field, especially those who can speak foreign languages and who have a passion for working in low-income communities.

This is about improving access to health care for many in the community and not about meeting quotas, said Dr. Jeff Hill, associate dean of admissions and student affairs at the UNMC College of Medicine.

Hill said minorities make up only about 10 percent of the first-year class in the College of Medicine this semester. Currently 13 undergraduate students representing all four classes are taking part in the program, which began this year. Three freshmen will join the program each year.

Nebraska Medical Center again tops list of the state's top hospitals, according to U.S. News & World Reports

The Nebraska Medical Center again tops the state's top hospitals, according to U.S. News & World Reports

The University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) at Omaha has again been named the top-ranked hospital in the state by the U.S. News & World Report survey.

UNMC also received high ratings in eight medical specialties:

• cancer
• gastroenterology and GI surgery
• geriatrics
• gynecology
• nephrology
• neurology and neurosurgery 
• pulmonology
• urology

“To again be named the best hospital in the state is a testament to the people who work for this organization and their continued dedication and passion,” said Dr. Dan DeBehenke, of Nebraska Medicine, in a press release. 

UNMC pathologist Thomas Williams named Nebraska’s top public health official

Pathologist Dr. Thomas Williams

A local Omaha pathologist has been chosen to serve as Nebraska’s next top public health official.

Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts announced the appointment of Dr. Thomas L. Williams as the state’s next chief medical officer and director of the state’s Division of Public Health. The appointment comes more than a year after the resignation of Dr. Joseph Acierno.

A blue ribbon panel comprising of the Governor’s Office and Courtney Phillips, director of the Department of Health and Human Services, interviewed nearly two dozen candidates for the job.

“Williams stood out ... because of his wide-ranging experience and heart for public service,” Gov. Ricketts said.

Williams currently directs laboratory medicine and is the chairman of the pathology department at Methodist Hospital in Omaha. He also teaches pathology as a professor at the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) College of Medicine.

Samuel Bierner named to head new physical medicine & rehabilitation program at UNMC

Dr. Samuel Bierner to head new PM&R department at UNMC at Omaha 

Dr. Samuel Michael Bierner, M.D., a Texas physical medicine and rehabilitation (PM&R) physician or physiatrist as they are more commonly known as, has been selected as the founding chairman of the new PM&R program at the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMBC) at Omaha. (See www.unmc.edu). 

Dr. Bradley Britigan, Dean of the UNMC
College of Medicine on appointing the
founding chairman for the UNMC's
newest PM&R department

The announcement came yesterday from Dr. Bradley Britigan, M.D., dean of the UNMC College of Medicine at Omaha, pending the approval of the University of Nebraska Board of Regents.

His appointment on March 1, 2016 marks the end of a nationwide search for the position of the new chairmanship for the new fledgling department at UNMC. Dr. Bierner’s appointment is effective April 1, 2016.

"The biggest attraction for me to come to Nebraska is to be a part of establishing a brand new program at UNMC," Dr. Bierner said. "It's a great opportunity for me to have an impact that would put a capstone on my career."

Dr. Bierner has more than 25 years of experience in the specialty of PM&R, which in recent years has been given the unflattering nickname of "Pleasure, Money & Relaxation" by other more serious disciplines in medicine.

PM&R is a relatively unknown medical specialty that cares for adults and children who experience disabling medical conditions such as traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, and impairments from stroke, musculoskeletal and neurological diseases.