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Show Wednesday, November 15, 2006 B1 Verna after By Jennifer Petty Express Writer Dr. Larry Wilcken knows about change after working for nearly 30 years for Ashley Valley Medical Center. Wilcken, who retired last week as an emergency room physician, will be headed to Guatemala City, Guatemala with his wife Jean to serve a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Wilcken will spend 18 months serving as the Medical Director for Central America. Wilcken grew up in Hanna a small community outside Tabiona. When he was a freshman fresh-man in high school, his family fam-ily moved to Roosevelt and he finished high school at Union High. He then completed his undergraduate degree at Brigham Young University before being drafted into the Army. He went to medical school at Rush Medical College in Chicago, Illinois, then completed com-pleted a family practice residency residen-cy at the University of Utah. After his residency, he was hired as a member of a team of health care professionals to open a clinic in Vernal that would provide total health care. The clinic wasn't economically eco-nomically profitable, so the University sold the business to Dr. Wilcken. He, along with his partner, Dr. Norman Nielsen began a family practice office. "All the family practice doctors had to take turns doing shifts in the emergency room," said Wilcken. After 10-15 years of doing both family practice and emergency emer-gency room medicine, Wilcken decided he couldn't do both, so switched to just doing emergency emergen-cy medicine. When asked what appealed to him about working work-ing in the emergency room, Dr. Wilcken said, "You never knew what was coming through the door and it was exciting in that regard." The more regular hours of the emergency room shifts were also appealing. Wilcken was known for his kindness and good "bedside manner." Debbie Spafford, who has personally worked with Dr. Wilcken for many years, said "Dr. Wilcken is always concerned con-cerned about his patients." One family wrote a letter to the editor four years ago about health care in Vernal and when they mentioned Dr. Wilcken said, "He took exceptional care of her and when she didn't want to be admitted let her go home. He called her several times checking on her." Over the 30 years in Vernal, Wilcken has seen a lot of changes chang-es in medicine. When he start Wilcken, an amateur classical guitarist, iOWcst 2 VemU'tah IIwy40,StcF 435-781-2500 Outstanding Agents. Outstanding Results. vJt .4"'- - II :r ! ': I 7 Basin Life nearly ed, it was unusual to have helicopter heli-copter flights, but now, there are about five trips a week. "Obviously the technology has changed," said Wilcken. "There have been tremendous advancements advance-ments in technology and medications. medi-cations. There are so many more medications available now. In a way, it's made things more complex and complicated, but it has also extended life and we're able to treat problems more specifically now, where before we had to treat patients more globally." When asked what he saw as the most important factor in treating patients, Wilcken said, "It is important to establish rapport rap-port with patients. They need to trust your judgement. It's a challenge and one I felt I always had to continue to work on." As a "retiree" Wilcken has enjoyed having time to just help people and friends out more without being tied to a schedule. "I don't have to worry about resting to have energy for a night shift," he said, but he will also miss aspects of medical medi-cal practice. "Being in the ER and having someone come in who is critically ill and stabilizing stabiliz-ing them and facilitating care and getting them to a less critical criti-cal condition is very satisfying and rewarding." Wilcken can't give up medicine medi-cine completely, as it has been such a big part of his life for so many years. He has started a little home business where he mostly visits patients who are not able to leave their house very easily. "People often think you need to see patients in the clinic because of all the equipment equip-ment and medicines available," said Wilcken. He continued to say that while it is true not everything can be taken to a person's house, because of the technological advances and the "miniaturization of equipment" great steps have been made for home health care. Wilcken has wires that hook up to his laptop computer to monitor heart patterns and a digital machine to read blood pressure. "I really enjoy visiting visit-ing patients in their home, they are so appreciative and it is so rewarding." Wilcken would like to continue this business following his mission. Wilcken sees health care coming in a complete circle. "People still want personal care from a live physician," he said. Wilcken thinks that as the population continues to age, that home physician care will become even more important. Wilcken also has opinions about what medicine needs. "Medicine has become a business busi-ness instead of a service," said enjoys relaxing to music. 1 Ih-i. 7 J - i nanus tor doc Wilcken. In some respects it has lost the "personal touch and caring that needs to be in medicine medi-cine and has been in traditional medicine." Besides practicing medicine, Wilcken is active in his church and considers it an avocation. The church becomes a big part of your life and almost everything every-thing you do is influenced by it, said Wilcken. He also enjoys tennis, racquetball and playing classical guitar. Wilcken is part of a group of eight to ten musicians musi-cians that get together and perform per-form pieces that individuals of the group have prepared. He has helped coach tennis, and seventh and eighth grade basketball, and spends a lot of time taking care of the 8,000 trees that make up his Lapoint orchard. Wilcken will celebrate his 31st wedding anniversary in December and he and his wife Jean have four children. His oldest two daughters work in the real estate industry in Salt Lake, his son is working on a family oil project, and his youngest daughter is a junior at BYU, majoring in microbiology. vernalsocietyyahoo.com mm ,nii... mj''v:m it "J , " v. rs ; & U j J yi?sm&w Dr. Wilcken and family (I to r): daughters Pam and Kristi, Wilcken, wife Jean, son Erik and daughter Anne have enjoyed living in Vernal. Dr. Wilcken was always focused on the -"- r et rr? ens - t , 4 iff Dr. Wilcken has treated many of Vernal's residents in the hospital ER. ij , & 1 ' A patient and believes gaining a patient's trust is most important. t - 1 VA w LI i Looking forward to many more ,gf eat years! Community Calendar November Utah Fine Arts League art display at Western Heritage Museum during the month of November. November 13-December 20 Uintah County Library Food for Fines will be held until Dec. 20. Bring in cans of food and your overdue fines will be waived. 1 can of food equals $1.00. November 15 "Downloading a GEDCOM" will be taught at the Family History Center by Hazel Bentley at 7 p.m. Sign-up recommended. rec-ommended. November 16 Charyl Siddoway will teach a class at the Family History Center on Finding Your Ancestors in Uintah County at 5:15 p.m. Bedtime Story Hour at Duchesne Co. Library Children's Room at 6 p.m. Contact DDI Vantage for more information, 722-3008. November 17 Community dance at the Golden Age Center, 155 South 100 West from 8 to 10 p.m. every Friday night. Kay's Band provides the music. November 16 Great American Smokeout is Nov. 16. A free monthly public pub-lic seminar will cover recent scientifically validated and effective methods to quit for good. Medications, Cognitive and Behavioral strategies, Hypnosis, and other means. Conducted by Dr. Michael J. Bjornson, Ph.D., Health Psychologist. The seminar will be held Monday, Nov. 27, 2006 at Kingsbury Community Church, Social Hall, 65 East 100 North, Vernal. Reservations required. Call (435) 781-8989 to sign up. November 18 St. James Catholic Church will be sponsoring "Winter Games" beginning at 7 p.m. at the Western Park Convention Center. Admission is $6. This is their annual fund-raiser for charity purposes. There will be food, fun, games and lots of prizes. No children under 12. Vernal Elks will sponsor the Elks Hoop Shoot at Uintah High School, ages 8-13. Sign ups will be at 11 a.m., the shoot will be at 12 noon. For more information, contact Travis Reynolds, 781-1482. November 20 Community Bible Study every Monday at 7 p.m. at 3630 South 1500 East. November 21 "Advances Focus Filter in Personal Ancestral File" will be taught at the Vernal History Center by Karen Coombs at 5:15 p.m. Sign-up is recommended. November 22, 24-27 Trees for Charity will be held at Western Park. Call 789-1352 for more information. November 24 Community dance at the Golden Age Center, 155 South 100 West from 8 to 10 p.m. every Friday night. Kay's Band provides the music. Community Holly Days will be held at Cobblerock Park. For more information call 789-1352. Community Parade of Lights. Contact Vernal City at 789-2255 for more information. November 24, 25 Santa's 27th Annual Workshop Craft Fair will be held at the Vernal Middle School. Hours are: Friday the 24th, 12 to 5 p.m. and Saturday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, call Tena at 789-1195. 789-1195. To place items of public interest inter-est in the Community Calendar, call 789-3511 or email them to editorvernal.com. ? |