She bridges the gap for parents, doctors

Dr. Paige Church believes that her parents' "Yankee wisdom" is what gave her a normal life. Born with spina bifida, a dangerous birth malformation that required repeated surgeries throughout her childhood, her parents would have been excused for treating her like an invalid.

But they didn't.

"I had to make my own bed the day after I had surgery," said Church, 35. "When I was 14, my Mom said, 'You can let this shape you and make you less of a person, or you can do something good for the world.' "

Church now runs the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit follow-up program at Floating Hospital for Children. After a premature baby is released from the hospital, part of Tufts-New England Medical Center, Church is the one who bridges the gap between the families and their primary care physicians -- checking on the baby's feeding, breathing, and development, making sure that parents have the resources their child needs.

"Boston is the epicenter of medicine, with some of the brightest minds in the world in this city," she said. "But that doesn't mean healthcare is accessible. Especially for parents of kids with complex medical problems."

A native of Vermont, Church grew up in the country town of Shelburne. Her illness meant that she spent a lot of time being assessed by specialists. "But no one looked at me as a whole kid," she said. "Most doctors don't have the time allotments to do that effectively. As a physician, I wanted to look at the whole kid, development and everything."

She cited an example of a patient who wasn't growing properly. Doctors studied the boy's gastrointestinal tract to no avail. Only by having the patience to spend time with the boy and getting a thorough understanding of his case did Church and her colleagues realize that the boy was autistic, and wasn't growing because he had selected only a few foods to eat.

To help her treat the whole patient, Church trained in a rare double-specialty: developmental pediatrics and neonatology (newborn care).

"She's a clever duck," said Simon Michael, Church's mentor and director of the hospital's training program in Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine. "She has an unusual background in being trained in two seemingly unconnected areas, but a lot of these kids have developmental issues that arise as a result of prematurity."

Kevin Petit, interim pediatrician in chief for Floating Hospital, said Church hatched up the idea to combine the two specialties. "She's proving the interface of developmental pediatrics and neonatology," he said. "A lot of these kids have subtle problems that aren't easily picked up, and then they evolve into more significant problems as they get older. Having someone with Paige's unique training means these kids don't fall through the cracks."

Lynne Bopp is the mother of one of Church's patients.

"My son Aidan was born at 24 weeks at 1 pound, 9 ounces. He was in the NICU for 103 days," Bopp said. She credited Church with the fact that her son is now thriving. "She would sit and talk with us after her shift was over. She gave us a lot of hope," Bopp said. "You almost forgot that she was a doctor."

Last month, Church won the hospital's Sidney S. Gellis, MD, Young Physician's Award in recognition of her clinical work. "Having been a patient, I know how painful, frustrating, and scary it can be," she said. "That's stuff I understand very well."

Hometown: Melrose

Family: Husband, Erik. Daughter, Elizabeth, 8 months. Yellow Labrador, Ty, 4.

Hobbies: Fly-fishing. "Because of my medical history, I didn't have the strength to do some [more strenuous] stuff."

On silver linings: "The nice thing about my birth defect is that I get a re-education every four or five years [in what it means to be a patient.] So if I ever lose my sensitivities, I get reintroduced."