He will report directly to Executive Director Denise Watson.

Pardue comes to Mountain Valley Hospice & Palliative Care with nearly 30 years of professional experience, 25 of them in financial management. Most recently, Pardue was employed by Ajilan Finance and served as a controller for Hanesbrands Export in a temporary assignment that included month-end close, financial reporting and analysis and planning. Between 1988 and 2004 at UnitedHealthcare in Greensboro he was controller, finance director and accounting manager. Prior to that he was a plant controller with Hon Industries Inc., an office-furniture manufacturer in Louisburg, N.C.

Pardue earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A native of Elkin, Pardue currently lives in Kernersville with his wife, Kathy.

Mountain Valley Hospice also has announced that Mary Beth Wood will be the coordinator of its new “Transitions” program.

The “Transitions” program serves people with life-limiting illnesses who may not be eligible for, or wish to enroll in, hospice, but who may benefit from volunteer support and community resources.

Mountain Valley Hospice & Palliative Care is a nonprofit organization serving the terminally ill in Surry, Yadkin and 11 other counties. Through its team of trained specialists, health-care professionals and volunteers, Mountain Valley Hospice addresses the growing need for compassionate hospice care through offices in Yadkinville, Elkin, Mount Airy and Galax, Va.

In October 2007, Mountain Valley Hospice broke ground for the state-of-the-art Joan and Howard Woltz Hospice Home scheduled for completion this fall 2008.

The grant will support Communities Caring for Families, the organization’s initiative to more than double services to children ages 10 to 16 in Surry and Yadkin counties.

Crossroads Behavioral Healthcare is the Local Management Entity for mental health, developmental disabilities and substance abuse services in Iredell, Surry and Yadkin counties in northwest North Carolina. As the local public manager of services, Crossroads ensures that citizens have access to quality, appropriate services provided in a network of private organizations.

The Crossroads region covers 1,450 square miles with a population of just over 250,000, extending from the Virginia state line to the shores of Lake Norman.

The clinic shares the building also occupied by Dr. Robert W. Hower’s White Sulphur Springs Chiropractic Center.

Vedder earned a bachelor’s degree at St. Johns University in Collegeville, Minn., and his master’s degree in physical therapy at The College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, Minn. He was the director of the ProHealth Rehabilitation Department at Northwest Medical Partners from 2002 through 2007. He is the director of the physical therapy assistant program being developed at Surry Community College in Dobson.

Kristin Mills, a licensed physical therapist assistant who at ProHealth Rehabilitation, has joined Vedder at White Sulphur Springs Physical Therapy. She is a 2003 graduate of Wytheville (Va.) Community Collegea and experienced in orthopedic and neurological rehabilitation.

Regina Combs is the clinic’s office manager.

“We pride ourselves in providing aggressive physical therapy with compassion, caring and a commitment to quality,” Vedder said. His philosophy is that physical therapy can and should be a life-changing event that helps people maximize their potential in various aspects of life.”

“We also believe that physical therapy does not have to hurt to be successful,” he said. “We will find the most effective and pain-free manner to help you achieve your goals.”

White Sulphur Springs Physical Therapy accepts most major insurance policies. Its telephone number is (336) 783-9400.

Motorists will be redirected to the Worth Street parking lot. Signs will be posted. A full-time shuttle service will begin Thursday and operate Monday through Friday from 5:30 a.m. until 9:30 p.m. There will be pick-up and drop-off locations at the shuttle bus stop shelters in the Worth Street parking lot, the public Emergency Department entrance, and the Main Entrance.

Other shuttle locations may be added and will be announced at a later date.

In a news release announcing the hospital’s plans, CEO WIlliam “Bill” James said, “Northern Hospital of Surry County appreciates the public’s patience with the current and upcoming changes as construction begins on the Surgical Services Relocation Project.”

Sherry Youngquist of the Winston-Salem Journal described details of Northern Hospital’s $22-million renovation and expansion program in her Jan. 6 article, “Surry hospital to start expansion this month.”

The system’s high-resolution, high-speed CT angiography will help physicians gather information they need to better diagnose diseases and life­-threatening conditions including cardiovascular disease and strokes.

In a single rotation, the LightSpeed VCT creates 64 high-resolution anatomical images, each section as thin as a credit card. These images are combined to form a three-dimensional view of the patient’s anatomy.

LightSpeed can capture images of a beating heart in five heartbeats and other organs in one second and perform whole body trauma exams in 10 seconds, more than twice as fast as conventional multi-slice CT scanners anywhere in Northern Hospital’s service region. This speed is especially helpful in shortening breath holds for geriatric patients, patients who are on ventilators and pediatric patients.

Director of Imaging Services Michael Leonard said, “Volume CT is patient friendly. Fast scans can help reduce patient stress and anxiety and some volume CT procedures can be done in only one simple exam.”

“We’re breaking barriers in speed and accuracy of patient exams and are now able to offer new and enhanced diagnostic procedures thanks to our new LightSpeed VCT,” stated Don Henderson, lead CT technologist.

Cardiac and coronary artery angiography CT scans are expected to begin by the spring of 2008.

For patients with chest pains, the LightSpeed VCT can help physicians rule out (or in) three potentially fatal conditions: aortic dissection, pulmonary embolism and coronary artery disease.

In stroke cases, where treatment should begin within an hour or less to ensure the best outcome for the patient, the LightSpeed VCT permits rapid imaging of blood vessels in the brain. It also reduces the number of exams a patient may need to undergo.

The Imaging Center at Northern Hospital of Surry County is staffed by board-certified radiologists from Forsyth Radiological Associates in Winston-Salem. The staff of CT technologists is ARRT CT certified and experienced. The center has three CT scanners to serve patients 24 hours a day.

The Imaging Center performed more than 21,000 CT scan procedures in 2007, detecting all sorts of diseases and injuries in patients from Surry and surrounding counties.

Berryman is a registered dietitian with more than 12 years of experience in public health.

She succeeds David Stone who resigned effective Jan. 1 to become director of the N.C. Local Health Department Accreditation Program.

The Surry County health director oversees projects and programs that include preventing or controlling the spread of disease, preventive medicine, environmental health and animal control. The department provides home health services, operates clinics for children’s health and dental care, sponsors primary-care clinics and helps develop employee-wellness programs.

The Surry County Health and Nutrition Center in Dobson was one of the first state-accredited health departments in North Carolina.

Northern Hospital of Surry County will begin its $22-million Surgical Services Relocation Project in January. A 58,000-square-foot addition will go up at the south end of the hospital’s main campus on Rockford Street in Mount Airy. The building will be the future home of Inpatient and Outpatient Surgery, Day Surgery, GI Endoscopy, Pre-Admission Testing, Anesthesia, the Post-Anesthesia Care Unit, Central Sterile Supply, a mobile technology dock, and a new public lobby and waiting space. Associated parking and site improvements will adjoin the building.

Two and one-half years in the making, this project is to be completed by the fall of 2009.

The state-of-the-art digital operating room suites will incorporate the latest in medical advancements and provide the surgeons and staff with tools needed to serve the community and surrounding areas for years to come, according to CEO William B. “Bill” James.

The new Surgical Services building has been designed from the ground up from a patient and family member’s perspective starting with a convenient, level, new parking area. The distances between outpatient registration, pre-admission testing and the surgical waiting area will be shorter, making it easier for patients and family members to navigate through the new area. To ease the stress associated with waiting for a family member having surgery, a much larger waiting area has been designed with additional seating to make the family’s wait more pleasant. Two consultation rooms will be available for the surgeon to privately discuss the patient’s surgical outcome with the family. Volunteers and hospital employees at the waiting room desk will assist families, answer questions, or simply listen and talk with family members to ease their anxiety.

Close to 20 local and regional contractors will be involved in the work, all coordinated by the hospital’s construction manager, John S. Clark Company of Mount Airy. Wilkerson Associates Architects from Charlotte have handled the design work.

“Elkin is actually undergoing a ‘mini-construction’ boom,” Matthews reports, “with the hospital expansion; an $18-million, 221,000-square-foot Super Wal-Mart; a $4.5-million, 100-room, 3-story Fairfield Inn & Suites hotel; and a new Walgreens drugstore.”

Other projects mentioned in The News’ report (plus some of our own notes) include:

A $925,089 medical office building that BGSS Investments LLC is constructing at 100 North Pointe Boulevard in Mount Airy. The principals in BGSS Investments are Bobby Harold, co-founder of H&W Trucking, and his children Gary Harold and Susan Harold Thomas.

A $385,560 addition being developed by Diversified Investment Properties (partners Todd Surratt and C. Richard Vaughn Jr.) at the Southeastern Sign Works site, 609 Junction St. in Mount Airy.

A $482,030 addition at the Golden Living Center (formerly Surry Community Nursing Center), a skilled-nursing facility at 542 Allred Mill Road in Mount Airy. The building permit for what will be the Penny Walker Rehabilitation Center was issued to Beverly Health and Rehabilitation Services which is, like Golden Living Centers, a subsidiary of Beverly Enterprises Inc.

A $225,000 permit to Linda and Scott Needham for renovation and remodeling at 215 E. Main St. in Pilot Mountain, a building once occupied by Pilot Hosiery Mills.

Leading the list of residential building permits are two homes in the State Road area north of Elkin near Cedarbrook Country Club. One is a $550,000 permit issued to Mark and Vickie Heiner, 219 Camp Creek Lane; the other a $360,000 permit issued to Samuel Jason Couch, 326 Camp Creek Lane.

A new laboratory will replace the existing facility last renovated in the 1970s. Already under way, that construction is to be completed early in 2008. In the coming months, the hospital also will relocate and improve its technology center and upgrade parking facilities, adding two surface lots. A new parking garage will be constructed by 2010.

Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital’s president and CEO, Steven Pennington, told the Elkin Tribune that the expansion is designed not only to expand Hugh Chatham’s services and capacity, but to maintain its community-hospital “feel.”

“We want to be able to expand services so that patients do not have to travel to receive health care,” Pennington said. “We want to make it convenient for patients to have excellent services and be able to do that right around the corner in Elkin with easy access to parking and to be cared for by their family and friends. We think with our current technology and commitment to excellence from all our employees we have a unique opportunity to blend these together.”

“More rural hospitals are reducing services or joining huge hospital companies,” noted a representative of Alliant Management Services, which provides management services to the hospital, “but (Hugh Chatham Memorial) wants to stay independent and expand.”

“You get a sense of pride here,” said Tracy Byers, assistant hospital administrator. “They are proud of the fact that this hospital has been well taken care of over the years and has been pretty responsible financially. Now patients are deciding to go to the local hospital rather than drive to cities. People realize you don’t have to go to Winston-Salem or Statesville or Charlotte.”

The ER/ICU renovation is a need that has become urgent over the past two years, according to the HCMH Foundation, which is coordinating a fund-raising effort to support the improvement project. Emergency-room volume has increased at a rate greater than 8 percent annually since 2004 and is expected to total 23,000 . With a decline in the number of insured Americans, the trend locally, regionally and nationally is for more patients to use hospital emergency rooms rather than visit private physicians’ offices. The project at Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital will renovate 8,000 square feet of existing space and add 75,000 square feet to the emergency room.

Dr. Jim Harrell Sr., chairman of the hospital foundation, said, “Doctors and employees in both the emergency room and the ICU provide a high level of care. The ability to treat a greater number of patients through the expansions of these areas is reason for our community to thoughtfully and prayerfully consider their gifts to our 2007 annual campaign.”

National health-care analyses also indicate that Hugh Chatham Memorial’s primary service area will grow at a 5.5 percent rate over the next 10 years while the secondary service area is predicted to grow at a 1.3 percent rate. The population in the hospital’s service area, which includes Surry County, already utilizes the emergency room at a higher rate than the North Carolina or national average.

The inpatient and residential facility will serve patients at the end of life in Surry, Yadkin and surrounding counties. The plan for the hospice home calls for 20 patient rooms with access to the outside grounds, large kitchen areas so groups can dine together, a movie room for sharing videos together, a play area for children, RV hookups for visitors from out of town and other amenities to help families through the end of a loved one’s days.

Hospice has raised nearly $3 million toward the cost of building the home, but another $2 million will be needed
to cover those expenses.

The project is being developed by Mountain Valley Hospice & Palliative Care. Barbara Chatham and Robert Merritt are the honorary fund-raising campaign chairmen. C. Richard Vaughn is the campaign chairman.