After decades of absence, the opening of a new doctor’s office is bringing back medical care to Broad Channel, and with it, a type of care advancing a medical practice that has been absent for even longer.
While undergoing finishing touches, the small office at 814 Cross Bay Blvd. with the “Doctor On Call” sign in the window, had already been gaining neighborhood interest and curiosity. Over time, the space had previously been home to several businesses.
Now with an operational soft opening on June 1, and formal grand office opening planned for just after July 4, internal medicine specialist Dr. Papanna Ravichandra MD is bringing a different, more flexible patient-centered care to the area.
Some residents might already know Dr. Ravichandra from his office at 114-12 Beach Channel Dr. in Rockaway Park. He also has offices in Manhattan, and another newly opened in the Bronx. Ravichandra has been in practice for more than 25 years and is affiliated with Mount Sinai Beth Israel and Mount Sinai Hospital.
According to his staff, he takes nearly all insurance plans, with the only current exceptions being HIP and MetroPlus networks, which they are working to become a part of. “Everything else we take,” staffers noted. “He’s not going to turn anyone away.”
As for his different approach, medical assistant/office manager Laura Ross York said, “Ninety percent of the patients we see at home.” York, originally from the Channel, added, “We do things to accommodate the patient. It’s all about the patient.”
That is, as far as possible, Dr. Ravichandra brings care, along with a host of medical services, to patients right in their own home. “His purpose is to keep the patient at home and comfortable,” York explained. This means patients can be treated and recuperate in already familiar surroundings, and they do not have to travel to a doctor’s office when ill. This also helps patients who are unable to travel.
To some, this may recall a once common practice known as the house call. Here, doctors, toting a small black bag with their stethoscope and other medical essentials, would visit the home, check vitals, give injections, write out prescriptions, and offer whatever limited treatments possible.
But even as far back as 2015, Forbes magazine noted, “House calls used to make up 40 percent of U.S. doctors’ visits in the 1940s, before going into decline in the 1960s. These days, they comprise less than one percent of consultations.”
However, nowadays Dr. Ravichandra is bringing more than basic medicine and a little black bag to his patients’ bedside. According to York, they bring everything. Chest x-rays, EKGs, monitoring systems, IV fluid drips, bloodwork intake, which will be sent to the lab for the patient, vaccinations, as well as Vitamin B, testosterone and other injections. His office will also arrange for home health aides and in-home physical therapy when needed. “Whatever it is, we send it to the house,” York said. She added, “If a patient needs transport to a hospital, we set that up.”
According to York, Dr. Ravichandra sees patients all across the five boroughs at all hours of the day and night. Broad Channel residents have reported seeing him late at night in the new Cross Bay Blvd. office. York explains he’s checking on renovation progress and following up on patients. He is often in contact over the phone with people in his care. “He’s very compassionate. He’s (often) up all night following up with patients,” York shared.
“He’s all over,” even seeing patients in assisted living and rehabilitation centers. “He also understands where people need medications,” York said. The doctor will speak with patients on the phone to keep up with their needs without them having to travel into the office.
“You can call that man 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” York said. “He’s there.” Again, “it’s easier for the patient.”
Like the new Broad Channel office, the Rockaway office is fitted with soft lights. “Our colors are red, white and blue,” York noted. Plus, large screen calming landscape images featuring gently moving pools and rustling leaves. At first glance, these offices look like a relaxing day spa, a comment some in Broad Channel at first echoed in wondering about what this new business would be.
Besides the ambience, the idea of a different kind of doctor’s office may also take some getting used to.
“When we first got here (to Rockaway),” York recalled, “a lot of people were skeptical. They’re used to coming into the office. They’re not used to us coming to them.” Even just a phone call and sending a picture of one’s insurance card is all it takes to get the patient and their data registered in the system. “We take all your information over the phone.”
“We have a very simple phone number, 212-888-2222. You call or text that number, he’ll call you back, I’ll call you back. You could call on a Sunday and he’ll be there Monday morning,” York said, adding that their newer business even has a QR code for easier access.
Before the arrival of the new office, Broad Channel had no neighborhood medical care in several decades. Local physicians, small individual practices, ideas for rotating doctors coming in, a concept of building a medical center off Cross Bay, all went by the wayside years ago. Even the community’s dentist had retired by 2011, and pharmacy closed in 2010, three years after it opened.
But as resident Kathleen Reardon Savino noted, “It’s about time Broad Channel got back a medical office. Long overdue!”
About the care itself, Ann Marie Olmstead Mills said, “Dr. Ravichandra is a good physician and a wonderful human being. He took great care of my mother-in-law before she passed, often going well beyond his call of duty. More than just her doctor, he was a friend. He listened, cared deeply, and always treated her with compassion and dignity.”
After such a long wait, Dr. Ravichandra’s new office might be just what the doctor, and the community, ordered.
Photos by Dan Guarino.
