Let's Talk About RSV

Cami Smith:

Welcome to Centra Scripts. Here we talk about health, wellness, and practical tips for your everyday life. I am your host, Cami Smith.

Hi, and welcome to Centra Scripts. My name is Cami Smith and I am your host. And I am here today with Dr. Travis Engel, who is the chair of pediatrics here at Centra. And we are going to dive into the fact, the fiction, all of the things we need to know about RSV. Because it is sweeping across not just our community, it's sweeping across the nation. We're kind of at a critical point. And so we're going to have you share all of your wisdom with us. But before we dig into that, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself and what brought you here to Centra?

Dr. Travis Engel:

Yeah, absolutely. So my wife and I, and our three kids actually relocated back in July for this position. I graduated in Liberty University's first medical school class.

Cami Smith:

Very cool.

Dr. Travis Engel:

So I was here from 2014 to 2018, and we always knew this was a place we kind of wanted to come back to. After that, briefly stopped in Chicago for three years and did my residency there in Northern Chicago, which was a great experience. And then I have some additional fellowship training in pediatric critical care, which I got at Children's Mercy in Kansas City Missouri, which is an amazing hospital. So the ability to wrap that experience back up and come back here and work here in the community that really kind of started my medical education is really neat and it's an exciting time for our family.

Cami Smith:

You love the Lynchburg area. Great place for our family. What are some of your favorite things about Lynchburg?

Dr. Travis Engel:

Oh my goodness. The view. I mean, I always tell people there's really just not a bad place to look in the city.

Cami Smith:

There's not.

Dr. Travis Engel:

And also getting to really reengage with the medical students over at Liberty and kind of start giving back to that school that, like I said, launched my medical career has been really neat.

Cami Smith:

So do you go back? Oh, that's right. You said you teach there.

Dr. Travis Engel:

Yeah, so I'm actually adjunct faculty over at the medical school now, so it's really kind of come full circle for us. It's been really great. And I think a lot of people don't realize here in the community that we actually have kind of an academic medical center. I mean, yeah, we really do. We have medical students, students, nursing students, and we're doing a lot of medical education there.

Cami Smith:

That's really cool. So why Centra?

Dr. Travis Engel:

Well, I mean, number one, the area. I think we wanted to come back to this area. Number two, just I would really emphasize the culture of yes there. There's a lot of programs and a lot of things I wanted to do when I came back to Centra and a lot of things I wanted to bring back with me. And the organization as a whole has been super enthusiastic about engaging on all fronts in addition to the fact that I think there is such a community need to have a pediatric resource like Centra for pediatric inpatient care. Here so that families don't have to go 45 minutes to an hour away to get pediatric care. So that's really important to me, keeping families close to home, getting them better here, not sending them an hour away for services that we can offer easily in this community.

Cami Smith:

Yeah, I love hearing your passion behind that. And so here we are talking about RSV. And if you go on s

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