Whitcomb, Mistry Named To New Catholic Health East Hospitalist Positions

SPRINGFIELD — Dr. Winthrop F. Whitcomb of Mercy Medical Center in Springfield has been named director of hospitalist services for Catholic Health East, a health care system that extends from Maine to Florida, encompassing 31 hospitals and a network of long-term care facilities along the East Coast.

Whitcomb, who became the director of the hospitalist program at Mercy 11 years ago, will continue as a hospitalist at Mercy and will also serve Mercy as director of clinical performance improvement.

Dr. Bipinchandra Mistry, who has been a hospitalist at Mercy for five years, will serve as the new medical director of the Mercy Inpatient Medical Service at Mercy. Mercy Medical Center is a member of Sisters of Providence Health System, which is affiliated with Catholic Health East.

“There is enormous potential to use the collective expertise of Catholic Health East hospitalist programs to enhance patient care at each of the system’s hospitals,” said Whitcomb. “My aim is to pool that expertise and make it available to all of CHE’s hospitalists.

Whitcomb and the Mercy hospitalist program was featured on Cable News Network earlier this year.

“Dr. Whitcomb will help lead the physician leadership in the development and enhancement of hospitalist programs across the Catholic Health East system,” said Dr. Richard F. Afable, executive vice president and chief medical officer for Catholic Health East, which is headquartered in Newtown Square, PA.

Whitcomb has been a national leader in the hospital medicine and hospitalist movement for many years. He is a founder and first president of the Society of Hospital Medicine, a medical organization that under his leadership has grown from just a handful of interested clinicians to more than 4,000 members in the last eight years. He has lectured widely on the subjects of hospitalist program development, management, and quality improvement for inpatient care. He has authored numerous articles and book chapters on hospital medicine and is known as an authority on the subject by his colleagues and peers.

“Dr. Whitcomb has developed the Hospitalist Program at Mercy Medical Center into a template for the rest of the country. The excellent clinical skills and superb quality and service provided by Mercy Inpatient Medicine Service to our patients, is known to all of us,” said Dr. James E. Fanale, chief medical officer and chief operating officer at Mercy.

Whitcomb received the 2004 Hampden District Medical Society Community Clinician of the Year Award in 2004.