His practice specializes in pediatric care, but Dell Shepherd, M.D., shows the medical students who rotate through his North Platte office that the type of medicine he practices cares for the entire family.
“The medical students see a unique relationship that we develop with our patients,” he said. “It’s a smaller area — we live with our patients and know them within the community.”
Since 1979, Dr. Shepherd has given his talents and time to the College of Medicine’s volunteer faculty program, providing pediatric experiences to UNMC medical students. For his longtime service and dedication to the volunteer faculty program, he is the recipient of the March 2002 Volunteer Faculty of the Month Award.
“Dr. Shepherd has been exceptionally supportive of the teaching program for the department of pediatrics for more than 20 years,” said Bruce A. Buehler, M.D., chairman of the department of pediatrics. “His compassion and empathy for families exemplifies the true spirit of the physician.”
Dr. Shepherd earned his undergraduate degree from Nebraska Wesleyan University in 1970 and his medical degree from UNMC in 1973. He stayed at UNMC for two years serving a pediatric residency and then moved to Houston for two years for a pediatric hematology-oncology fellowship at the Baylor College of Medicine.
Since 1979 he’s practiced at Adolescent and Child Care Specialists in North Platte, Neb., with his partner Samuel Perry, M.D., who received the College of Medicine’s June 2001 Volunteer Faculty of the Month Award. Anywhere between one and five medical students rotate through their office each year.
For six to seven weeks, the students spend at least five days a week seeing patients in the office and also do brief rotations at the Great Plains Regional Medical Center in North Platte.
Dr. Shepherd says that interacting with medical students and hosting them at his practice keeps him on his toes: the students are allowed a large amount of responsibility and are asked to start seeing patients right away.
Because North Platte is a smaller community the students see a wider variety of patients than what they’d see in an urban pediatric practice, he said. But what Dr. Shepherd stresses most is the community aspect.
“I enjoy mentoring students on the developmental aspects of pediatrics, but teaching them how to form relationships with the patients and their families is just as important,” he said. “Hopefully, during their rotation here the students can learn that.”