As a first contribution to the Physician Source in this role as Chief of Staff at ThedaCare Waupaca, I think it wise to offer some updates and introductions to the rest of ThedaCare.
Through the last 2 years, the medical staff at ThedaCare Waupaca has witnessed the retirement of 3 family physicians, Dr.’s Michael Bauer, Russel Butkiewicz, and Charles Rathjen, and one general surgeon, Dr. Gary Edelman. We are grateful for their years of service to the community of Waupaca and for their collective wisdom that they have shared with us. We look forward to continued work with Dr Butkiewicz in his new role as Medical Director at the Wisconsin Veterans Home in King, Wisconsin.
These retirements created openings for the hiring of 4 new family physicians: Dr.’s Amy Mandeville, Holly Haberman, Ezra Lyon, and myself, Robert Sedlacek.
Dr. Mandeville is an experienced family physician who practiced in the western United States before moving to the area. Her practice includes obstetrics, and she serves on our credentials committee.
Dr. Haberman joined ThedaCare directly from of her Maternal-Child Fellowship and is trained in operative obstetrics. She joins Dr. Baeseman and Dr. Durst as the third family physician performing C-sections on the campus and is the current Secretary-Treasurer of the Medical Staff here in Waupaca.
Dr. Lyon comes from the family medicine residency at UW Madison. He is also practicing family medicine with obstetrics and is the newly appointed Associate Medical Director for Integrative Addiction Treatment, helping increase access to safe and effective treatments for opioid use disorder in primary care clinics across the system. He is the physician champion in our clinic for Medication Assisted Therapy with Suboxone and helped recruit me and the other new physicians to prescribe suboxone for opioid use disorder patients.
I, Dr. Sedlacek, came to ThedaCare after 9 years at a different Wisconsin health care system, where I served in various leadership capacities from chair of a systemwide opioid and pain management steering committee to president of the medical staff of the local critical access hospital. Here at ThedaCare, I practice family medicine without obstetrics, and I am the new Chief of Staff.
Lastly, with Dr. Edelman’s retirement, the medical staff of ThedaCare Waupaca are pleased to welcome surgeons from both Fox Valley Surgical Associates and Surgical Associates of Neenah to the campus. We are grateful to have 2 surgical groups on the campus to help meet the needs of our patients and look forward to working with both groups.
Other exciting changes include hiring several new physicians for our emergency department. More on this with a future update.
Yours in the search for health and healing
Robert Sedlacek, MD, FAAFP
Chief of Staff
ThedaCare Medical Center Waupaca
