THE DOCTOR’S office is not often considered fun, but Bowling Green pediatrician Casey Miles ensures her patients enjoy their time with her. For the past eight years, Bowling Green Internal Medicine and Pediatrics has employed her, and while Norton Children’s Medical Group acquired the private practice, her relationship with her patients has not changed.
Medicine was a career path Miles chose early. In third grade, she decided she wanted to be a neonatologist. That childhood idea has become a reality.
“I learned how to spell neonatologist so when people asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up, I could say and spell it for them,” Miles said. “That’s how I decided that I wanted to go into pediatrics specifically.”
She was influenced in part by her mother, who was a part of the health care system and exposed Miles to the clinic and hospital setting, but also by Miles’ own desire to be impactful in her community. While it was once just a childhood dream, Miles stuck with her chosen career and still loves what she does every day.
“I love the variety of opportunities I have to work with our patients in the clinic setting,” Miles said. “When a child comes in, I’m not just talking to the parent. I’m talking to the child, the parent, and sometimes the grandparents. We’ll often have medical students staff with us, allowing for different types of educational opportunities in the clinical setting.”
Miles also enjoys the opportunities to advocate for other people in the community.
“Choosing medicine really has allowed me to explore all of my interests, not just seeing patients in the clinic,” Miles said.
Creating a safe environment for her patients is most important for her practice, and Miles takes this seriously. She, her patients, and their guardians are a team working together. To create that team, Miles said it is important to listen to people’s concerns, respect their perspectives, and empower them with education.
The same is true for the team of medical professionals she works with.
“Also important for my job is to work with our staff to provide education and resources to empower them to help patients, to hear and respect their perspectives, create a positive team environment, and recognize them for being important to our families and to our team,” Miles said.
After all, no one can accomplish great things alone. Now that Miles works for Norton Children’s Medical Group, she said she has fewer administrative duties and can focus on some of her other goals: advocating for pediatric mental health services, working more with children with special health care needs, and encouraging the health community in Bowling Green and throughout Kentucky to work together.
“I want to advocate for collaboration among the high schools, technical and community colleges, universities, and the state of Kentucky to fund early exposure to the health care field and to help subsidize education for those who want to attend college,” Miles said. “Also, [we want] to continue to encourage collaboration from health care facilities here in Bowling Green to help provide our community with advanced health care services that they deserve and that really can only be accomplished by all of us working together.”
Miles has many hopes for the Bowling Green community, but she also makes sure to focus on each patient she sees. As part of each yearly appointment, Miles and the children she works with set goals for the next year — something the child can work on and improve on. She said it’s always a special moment when they arrive in the office eager to share their accomplishments over the previous year. Ultimately, she hopes every child feels that way.
“I hope that I have made all the children I have worked with feel respected, capable, and comfortable [enough] that they can come to me when they need something,” Miles said. “I also hope that some of them have been inspired to enter health care and remain in our community.”
With solid goals and good collaboration, there’s no telling what they, or anyone, can do. GN
