Dr. Denice Smith, born and raised in Morrison, IL, has expanded her professional responsibilities to serve residents at two facilities.  Currently, she serves as a Family Care practitioner at Morrison Community Hospital and is the Medical Director of Four Seasons Living Center, within the hospital.  Now, she has also joined the Pleasant View Rehabilitation and Health Care Center as their Medical Director.

A graduate of Morrison High School, Dr. Smith attended Southern Illinois University in Carbondale and Medical School at the University of Illinois and completed her residency at Genesis in Davenport, IA.  After being asked about her background, Dr. Smith said, “I’m back…after an almost 15-year hiatus!  It’s a good community.  That’s why I came back.”

She feels that Pleasant View has the opportunity to bring a lot to the community.  “I think the biggest goal really…is to bring it [local physician care] back to the community, but allow more physicians to continue caring for their patients.  Before, they did not have a lot of options for physician choices here.”

There are other nursing homes in Morrison, and Dr. Smith feels that it is important that as the population ages, and as certain services become important, that they try to work together to bring another option for good quality care, for the elderly or those that can not take care of themselves.

Photo:  Chad Haskell, Morrison Community Hospital Director of Communications and Fund Development; Rhonda Biller, Pleasant View Rehabilitation and Health Care Center Administrator; Dr. Denice Smith, MCH Family Care Physician; Lisa Gremba, PV Community Relations Coordinator

Rhonda Biller was asked to further expand on some of their goals.  She stressed, "It was to bring the community care back to the residents here at Pleasant View."  She also indicated that the majority of referrals were from within Morrison. She worked really hard at bringing in staff that would continue this care. Biller is Pleasant View Rehabilitation and Health Care Center Administrator.  She has been with the Petersen Health Care, Inc. network since February 2007, at another facility, and joined Pleasant View in October 2008 when the network acquired it.

As the Medical Director, if people don’t have a physician at Peasant View, Dr. Smith will take care of them.  If a patient wants to change physicians, she will be their doctor as well.  Other community physicians can come to Pleasant View to care for their existing patients, also.

The doctor explained, “When you’ve been with your doctor for a while, it’s hard to make those changes, especially…if coming to a place that’s not home.”

She mentioned other good improvements in the quality of care and at Pleasant View in general.  Community members can feel better about making a tough decision should the time come.

“Having grown up here and been here before--there [have], of course, been a lot of changes over the years-- coming back, there [have] been a lot of improvements already that I’ve seen.”

Referring to Pleasant View in Morrison, “It’s almost like there’s a town inside of the town.”

Pleasant View has 74 beds in the facility and includes long term-care.  Two other long-term care options are available in Morrison.

Dr. Smith said in regards to long-term care, “Because of the very confident nursing staff here and the training that they’ve had, they do have the ability to take on some more of the complex cases.  That gives...more options to the community, too, if people have complex care.”

For more information about Pleasant View Rehabilitation and Health Care Center, please contact Jill Smith, Director of Social Services, at 815-772-7288.

By Andrew Williamson, The Prairie Advocate