VIP 23

Gray Elrodt, M.D.: Building a healthier Berkshire County
By Patrick Rheaume

While a student at Princeton, Dr. Gray Elrodt stood in awe of a professor who would solve problems by bringing together diverse disciplines like politics, science, sociology and psychology.

Today, as Elrodt chairs the department of medicine at Berkshire Medical Center, he works to implement that same spirit of collaboration into the hospital's programs.

"It's essential for the medical community to work together with the faith community and business and the government to provide our constituents with the best possible service," he says.

Although Elrodt grew up in Westchester County, N.Y., his roots in the Berkshires extend back to summers spent in Hillsdale, N.Y. He earned his M.D. from New York Medical College, completed his residency at UCLA/ Cedars-Sinai Hospital, and worked there for the next 20 years.

"I always loved science," he says. "I was premed all along.”

In 1996, Elrodt returned to the East Coast. "My wife and I decided that we wanted to settle down from the consulting world, which involves a lot of travel and moving around." Having determined that "the Berkshires are a wonderful place to raise a family," Elrodt found an opening at Berkshire Medical Center.

Since Elrodt joined BMC, the Medical Center has developed a number of programs to improve the health of local residents. Among these are the stroke team, where, by fostering partnerships between nurses and neurologists, BMC has created a service "that is among the best around." In addition, he praises the hospital's cardiovascular and diabetes prevention programs.

Elrodt acknowledges that BMC, like medical entities all across the country, faces increasing financial strains. "For us to be successful, we are going to have to be very creative in how we reach out to the community," he says. He cites this creative spirit as the reason why BMC has managed to do more with less.

"Fortunately, the hospital has taken a very proactive approach to attracting the physicians we need," he notes. As doctors become more scarce, and financial resources diminish, Elrodt sees the need for increased collaboration with outside sources to maintain financial vitality. "Business leaders rely on the health care industry to keep their workers healthy and productive,” he says. These mutual interests, he believes, will foster mutual solutions.

He is very clear that, "We will figure out how to offer the very best services and programs."

Elrodt sees clinical depression as a perfect area for collaboration between health care professions and business. Because depression seriously affects worker productivity, companies and workers need the type of "integrated behavioral health program" that BMC offers patients.

"Doctors can work with government and business to get people into programs that will help them be healthy and productive again," he says.

"I was struck by a number of things about the community, but none so much as the prospect of dramatically improving the health care system in a specific area."

Unlike sprawling Southern California, the Berkshires hold a scant 135,000 residents, almost 80 percent of whom rely on Berkshire Medical Center for their health care.

"I looked at the demographics of the area," recalls Elrodt. "I realized that we could coordinate the resources in this health system, we could present a strong program to community.” He was excited by the idea of building, step by step, a healthier Berkshires.

Elrodt lives with his wife, Marianne, and has four children. He enjoys running and, more recently, auto racing.

He is deeply involved in the American Heart Association and serves as president of its Berkshire County Board. "By 2010, the AHA wants to cut the cardiovascular morbidity mortality rate by 25 percent," Elrodt says. In Berkshire County, "we want to come through and deliver that 25 percent."

"It's got to be done," Elrodt says of the work ahead at Berkshire Medical Center. "And we’ll do it.”

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