Page 7 - 2016ReadersChoice

Sunday, July 31, 2016 Readers’ Choice Awards El Dorado NEWS-TIMES 7 Dr. Bevill chosen top doctor in readers’ survey
Dr. Gary Bevill, a founding mem- ber and provider at SAMA Healthcare, considers it a
“huge honor” to have been selected as the top healthcare provider in Union County in the El Dorado News-Times 2016 Readers’ Choice Awards.
For Bevill, however, “the real honor” is that generations of families trust him with their healthcare needs.
Admittedly uncomfortable with the attention, Bevill searched for just the right words to describe how he felt upon hearing the community’s feed- back him and the job that he loves.
“Just the idea that it’s something that I didn’t run for — to know they would think that much of me ... I feel like I have the best job in the world,” Bevill said, visibly moved by the unexpected honor. The longtime family medicine practitioner said he looks to working each day with “moms, dads, grandpar- ents,” and children who seek out his expertise and professional judgement to help live their healthiest lives.
Bevill will be the first to acknowledge that he did not experience an “a-ha” moment when he decided to pursue medicine as a career, though the seeds were planted early on from watching his grandmother care for family, friends
Terrance Armstard/News-Times
Top Doc: Dr. Gary Bevill was named the top doctor by News-Times readers in the 2016 Readers’ Choice survey.
and neighbors with home remedies in rural Bearden. “She always used home remedies when I was growing up. A lot of people called on her. If someone
came home from the hospital, she was the first one that went, and I used to go with her,” he said. Bevill also recalled his mother saying that he was always on his best behavior during visits to the doctor when he was a child. Even though such trips were not his favorite activity, Bevill said, he recognized then that certain benefits came from walking into a doctor’s office.
“My mother said she never had a problem taking me to the doctor. I never showed out. I just thought it was interesting that you can be sick, and then you could go see one particular person and get well,” he explained.
A love of chemistry and biology was reflected in his class-schedule selec- tions at Bearden High School, from which he graduated as valedictorian, and later as a science major at Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia. Conversations with friends in the healthcare field — doctors and nurses — gave Bevill pause, and he realized that he could wrap his life experiences and educational training in chemis- try and biology and how they affect the human body into one professional package to serve the public. “Becoming a doctor, you get to take science and apply it to life,” he said.
The time he spent with his grand- mother as a boy and seeing the work she did in the community helped Bevill develop an affinity for senior citizens, prompting him to pursue additional certifications to make geriatrics his sec- ondary specialty.
“I really like working with my older patients. I think we kind of forget that none of us could get what we’ve got without our parents and grandparents,” he said. Bevill credited his wife of 38 years, Donna, with helping him to reach his professional goals — he recent- ly became a Fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians — while still being able to capture precious moments with his family.
The Bevills have an adult son and daughter and two (soon to be three on the day he spoke with a News-Times reporter) grandchildren.
Bevill pointed to his “work family” at SAMA for making it easier to balance a demanding schedule and enjoy his time in the office each day.
“Dr. Callaway says you have your home family and your work family, and to be happy, you have to have both,” he said. “With the partners, the staff, and the patients, we’ve been able to create our very own, happy family right here.”
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