The new 46,600-square-foot Multispecialty Center and Stark Diabetes Clinic in League City celebrated its opening with several events: a ribbon cutting, open house and community health fair. UTMB Health care professionals provided free screenings during the health fair, including blood pressure, blood glucose and more. 

The new UTMB facility, which opened in August,  focuses on disease management, with a number of specialized clinical services related to diabetes management. In addition, the center offers a wide range of primary and specialty medical care, a strong focus on disease prevention and management, the services of the Stark Diabetes Clinic, the expertise and skill of UTMB’s university clinicians and a convenient, easy-access location.

With the opening of the Multispecialty Center, UTMB is consolidating many of the clinics it had opened throughout the mainland in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike. Clinics from Friendswood, Clear Lake and Texas City all will now be located in the new center.

“Our vision for patients is a whole new type of health-care experience,” said Jenny Lanier, senior practice manager for the new Multispecialty Center. “Going to the doctor has typically been something that people often wait to do until they are very sick or in terrible pain. Our vision is to help people avoid getting to disease stages that are difficult to treat successfully by offering fully integrated screening and prevention health services that can detect problems that should be addressed before they reach an acute stage.”

These challenges were the driving forces behind the development of the Multispecialty Center. Its focus is twofold: first is prevention of the kind of chronic conditions that are increasingly prevalent among older adults; second is helping those patients who have already developed chronic conditions manage their health most effectively to prevent costly, debilitating and even life-threatening complications.

The center’s state-of-the-art strategies focus on personalized prevention, evaluation and management of diabetes mellitus, hypertension and lipid disorders and their complications. In addition to patient care, the center includes translational research aimed at optimizing prevention of diabetes, hypertension and lipid disorders and optimizing outcomes.

“The physicians at the new Multispecialty Center are top specialists in their fields,” said Dr. Steve Quach, associate professor and chief medical officer at UTMB. “Beyond their clinical work with patients they are also medical professors and internationally renowned researchers. The care they offer is often informed by their own cutting-edge research or that of their UTMB colleagues.”

One of the many state-of-the-art features offered at the new center is MyChart, a new online system that provides patients direct and confidential access to portions of their electronic medical record. A patient’s lab results, appointment information, medications, immunizations and more are all securely stored for quick retrieval. Test results are posted securely online so there is no waiting for a phone call or letter. Communications between doctor and patient may also be posted and appointments may be requested online.

The interior of the Multispecialty Center features a peaceful, park-like atmosphere with floor-to-ceiling LED backlit photos of natural themes and seasons along with contemporary craftsman-style woodwork and stonework throughout.

“The serene interior of the new center evokes a sense of calm — all part of our message of wellness through prevention,” said Diana Browning, UTMB’s vice president for ambulatory operations. “Our aim is to create a whole new kind of health center where patients have access to many different specialists under one roof. The result is a very integrated specialty care experience.”