Our Mission
Our Mission
Our Present
At DV Pediatrics, we strive to provide the best care possible to our patients and their families. To that end, we are working hard everyday, not only to see the day's patients and help our families with appointments and other requests, but also to actively search for, learn, and utilize the latest medical information, strategies and technologies.
From a previous workplace, our nurse practitioner Katarina, or Ms. Kat, brought with her experience, a knowledge base, and a passion for helping children and their families manage weight issues/obesity. Since joining our ranks, she suggested and joined our other providers in attending a series of meetings related to diagnosing and managing obesity. We are also experimenting with using AI to help our providers spend less time typing notes, both during and after visits, so they can spend more time doctoring.
Our Future
As the rates of autism diagnoses and vaccine-preventable diseases continue to rise, we want to double our efforts recognizing, diagnosing, and managing these conditions, as well as doing our part to keep such vaccine-preventable diseases out of our community.
Diagnosing Autism
In 2026, Dr. Vicki and Ms. Kat have been participating in a program in which they are learning and earning qualifications that will allow them to independently diagnose autism and order recommended treatment. In fact, they have already completed enough training to perform the requisite interview and evaluation, and they hope to complete the program by the end of the year.
Keeping High Vaccination Rate
As we continue to see outbreaks and increases in case numbers for vaccine-preventable diseases, particularly measles and pertussis (whooping cough) in the US, it is that much more important for us to keep our vaccination rate as high as possible to protect our patients and community.
Not everybody can get every vaccine, so the goal of vaccination is Herd Immunity. The Herd Immunity Threshold for measles is estimated to be about 95%, meaning 95% of the population needs to be vaccinated (or have prior immunity); the measles vaccination rate in Georgia is only 90%.
Other than providing vaccines according to the American Academy of Pediatrics guidelines, the biggest thing we can do to try to improve our vaccination rate is combat vaccine misinformation. This means providing detailed counseling when we offer vaccines, keeping up-to-date on the latest vaccine studies and recommendations, and trusting the science behind the vaccines and the recommendations.
