Dr. Jeffrey Kenneth Kerner, DO

Veteran emergency room physician Charles L. Reese IV, M.D., FACEP, has served as chairman of Christiana Care's Department of Emergency Medicine since 1995. Dr. Reese has been on staff since 1981, after completing his internship and residency at the Medical Center of Delaware, which later became part of Christiana Care. He served as the department's vice chairman for seven years before becoming chairman. Under his leadership, the Department of Emergency Medicine has changed in a number of significant areas. Several facilities have been expanded and redesigned. The residency program and faculty have grown, and research has increased. Several fellowships have been added, including a nationally-known ultrasound program. An informatics system, which uses computer applications to improve the delivery of health care, has been installed. And numerous programs have been implemented to improve the medical staff's performance and patient response to medical treatment. His other responsibilities as chairman include strategic planning for emergency services, and overseeing credentialing, privileges, clinical operations, education and research. He also serves as a liaison between the Emergency Department and several areas within Christiana Care and in the community. He has particular interests in performance improvement and medical quality, operations management and medical informatics. Dr. Reese is the department's senior attending physician. He also is vice president of DFES Corp., the medical group that provides physicians for Christiana Care's emergency rooms. Certified to practice both emergency medicine and internal medicine, Dr. Reese is program director of the health system's residency program that combines these two specialties. Dr. Reese is chair of the Emergency Department Benchmarking Alliance, a national group of large hospital emergency departments that are dedicated to sharing data and best practices. He also has sat on a national panel that advises the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on quality measures for evaluating how well care is delivered in emergency departments nationwide. Dr. Reese has given several presentations about emergency medicine at national conferences. He also has worked with his colleagues to publish dozens of articles and abstracts in his field, including many about heart attacks and the use of blood-clot busting drugs and surgery to open clogged arteries in the heart. Dr. Reese earned his medical degree in 1978 from Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia. He currently serves as a clinical assistant professor in the university's Section of Emergency Medicine under the Department of Surgery. Throughout his career with Christiana Care, Dr. Reese has served on numerous committees, councils and task forces for the health system. Some recent activities include helping to create the Clinical Decision Unit and facilitating the center-wide transition to recording medical orders via computer. He also is guiding the expansion of the emergency room at Wilmington Hospital and leading a project to improve the ways that patients access acute medical services.