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Physician Spotlight: Dr. Reis B Ritz, MD – Emergency Medicine
Dr. Reis B. Ritz is an Emergency Medicine Physician in El Paso, Texas at William Beaumont Army Hospital and is affiliated with other hospitals in the Texas area. He attended United States Military Academy at West Point (Undergrad), Carl Darnall Army Hospital Emergency Medicine Residency Program, and received his medical degree from Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. In addition, he is planning on attending the University of Texas fall 23’ to pursue a master’s degree in business.
What are your personal and professional experiences and how it led you to be an emergency room physician and your career?
Well, it really starts with undergrad. I went to a West Point for undergrad and I was already committed to service in the army when I decided to go to medical school. When I was thinking about different residency programs specializing in emergency medicine stood out as a good fit for my Army career. I like the fast pace, different kinds of patients and mixing it up. that’s what led me into emergency medicine and after about 12 years on active duty is when I came across working in El Paso. I moved there for my last station in the military and that’s how I ended up ultimately with USGP. It’s been 15 years now since I graduated in medical school and at this point of my career, it’s been good to meet the folks at USGP and similar places so that because I can manage my time and my schedule, and it works out perfectly with my career in emergency medicine.
What drew you to USGP originally and how have we changed since?
I was previously stationed at El Paso, and I was the Interim Chief of the ER and the assistant as well. when I came off active duty I joined as a contractor because I still wanted to work there, it was a different contract and then USGP took over a year later.
What things have stood out for you about our management team?
The contract that we had before was pretty good and we were nervous about changing the contract and what was going to happen. I reached out to Angela (Program Manager) since I was so involved in the hospital’s emergency department and just to kind of help her, you know talk about the different Ins and outs and she was Very easy to work with. Very pleasant, very nice, and very, competent she knew what she was doing. right away it kind of put me at ease. You have this contract that’s going great. And then you never know, somebody else comes in and takes it over. And it could turn South but she very quickly put me at ease. I talked to some of my other Friends who were on the contract as well who talked to her, and we all just got a great feeling right off the from the beginning with USGP. It’s been great from there we’ve had nothing but good things to say and I hope they continue to keep the contract. Let’s put it that way.
How do you feel that your work with military personnel is different from your experience in the commercial sector?
When I was in active duty, I worked quite a bit on the on the civilian side. I was at Fort Hood before, I worked mostly in San Antonio. I was very familiar with the Texas market so to speak as far as medicine, I was initially offered a job at Methodist when I came off active duty that I turned down because I had family in town. I worked quite a bit in El Paso as well at the, at the civilian hospitals too. I have quite a bit of experience in both. Currently in both (commercial and military) out of all the ones that I have worked for USGP has been one of if not the easiest and most pleasant groups to work with. That’s saying a lot because I’ve worked for about 27 different emergency rooms throughout my career in and most of those managed by different you know contract groups or CMG. I’ve seen quite a few. USGP is probably my favorite to date so far.
Has working on a government facility changed how you feel about the work you do?
I enjoy the military facilities much more than civilian ones across the board. Depending on what area of the country, but for the most part the military facilities, the staff, the nursing staff, the doctors that are there, they are typically a group that has been there and for a while, everybody knows each other, everybody’s friends. it’s a much tighter knit community and there’s a lot more collegiality and that stems from most people that are there are previous military, and they share that bond in common. The other side that there is, is the folks that work there. they work there because it’s rewarding, and they enjoy it. I prefer working with the military side and doing the military contracts. You know it’s civilian world obviously this is America, it’s largely driven by money and profits and you lose some of that at the military places and you really get to focus more on just practicing medicine and taking care of the patients and you’re not hammered or constrained by all the metrics, the volumes and seeing a bunch of patients and running people through like a factory so to speak. that’s why I enjoy working on the military side of things because I can slow down and have more focus on doing the right thing and practicing medicine, not just Running people through as quick as I can.
What are the most rewarding aspects of the work you do?
Yeah. And the other thing about the military facilities and in Fort Bliss is the same is that they have residents there and a lot of them are teaching hospitals. I get to interact with the residents and teach the residents. And at this point in my career, doing this for 15 years, I’ve kind of mastered the emergency medicine. I’m starting to get A lot more personal satisfaction and feel rewarded by teaching the younger doctors and teaching the younger nurses and in military medicine with the government contracts a lot of PA and nurse practitioners that go out to the units, and they get deployed with the units. teaching them and mentoring them as far as emergency medicine goes is very rewarding, much more rewarding than being a pit doc and seeing a bunch of patients and not, not giving back to the medicine community, so to speak. I do appreciate that a lot as well. That’s probably something that keeps me coming back to the military contracts.
What’s the best advice you can give to someone who wants to work for a Military Treatment or Federal Facility?
The biggest advice I would give would be to be patient because it is the government after all. And sometimes the government moves at its own pace. with credentialing or getting the computer set up or your cat card or whatever it may be, sometimes those things don’t happen quite as quickly and efficiently as a lot of the other civilian places. when you’re thinking about or you’re coming to work for a government contract, you just must keep that in mind. That it’s a little bit different working for a company that’s involved with the government. USGP especially and as I mentioned we work with quite a few contract companies, does a really good job with interacting and interfacing with the government and the military side of it to make that as smooth as possible. you never have this situation where you’re showing up and your computers access is turned off. Your cat card isn’t working or if there is an issue, Angela and those folks are always able to make sure that they get it fixed. even though working for the government can be frustrating sometimes, USGP does a good job of interfacing with you so that it’s as easy as possible.
that would be my advice to anybody who’s considering working would be to be patient because ultimately in the end, the work is more rewarding and it is, it is worth it.
