Dr. Brian McKenna Brings Women's Health Initiative to Peconic Bay Medical Center

Northwell Health’s Peconic Bay Medical Center has announced that they will be bringing a women’s health initiative to the East End, led by Dr. Brian McKenna, the vice president of Strategic Initiatives in Women’s Health.

The project is set to take place over the next few years and will involve a revamp of the women’s health department including general OB/GYN services, a fertility program, maternal fetal medicine programs, urogynecology and breast medicine. As McKenna has worked alongside Northwell over the past 10 years in expanding and upgrading hospitals throughout Long Island, it only made sense to bring him on board with Northwell’s latest initiative in bringing premium women’s healthcare services to all.

Dr. Brian McKenna & Women’s Health Services

“There’s a tremendous amount of need out here when it comes to good healthcare and this is for women of all financial backgrounds,” says McKenna. “The good part about enhancing all of these services, we will be able to help everybody and Northwell has a very good track record and history of looking out for equity in healthcare.”

McKenna’s expertise in developing women’s health services goes back to his first OB/GYN practice in Smithtown in 1992 which gained a noteworthy reputation amongst the medical community. McKenna continued to build and optimize his practice over the course of 20 years before he was consulted by Northwell.

From there, he moved his practice to South Shore in 2012 after being asked by Northwell to take part in working with South Shore Hospital which was called Southside Hospital at the time. According to McKenna, South Shore was very underdeveloped and in dire need of better services in order to truly help the community.

Since 2012, Northwell has spent approximately 17 million dollars in project money on South Shore and has even expanded into South Shore University Hospital where they have a residency program in OB/GYN. McKenna was then asked by Northwell to be the managing director for women’s healthcare on East Long Island.

“The goal is to project and build up women’s healthcare resources out here in a way that mirror images the quality west of here, so one of the operations underway is the ultimate renovation of Peconic Bay Medical Center’s women’s healthcare division,” says McKenna.

Dr. Brian McKenna Joins Peconic Bay Medical Center

As many aspects of Peconic Bay have gradually received Northwell’s care in renovation and expansion, initially Northwell approached McKenna about the idea of going to the East End four or five years ago in order to further develop their women’s health department, but once the timing was right to embark on an expansion of their services, Mark Solazzo, the COO of Northwell Hospital approached McKenna.

“I thought the probability of success for this program was going to be very high and I thought the commitment by Northwell was going to be very strong,” says McKenna. “We want to be a healthcare organization, we don’t want to be a sick care organization, so preventative health, getting to people early, helping them understand in a very heartfelt way about how small changes in their life right now can pay off big time later on.”

As the women’s health initiative at Peconic Bay is set to take off, the plan is to continue offering these expansions and services to facilities in need on the East End. The combination of Northwell’s commitment to do so and McKenna’s dedication to offering the best women’s healthcare seem to make a great team as the initiative gets started.

Dr. Brian McKenna Telehealth

Northwell will also be utilizing their Telehealth technology as part of the women’s health initiative for Peconic Bay. Prior to the pandemic, Telehealth was certainly a unique service to offer the ability to consult with a doctor without having to leave your home, but Telehealth goes beyond consulting and uses the function to go a step further by allowing doctors to confer with a fellow clinician or caregiver with the use of the Telehealth direct interactive camera.

One such use includes their nursery, which would give the ability for doctors to not only see the baby on camera but use the technology to make the determination if a baby can be treated there or needs to be stabilized and transferred to a separate facility. This kind of technology can make a big difference in vital and life saving decisions that can be made much more quickly and accurately than just conferring over the phone or video with less technological capabilities.

“My goal is to be extremely collegial, to be extremely available, to work as concierge physician in facilitating my colleagues when it comes to getting somebody the kind of healthcare that they might need within the realm of women’s health,” says McKenna. “I’ve made a commitment to help spearhead this project, and I’m hopeful to utilize as many resources as possible from Northwell to create a comprehensive women’s healthcare experience out here that will meet everybody’s needs.”

Find Dr. Brian McKenna at northwell.edu.