Husband and wife doctor duo establishing their own practice
The husband and wife physician team of Kendra and Jonathan Lynch are branching out to their own office at the beginning of the new year. The duo is planning to practice medicine together as Wellness Life Center, LLC, in Cairo, leaving Cairo Medical Care approximately 10 years after they first started seeing patients here.
“Wellness Life Center LLC, has grown so much, the Cairo Medical Care partners felt it was ready to become its own entity,” says Dr. Kendra Lynch. “We’re excited.”
In addition to family medicine, the Lynches say the practice will specialize in obesity medicine and also functional medicine, a form of medicine that aims to find the root cause of a problem rather than just treating the symptoms. Dr. Kendra Lynch has a second board certification in obesity medicine, and has been treating people who suffer from obesity as a disease since 2011.
Functional medicine became a focus of Dr. Kendra Lynch after she started battling joint pain over the last six years. She was only recently diagnosed as having relapsing polychondritis, a rare autoimmune disease that causes pain, often in the cartilaginous tissue around the joints.
“Because of what I’ve been through, it makes me more passionate about helping people heal. Classic medicine treats the symptoms of the illness, but how do we go beyond that to heal? The knowledge that we have has increased so much that now we can go back and say let’s look at the genetics and the environment . . . go back to help the body heal itself,” says Dr. Lynch.
Since May, she has temporarily ceased seeing patients in person as she undergoes triple immune suppressant therapy in an attempt to treat her condition. “Jonathan and I are Christians and believe God never wastes anything. I believe I will be healed. He gives us wisdom in how to take care of our bodies. We’re excited for what he has in store for us and the Wellness Center and the future,” Dr. Lynch says.
In her absence from the office, nurse practitioners Wendy Pearce and Brian McLaughlin have continued to see Dr. Kendra Lynch’s patients with her input. “I’m very active in the background. Our nurse practitioners communicate with me daily about patients,” she says. “They’re a real benefit to have in the practice.”
A third nurse practitioner, Temesia Calloway, is expected to join the practice in January.
The Lynches say their patients should experience no difficulties in the change except that Dr. Jonathan Lynch’s patients will see him in a new location, across the parking lot from his current office beginning January 2019. Wellness Life Center will be located where Dr. Kendra Lynch has seen patients in recent years, 1180 Fifth St.
“CMC is supporting us in this transition. . .we will transfer our patient’s information, so there is nothing our patients will have to do,” says Dr. Kendra Lynch.
Dr. Zita Magloire, CEO of Cairo Medical Care, says of the move, “The Cairo Medical Care family is excited for the Lynches as they continue to serve the needs of our community through the Wellness Life Center. CMC will continue to provide comprehensive primary care for the whole family as well as obstetric, gynecological and general surgery services.”
Kendra Lynch is a native of Cairo and 1996 graduate of Cairo High School. Dr. Jonathan Lynch is a native of Pike County. Both doctors studied medicine at Mercer University School of Medicine. The Lynches, both 41, are the parents of four children between the ages of 11 and 4.