Profile of a Rural FP: Carla Kakutani, MD
Carla Kakutani, MD, with her husband, Mike, and children Thomas and Rosie.
Name: Carla Kakutani, MD (Winters, CA)
Clinic: Sutter West Medical Group
Years an FP: 17
Years a Rural FP: 17
HPSA-designated Community? Yes
Critical Access Designated Hospital? An FQHC is in Winters
Staff Note: Dr. Kakutani has agreed to share her contact information with readers who may wish to reach her: kakutac@sutterhealth.org.
In 1992, I finished my family medicine residency and moved to Winters, CA, population 5,000, to start practice. This was by far the smallest town I’d ever lived in. I didn’t set out to do rural medicine per se, but I found it surprisingly difficult to find a place where I could see patients from all socioeconomic backgrounds and do full scope family medicine. Winters offered all that, but it also was a little intimidating. I was single, didn’t know anyone there, and I was replacing a beloved “Marcus Welby” family doc who had been practicing there for over 30 years. I wasn’t sure how or if I would adapt to a place so small it didn’t have a traffic light. Would I have any privacy? I joked to my friends that the first time I got stopped in the grocery store to talk about hemorrhoids, I was outta there!
Fast forward 17 years. I’ve now lived in Winters longer than anywhere else in my life. It has grown by 2,000 people and now has one traffic light and several places to get a good latte. What started as a private practice has morphed into a rural outpost of a larger multispecialty group, which gives me the ability to work part time, have access to EHR and do less call. I got married, had two children and now I watch them play baseball and soccer side by side with kids I delivered. I find that people are very respectful of the boundaries between my professional role and my role as just another member of the community, as long as I’m careful not to mix them up either.
Fast forward 17 years. I’ve now lived in Winters longer than anywhere else in my life. It has grown by 2,000 people and now has one traffic light and several places to get a good latte. What started as a private practice has morphed into a rural outpost of a larger multispecialty group, which gives me the ability to work part time, have access to EHR and do less call. I got married, had two children and now I watch them play baseball and soccer side by side with kids I delivered. I find that people are very respectful of the boundaries between my professional role and my role as just another member of the community, as long as I’m careful not to mix them up either.
Dr. Kakutani with medical assistants Karina Gonzalez and Shyla Trojanowski.
My commute to my office takes 3 minutes. The hospital is about 20 minutes away. Our small staff is either from Winters or other nearby small towns and their connection with the community adds to the warm, family feeling in the office. I see everyone from farm workers and the sorters in the nut processing plant that speak only Spanish to very well off ranching families and everyone in between. What’s best about working here is that my patients really understand the value of family medicine and continuity. Sometimes I have to argue with them to get them to leave town to see a sub-specialist! They have great faith in my abilities and training and do not feel that more and more testing/consults/medications is really better.
I wish I could bottle up my town and my practice and send it to every medical student considering family medicine as an antidote to what students get exposed to in academia. I’m obviously biased, but I think rural family medicine is a great way of life.
I wish I could bottle up my town and my practice and send it to every medical student considering family medicine as an antidote to what students get exposed to in academia. I’m obviously biased, but I think rural family medicine is a great way of life.
Profile of a Rural FP