CENTREVILLE — Compass Regional Hospice recently announced several exciting changes to its medical team.
Dr. Thomas Walsh of Queenstown recently decided to retire from his practice with Maryland Primary Care Physicians at the end of the year to take on the role of full-time chief medical director with Compass Regional Hospice, effective Jan. 1, 2019. Walsh has been the chief medical director for Compass Regional Hospice since March 2017, working contractually.
“We are fortunate to have Dr. Walsh come aboard full-time, and we are excited about where this truly first-rate partnership will take Compass Regional Hospice in the future,” said Executive Director Heather Guerieri. “Dr. Walsh oversees our medical team and is part of our leadership team at Compass Regional Hospice. Most of us have had the chance to work with Dr. Walsh during the past year and understand the benefits his skill and his presence have brought to our team. This is another exciting step in the growth of our organization.”
Additionally, Ashley Kinnally has accepted the role of nurse practitioner with the organization. She began her career with Compass Regional Hospice in February 2018.
Associate Medical Director Dr. John Durocher of Rock Hall, who has been with Compass Regional Hospice since 1998, retired from his position in July, to spend more time with family and travel. Durocher began in 1998 as a volunteer consultant and was hired as medical director in 1999. In 2014, he stepped down as medical director and took on the role of associate medical director to spend more time with family.
“We want to thank Dr. John Durocher for his steadfast commitment to Compass Regional Hospice for the past 20 years,” Guerieri said. “Dr. Durocher announced his retirement in July and he will be missed, but always will remain a part of our organization.”
“Compass Regional Hospice is excited to announce two new members to our medical team; Dr. Matthew King as our associate medical director and Ashley Kinnally, our new nurse practitioner,” Guerieri said. “They join Dr. Thomas Walsh, our chief medical director, and with the other members of our medical staff, contribute greatly to this absolutely first-rate medical team at Compass Regional Hospice.”
Walsh received his Bachelor of Science, magna cum laude, from Benedictine University in Illinois in 1974. He also is a 1978 graduate of Rush University’s Rush Medical College in Chicago and completed his residency in family medicine at the University of Maryland Hospital in Baltimore from 1978 to 1981.
He has practiced medicine in a private family practice since 1981, first in Anne Arundel County, and has been practicing in Queen Anne’s County since 1988. He was a founding partner and former board member of Maryland Primary Care Physicians and currently serves as the clinical director for its Queenstown site.
“As a family physician, I have the opportunity to be involved in the lives of patients and their families from birth until death,” Walsh said. “My nearly 40 years of medical practice has given me the privilege of caring for thousands of people. End-of-life care has always been an especially important part of my work.”
Walsh also has served as a Queen Anne’s County Orphan’s Court judge and he is a member of the Maryland Board of Physicians’ licensing, disciplinary and regulatory board, having been appointed by Gov. Larry Hogan in 2015.
“My involvement with Compass Regional Hospice as its chief medical director has given me the chance to be front and center with patients and families when it comes to end-of-life care. I am looking forward to 2019, when I will be full-time chief medical director, and I know this partnership will continue make me a better doctor and a better person.”
King is a board-certified family physician who currently practices full-time with the Anne Arundel Medical Group at Eastern Shore Primary Care in Chester. He completed his undergraduate education at Washington College in Chestertown, where he graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in biology in 1998. He received his medical degree from the University of Maryland School of Medicine in 2003, followed by a family medicine residency in Abington Memorial Hospital in Abington, Pa., where he was the chief resident in his final year.
King moved to the Eastern Shore in 2006 and joined a private practice in Chestertown, where he worked for six years before founding his current practice with Anne Arundel Medical Center in 2012. In addition to his private practice, he is a staff physician at Washington College and is the co-founder and board member of the Survivor Summit Foundation, which is a nonprofit organization that seeks to take cancer survivors on life-altering adventures.
“I am very excited to join the Compass Regional Hospice team,” King said. “Being a primary care provider, I have maintained a profound respect for the work of the hospice community and the important role they play in our patients’ lives. I have been impressed with the care Compass Regional Hospice provides, while successfully maintaining the dignity of their clients. I hope I can add to their capabilities going forward.”
He enjoys various sporting activities and spending time with his wife and three children.
Kinnally grew up in Bowie and Queenstown, and now lives in Crofton. She is a 2010 graduate of Salisbury University, where she received her Bachelor of Science in nursing. She graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 2017 with a Master of Science in adult gerontology. She worked as a primary care nurse for the University of Maryland Medical Center from 2010 to 2013 on the adult surgical unit, eventually moving to the post anesthesia care unit, before accepting her role with Compass Regional Hospice.
“I am proud to be a part of a team that is dedicated to providing the highest quality of care and expertise, which communicates passion and understanding to its patients and loved ones, and, above all, which honors life,” Kinnally said. “I enjoy being able to partner with my patients and their families during their final stage of life. Providing them with support, knowledge and compassion during what is often the most difficult time of their lives is beyond fulfilling to me.”
Kinnally enjoys spending time with her husband, Kevin, and her dog, Teddy, as well as her niece and nephews.
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~ Compass Regional Hospice – Care on your terms
Compass Regional Hospice is a fully licensed, independent, community-based nonprofit organization certified by Medicare and the state of Maryland and accredited by the Joint Commission. Since 1985, Compass Regional Hospice has been dedicated to supporting people of all ages through the challenge of living with a life-limiting illness and learning to live following the death of a loved one. Today, the organization is a regional provider of hospice care and grief support in Queen Anne’s, Kent and Caroline counties. “Care on your terms” is the promise that guides staff and volunteers as they care for patients in private residences, nursing homes, assisted living facilities and the residential hospice centers in Centreville and Chestertown. Grief support services are offered to children, adults and families of patients who died under hospice care, as well as members of the community who are grieving the loss of a loved one, through The Hope and Healing Center. For more information about Compass Regional Hospice, visit compassregionalhospice.org.