Driscoll Children’s Hospital RGV now accredited for pediatric residency

EDINBURG — Increasing access. These are the words most used to describe the occasion Friday as it marked the day Driscoll Children’s Hospital Rio Grande Valley launched its pediatric residency program.

For Matt Wolthoff, president of the hospital, this moment was a long time coming.

“This has been a major strategic priority for us as an organization,” Wolthoff said. “We knew we wanted to do this from the day we opened our doors.”

Small children wear their colorful tennis shoes during the Driscoll Children’s Hospital Rio Grande Valley NICU reunion event Saturday, Oct. 19, 2024, in Edinburg. (Delcia Lopez | dlopez@themonitor.com)

Now as they celebrate the program’s recent approval by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, Wolthoff and his team are excited to take the next step toward helping curve the need in the area.

The program, which is funded in part by an endowment from Frost Bank, is scheduled to welcome its inaugural residents in July 2026.

In fact, the facility is already accepting applications and is expected to begin recruiting residents within the next few weeks.

The three-year program will bring on as many as eight residents per class and is expecting to graduate its first class in 2029.

Wolthoff believes this is a testament to Driscoll’s efforts to increase access to care for children in a region that’s underserved in terms of pediatricians and pediatric subspecialists.

“In three years it’s going to have a direct impact on access to care for children,” Wolthoff said.

Jeanene Anthony, vice president of business development and planning for Driscoll Children’s Hospital, shared similar sentiments adding that their goal is to provide more care for more kids.

“We’re hoping that we will put a dent in the pediatrician shortage across South Texas,” Anthony said, adding that they will also be launching a Community Retention Program for their pediatric residents that will help provide financial support to stay in the Valley.

Among those in attendance was Veronica Treviño, a McAllen native who will now serve as the associate program director.

She stood with a smile across her face as she addressed those in the audience explaining that Friday marked a momentous occasion not just for health care in the Valley but for medical students in the area.

Treviño, 31, was among the first class at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley School of Medicine, who had to travel outside of the area for her residency.

She went on to complete her pediatric training at Driscoll Children’s Hospital Corpus Christi.

A pediatric resident at Driscoll Children’s Hospital in Corpus Christi treats a child Sept. 11, 2024. (Courtesy: Driscoll Children’s Hospital)

Although the institution was not too far from her hometown, Treviño explained she still faced challenges when having to split time between training and spending time with family.

“It’s very stressful to be training for what you’ve worked for your entire life and have things that you need to be at, at home,” Treviño said.

She recalled being in her second year of residency when her father got sick and having to travel back and forth as often as she could.

“I knew that I needed to give all of me at work, but I also had something very important going on at home and having to plan for that five-hour, round-trip road trip was not easy,” Treviño explained.

She added that throughout her residency she experienced many sleepless nights and oftentimes would be driving back to Corpus at 2 a.m. and then heading to work at 6 a.m.

As she reflected on her time as a resident, Treviño couldn’t help but feel excited for other medical students from the Valley who will now have the opportunity to receive pediatric training in their hometown.

“This program means that pediatricians from the Valley will no longer have to make those sacrifices,” she said. “They will be able to train here at home surrounded by their loved ones and everyone who has worked so hard to get them where they are today.”

She added that it’s a beautiful thing to get to experience Driscoll’s efforts in expanding training opportunities in the area and hopes it will ultimately result in more young physicians choosing to stay in the Valley.

“It’s very significant to me and very moving to me that I may not have had that opportunity while I was training but now I get to be a part of giving that opportunity to the generations to come,” Treviño said.

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