Children From Newborns To Age 21 Get Quality Care At Tendercare Pediatrics By Celeste McLaughlin Dr. Lalitha Raguthu is the new owner of Tendercare Pediatrics in the Summergate Professional Park, located behind Sam’s Club off S.R. 56 in Wesley Chapel. Dr. Raguthu bought the practice with her husband, Dr. Durga Chintakayala, or “Dr. Chinta” for short. The pair already own Blossom Pediatric Care on E. Martin Luther King Blvd. in Tampa, where Dr. Chinta has been in solo practice for the last three years, with Dr. Raguthu occasionally covering for him. Now, she is the primary doctor at Tendercare, and he covers for her as needed. “One of us is always here,” Dr. Chinta says. “When Dr. Raguthu is away at conferences, I see the patients.” Dr. Chinta and Dr. Raguthu have been married for 22 years and have two children. Their son, Sahas, is 15, and their daughter Sveta, is 12. The New Tampa residents are happy to have a practice closer to home. Tendercare Pediatrics previously was owned by Dr. Radhika Ranganathan. “The opportunity arose for us to buy this practice, and it was a quick transition,” says Dr. Chinta. The couple bought their home in Cory Lake Isles in 2013, when Dr. Chinta accepted a position in the spinal cord unit at the James A. Haley Veterans Hospital in Tampa. At the same time, they opened Blossom Pediatric Care, and Dr. Raguthu began working at Night Owl Pediatrics on Cross Creek Blvd. Prior to that, the couple lived in New York City, where Dr. Raguthu spent three years working in the emergency room at the Lutheran Medical Center in Brooklyn and
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Your child will always see either Dr. Durga Chintakayala (left) or his wife, Dr. Lalitha Raguthu, at Tendercare Pediatrics in the Summergate Professional Park. one year in Urgent Care at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx. She had previously earned her MBBS degree (Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery; equivalent to the M.D. degree in the U.S.) from the Mahadevappa Rampure Medical College in Gulbarga, India. She did her residency at Brookdale University Hospital & Medical Center in Brooklyn and served a one-year fellowship in Neurology at New York University in Manhattan, NY. During their time in New York, Dr.
Chinta worked at the VA New York Harbor Health Care System and also worked as an emergency physician and urgent care doctor at Montefiore Medical Center. Dr. Chinta earned his MBBS degree from Guntur Medical College in Guntur, India. He then did a one-year post-doctoral fellowship in nuclear medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, MD. He completed his residency in family medicine at St. Vincent’s Catholic Medical Center in New York, NY.
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Dr. Raguthu is proud to show off the new play area (photo, right) she created in the waiting room, so little ones don’t get antsy if they have to wait a few minutes to see the doctor. Even more than that, she says she gets a great response from patients when they visit her new room for nursing mothers. “A lot of mothers are breastfeeding, and that’s very important,” says Dr. Raguthu. “We want to give them privacy and encourage breastfeeding, so we created a nursing room just for them.” She says parents can feel comfortable bringing their kids to her, especially when they are sick or injured. “I have a lot of experience in urgent and acute care,” says Dr. Raguthu, explaining that she is well trained in handling emergency issues if they arise, such as acute asthma or lacerations. “We are accepting new patients, and we especially want to welcome back any patients who were with the practice before we came here,” says Dr. Raguthu, explaining that insurance companies have told former Tendercare patients that they needed to find a new doctor because Dr. Ranganathan no longer took their insurance. Dr. Raguthu wants those patients to know that while Dr. Ranganathan is no longer at the practice, Tendercare Pediatrics can accept their insurance. They can continue coming to the practice where they are already established, and she is there waiting to see them. Dr. Raguthu says that the new office offers an improved experience for anyone who
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