Maria Nieves Gutierrez-Go strives to help chil­dren become healthy, suc­cess­ful adults

Sur­rounded by images of Sponge­Bob SquarePants and sub­ma­rine and safari adven­tures, Dr. Maria Nieves Gutierrez-Go works in an envi­ron­ment that more resem­bles children’s dreams than the clin­i­cal atmos­phere of the typ­i­cal doctor’s office.

The pedi­a­tri­cian oper­ates the 7,600 square-foot Val­ley Children’s Med­ical Cen­ter in Indio with her hus­band, Juanito Go. In the past, she served as chair of pedi­atrics at John F. Kennedy Memo­r­ial Hos­pi­tal, also in Indio.

As a young woman grow­ing up with 14 sib­lings in the Philip­pines, Gutierrez-Go knew early on that she wanted to work in a pro­fes­sion that cared for peo­ple. Two older sis­ters were nurses.

“They were care­givers, and I could relate to that,” she says. “But I also knew that, as a doc­tor, I could accom­plish even more in terms of deci­sions and man­age­ment and mak­ing an impact on people’s lives.”

After immi­grat­ing to the United States in 1986, Gutierrez-Go con­tin­ued her edu­ca­tion in pedi­atrics that began in Manila. She com­pleted intern­ships at Rush Uni­ver­sity Med­ical Cen­ter and Christ Hos­pi­tal and Med­ical Cen­ter, both on Chicago.

“I love work­ing with chil­dren,” she says. “It’s really reward­ing to know that you’re mak­ing a dif­fer­ence in their lives, watch­ing them grow from birth to become healthy adults and, pos­si­bly, future lead­ers of our community.”

Gutierrez-Go and her hus­band launched Val­ley Children’s Med­ical Cen­ter in Sep­tem­ber 2006 to pro­vide much-needed qual­ity, extended care in the East Valley.

“We have opened our doors to all fam­i­lies from all walks of life, with the goal of influ­enc­ing and edu­cat­ing peo­ple about proper health­care and dis­ease pre­ven­tion,” she says.

Edu­ca­tion on an even grander scale is a key com­po­nent of Gutierrez-Go’s prac­tice. Val­ley Children’s Med­ical Cen­ter is one of the first orga­ni­za­tions in the Coachella Val­ley to join the Reach Out and Read Pro­gram, a national lit­er­acy pro­gram that pro­motes early lit­er­acy by dis­trib­ut­ing age-specific books to young readers.

The pro­gram is unique in that it is admin­is­tered through pri­mary care providers like Gutierrez-Go. “As part of the pro­gram, we also model in front of them by read­ing to them and read­ing our­selves,” the doc­tor explains. This way, they will learn to love books as they get older.”

Even with all its rewards, pedi­atric med­i­cine has its chal­lenges. Vaca­tions are few and far between for Gutierrez-Go (the last one being a short trip up the coast a year ago). The hours are gru­el­ing and, some­times, resis­tance to proper health­care is steadfast.

“Occa­sion­ally, fam­i­lies come in with the belief that immu­niza­tions for their chil­dren are not needed, which presents big chal­lenges,” she says. “I give them as much infor­ma­tion as I can in the most car­ing way possible.”

J. Tracy Her­mann. (2007, July). Grow­ing Con­cern. J. Tracy Her­mann. From http://www.palmspringslife.com/Palm-Springs-Life/July-2007/Growing-Concern/