Dr. Zanetta Lamar
Community oncology practice Florida Oncology and Hematology, a partner practice of Fort Myers-based American Oncology Network, continued its expansion this month with the opening of new locations in Naples and Fort Myers, and the addition of three new board-certified physicians.
Dr. Zanetta Lamar and Dr. Ferdy Santiago, who have a combined 15 years of experience practicing in the Naples community, began accepting new patients Aug. 1 at the new clinic, 708 Goodlette-Frank Road, Suite 200. The Naples location is equipped to deliver the latest cancer care and therapies.
Dr. Magali Van den Bergh, who has been practicing in the Fort Myers community for nearly 10 years, will staff its new clinic beginning Aug. 15 at 14543 Global Parkway, Suite 110, in Fort Myers.
Both new locations are equipped to deliver the latest cancer care and therapies, according to press releases announcing the clinic openings. The new Naples and Fort Myers clinics include private exam rooms and an on-site infusion room for patients. Additionally, as partner practices of AON, the clinics offer in-house lab and pathology services, access to a specialty pharmacy for oral oncolytics and in-clinic care coordination and financial counseling.
Dr. Ferdy Santiago
AON’s chief medical officer, Dr. Fred Divers, said in an interview that the network’s expansion to new markets in Florida is similar to its expansion in other states, including Texas, Hawaii, Georgia and Maryland; AON already had one Florida clinic in Clearwater.
Divers said he thinks patients benefit from the resources provided by AON’s wide-ranging platform.
“We have a single IT platform and a single instance of the electronic health record,” Divers said. “We have a data company that’s embedded in AON that allows us to do a lot of meaningful support for our patients, from navigating clinical trials to precision genomics. I think it’s important for patients to have a choice in their healthcare, and competition makes us all a little better.”
Santiago, Lamar and Van den Bergh bring knowledge of the Southwest Florida area to the new practices, along with an understanding of patients’ needs.
Dr. Magali Van den Bergh
“We try to deliver care in the community where the patient lives, with providers who are knowledgeable of the area,” Divers said. “We connect them (physicians) to a larger IT platform that has access to high-complexity labs, technology and pathology, and a data company that uses AI, essentially, to constantly review all of the patient metrics and provide clinical decision support. We make sure that regardless of the community in which a patient lives, they’re receiving the same high level of care that patients throughout the network are able to have access to, and that’s a key component of the network as a whole.”
AON’s centralized retail pharmacy, lab and pathology operations are all based in Fort Myers.
