Medical Director Dr. Steven Radi to retire after 20 years at Geneseo

SUNY Geneseo Medical Director Dr. Steven Radi is set to retire at the end of the semester. He retires having spent twenty years serving as Medical Director of the college.

Radi was hired as Medical Director in 2002 after working jobs in family health and college health.

Radi said, “After working about 20 years in different aspects of family medicine, I was looking for a position that was college health exclusively. When this one happened to come up, I think I was in my fourth year working part-time at Binghamton University. At the time, I also had another full-time position I had been working at the Binghamton outpatient [Veteran’s Association] working with the veterans there, which was a great job. But I was looking for a position in college health that was full-time and as a medical director when this one came up.” 

According to Radi, the College had recently combined the Health and Counseling Services into one department and that the model of student healthcare has improved over the last twenty years. Radi also oversaw the implementation of a new electronic medical records system that allowed integration of many health services and more interaction between students and healthcare providers.

“When I first came in 2002, in the previous two years Health Services and Counseling Services became combined into one department, previously they were separate. And over this period of time, I think the care of students had improved quite a bit just due to the fact that we had these professionals now really working together to take care of students. In 2011, I instituted the electronic medical record system that we have now, and that system has really, for a lot of practices, changed the ballgame as far as us being able to integrate our services together,” he said.

“It really changed the ballgame because it makes communication with students so much easier. I do that just all the time. It’s just great and it allows students to communicate through a secure message or ask me a question and I can respond to them very easily.” 

During his tenure as Medical Director, the College was accredited as a “medical home” by the Accreditation Society for Ambulatory Health Care (AAAHC). This accreditation is given after a highly rigorous examination of both student housing, counseling, and healthcare. 

Radi said, “We have to be reaccredited every three years by an accreditation service that's quite rigorous, we’re accredited by the AAAHC service. A very small percentage of college health services are accredited in the first place, and they offer an additional certification as a medical home. That’s something that I started to work on back in 2016, and I felt that by the time of our reaccreditation in 2019 that we had all the pieces of this concept. Being certified as a medical home basically says that you have put all the pieces of health together, that you're offering total, holistic care.”

Radi said that working in college health gave him an opportunity to expand on patient education and make a difference in students’ lives. 

“Where I trained had a tremendous emphasis on patient education, and I could really see back then the application of patient education at the right time, at the right moment for certain groups of patients. So, when I really started working at the university, it was like, ‘wow, yeah, there are things here that I really would like the students to know. They’re in college, and there are things that they can really bring forward from there that have tremendous effects on their lives, their health, and their lifestyle,’” he said. “When students come to college for the first time, there is such an opportunity to teach about so many issues that they can carry forth with them for the rest of their lives that hopefully will make them healthier individuals.”

Radi said that being able to connect with students on a more personal level has been a very rewarding part of his job, and that he has enjoyed being able to interact with the college population.

“I just really enjoyed working with the college population. We’re getting to know people, getting to talk to them, and listening to students about what they’re interested in and what their majors are. That’s a conversation I like to have with everybody. A lot of that interaction has always been a very important part of what I what I do. Truly, for me and hopefully for students too, hopefully they think that that shows some real interest from me in what they’re doing and what they’re pursuing.”

Radi said that personnel and academics had changed over the last twenty years, but Geneseo students remained largely the same as driven, ambitious students that he worked with at the beginning of his tenure.

He said, “Academically we attract really good students, really serious students. The students are interested in really working hard and achieving here, and I think that basically has stayed the same. So, I guess the overall answer is not a whole lot [has changed,] not the important stuff.”

He said that he’s not looking for another position, and that he’s ready to spend more time with his family and more time travelling. 

“I’m not moving on to another position. It’s no secret that I’ve reached full retirement age. Surely for the rest of this year I’ll just really look to do some things that are important as far as family is concerned and do some traveling. I think I’ll have other hobbies that I’ll start to work on like my very bad tennis game. I’ll make that a little bit better, hopefully. But number one has got to be visiting my grandchildren,” Radi said.