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Dr. Gregory Benson graduated from Poland Seminary High School
POLAND
Poland native Dr. Gregory Benson has been named medical director of Akron Children’s Hospital’s new Outpatient Surgical Center, which will open in May.
The center, on the third floor of the new $180 million Kay Jewelers Pavilion in Akron featuring six operating rooms and primarily will be used for ear, nose and throat, ophthalmology, urology, dental and plastic-surgery cases.
A pediatric anesthesiologist, Dr. Benson, a 1981 graduate of Poland Seminary High School and valedictorian of his class, previously was medical director of the Dental Surgery Center and co-director of the Pediatric Ambulatory Anesthesia Services at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus. He also was an attending anesthesiologist there.
A pediatric anesthesiologist is a specialist who takes care of pediatric patients exclusively.
“I am honored to be part of the leadership team responsible for the opening of the first free-standing, dedicated pediatric outpatient surgery center in Northeast Ohio,” said Dr. Benson, son of C. Edwin and Marilyn Benson of Poland.
“This is quite an exciting time to be part of the Akron Children’s family, and I look forward to serving our patients and families with this amazing facility and staff,” Dr. Benson said.
A 1985 summa cum laude graduate of Wittenberg University, he earned his medical degree from the Ohio State University College of Medicine in 1989. He completed his residency in anesthesiology at Ohio State University Hospitals and his fellowship in pediatric anesthesiology at Nationwide Children’s Hospital.
He said that much of the satisfaction of the job is taking a time that is anxiety-producing for kids and family and making it a more-enjoyable experience. Most of this is outpatient surgery, he said.
Coming to Akron Children’s is both a “wonderful professional opportunity and a chance to be closer to my parents, who live in Poland, and my brother, Tod Benson, who lives in Tallmadge,” he said.
He and his wife, Jessica, have two children: a son, Bradley, and a daughter, Jamie.