Geriatrics Clinical Faculty

Alyse graduated as a geriatric nurse practitioner from Yale School of Nursing in 2011, and began working in the YNHH-St. Raphael Campus division of geriatrics in 2012. Currently she works in Project ElderCare, a program that provides primary care to older adults in the community, and the Senior Assessment Center evaluating older adults for geriatric concerns, specifically cognitive decline and dementia. Recently Alyse joined the Geriatric consult service team at Yale-New Haven Hospital.

Dr. Bakkali joined the Geriatrics services Group at Yale in 2009 and has been working at different long term care and short term rehabilitation facilities (Mary Wade Home, Arden House). She also attends on the Cooney Firm Acute Care for the Elderly unit at Y-NHH, and has a clinic on Wednesdays morning at the Adler Center. Leen actively participates in training/exposing interns to Geriatrics outside the hospital, and is an attending for geriatric clinical fellows with their long term care patients at Mary Wade Home

Dr. Chua-Reyes came to the Yale Nursing Home practice in the summer 2003 after migrating back to the US, joining the Adler center later in the year. He has worked various Skilled Nursing Facilities including Mary Wade Home, the Willows at Woodbridge and Branford Hills Health Care center. Jesse is currently devoted to caring for post-acute, rehab patients and long term residents at the Arden House in Hamden, CT. He also sees a few patients on the side at Adler Center and at the Primary care practice at the Hearth at Gardenside Assisted Living Center In Branford CT.

Prior to coming to Yale, Jesse was in private practice in the Philippines from 1998 to 2003 and found it rewarding to simultaneously work in a government run hospital, a private hospital and do physician home visits for 5 years.

Dr. Datunashvili has been working with Yale Geriatric Practice as a full time attending since 2004.

During this time she has attended in various facilities: the Mary Wade Home, Whitney Center, and Arden House. Her work is mainly clinical and administrative activities. Her educational activities include precepting the geriatric medicine fellows during their sub-acute nursing home block rotations at Arden House and teaching the Yale Physician Assistants students.

Other educational activities include precepting Yale Internal Medicine and Waterbury Internal Medical/Primary Care residents during their outpatient Geriatric rotation in Arden House. Dr. Datunashvili worked closely with the geriatrics teaching faculty on developing structure and curriculum for this resident outpatient rotation.

Her interests lie in the transition of care, integrated models of geriatric care (community, acute and sub-acute settings) and end-of-life care.

Dr. Fabregas graduated from UConn Geriatric Program and began working in private practice, in Long Term Care as well as Short Term Rehabilitation, and eventually became involved with hospice care. In addition to being certified in Internal Medicine, and Geriatrics, she also received her certification in Hospice and Palliative Care.

For the past five years Geraldine has been with the St. Raphael's Campus, and presently involved in the Senior Assessment Clinic, in-patient consults and Long Term Care. Educational activities include working with the residents and geriatric medicine fellow. She also has been with Connecticut Hospice for 10 years providing care and collaborating with hospice nurses.

Following Medical School Dr. Henchel completed a one year internship, 3 years of Internal Medicine Residency, and 3 years of Oncology-Hematology Residency then spent two years in clinical oncology.

At present, she enjoys direct patient care, and teaching the house staff and is the Medical Director of two skilled nursing facilities: Mary Wade Home and Evergreen Woods.

Dr. Henchel’s primary goal is to provide and insure excellent care to residents in nursing homes and support any research programs that will help her to attain my goal.

Dr. Kerins completed his undergraduate degree and Master’s degree in Health Services Administration at New York University and medical school training at New York Medical College.

Subsequent Medicine residency training was completed at Long Island Hospital in New York and his geriatric fellowship was completed at the University of Connecticut, School of Medicine. He joined the full time faculty at UConn where he served as the Medical Director at Uncas on Thames Hospital as well as being the director of the clinical skills course for first and second year medical students.

Currently he is Program Director of the Yale Fellowship in Geriatric Medicine and Geriatric Medical Education, Medical Director of the Grimes Health Center and Medical Director of the ElderCare program. Dr. Kerins serves on the Admissions Committee for the Yale School of Medicine PA Program, as well as the Yale School of Medical Clinical Skills Program. He is a consultant for the State of Connecticut Department of Developmental Services and the Disability Center at the University of Connecticut, School of Medicine, and also a member of the State Commission on Aging and the State of Connecticut Office of Protection and Advocacy Fatality Review Board. In addition, Dr. Kerins also serves as a member of the VNA Community Health Care, Inc. Board of Directors and the Connecticut Coalition for End-of-Life Care.

His current areas of interest include the care of older adults with developmental disabilities, geriatric assessment, and dementia care.

Dr. Miller is a Summa Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Kansas. He received his Doctor of Medicine from the St. Louis University School of Medicine. He was a Henry J. Kaiser Foundation fellow in General Internal Medicine and Geriatrics at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry.

Dr. Miller was one of the first geriatricians to join the Section of Geriatrics in 1983. He was the founding Medical Director of the Dorothy Adler Geriatric Assessment Center. He has established a number of initiatives in the use of automated medical records for Geriatrics and rehabilitation and in 1995, began a small electronic medical records start-up.

Returning to Yale in 2009, Dr. Miller is currently an attending physician for YNH Geriatric Services, with clinical responsibilities at Evergreen Woods, a continuing care community in North Branford.

Jill received her FNP degree at Pace University in 1980. She worked for close to 10 years at Hall-Brook Hospital performing admission physical exams, and providing acute care to psychiatric and substance abuse patients. Following this position she worked at the

Southwest Community Health Center in Bridgeport. There I implemented a homeless program which provided medical care to people of all stages of life and varied backgrounds in 19 homeless shelters. In 1993 Jill began working for Bridgeport Health Department, School Based Health Centers and spent most of 16 years working at Bassick High School providing primary care to inner city adolescents. After being laid off, she took the last position left in the city for a year, running the STD clinic and performing annual physical exams and fitness testing for Bridgeport Firefighters.

Jill decided she needed to do something more challenging and graduated to work in Geriatrics. Jill took a position in an agency providing NPs to skilled nursing facilities for two years before coming to North-East Medical Group. She is now am stationed at Arden House with a great team of two physicians and one PA and couldn’t be happier.

Heidi’s been practicing geriatric medicine at Arden House Nursing home for 22 years. Originally she started with Hamden Internal medicine Associates in 1990 as they were the medical directors at Arden House during that time.

She has long enjoyed being a part of and seeing the growth of Arden House over the years from a Long Term Care facility to a Short Term Rehab facility. Heidi’s especially enjoy the relationship she has with her patients and their families.

Having a special interest in hospice care, Heidi continues to emphasize the importance of providing comfort palliative care at the end of life.

Dr. Toledo-Franco completed her residency and geriatric fellowship at the YNHH-St. Raphael Campus. Currently she is working on developing a research protocol for the approach and treatment of Delirium in patients admitted to the hospital. She plans to use the data to develop a set of guidelines for high risk patients admitted to the Hospital.