Services

Areas of Expertise

Women’s Health Services provides compassionate care across a broad range of specialties and focus areas. For a brief definition and description of our approach to each focus area and a list of providers specializing in it, please select a service on your right.

Women’s Health Services is the only nationally recognized Center of Excellence for Women’s Health in New Mexico. 

Western, Traditional and Complementary Approaches

All WHS practitioners are schooled in and knowledgeable of Western medical science. Our MDs and CFNPs hold medical degrees from some of the most prestigious schools in the country and have practiced extensively in hospitals, clinics and private practice. All are board certified in their specialties. In addition to Western medicine, our doctors and nurses are also familiar with and practice complementary, alternative approaches to care, including nutritional, herbal, homeopathic, bio-identical, plant and eastern-based approaches. Many of our practitioners believe that the time-tested traditional approaches, passed down from generation to generation, often have merit and applicability. Our providers take time to find out the patient’s health care philosophy and approach to well-being and offer individualized treatment options.

Primary Care

WHS is a primary care facility, providing full spectrum care from well-patient annual exams and preventive care to ongoing treatment of health issues. WHS brings a sex- and gender-specific approach to primary care. Heart disease, diabetes, addiction, thyroid function and even migraines behave differently, and need to be evaluated and treated differently, in women and men. WHS is one of 14 nationally designated Community Centers of Excellence in Women’s Health.  Please see Sex and Gender Medicine (link) for more details.

Practitioners providing primary care services and currently accepting new patients are: Dr. Lynn Bickley, Dr. Julie Craig, Dr. Cecelia de La Vallee, Naomi Landau, CFNP, Dr. Jennifer Pierce, Dr. Denise L’Heureux, Carolyn Tjoland, LPCC, and Cristy Wickman, CFNP.

Integrated Behavioral Health

WHS provides an integrated team-based model of care in which a patient and her health care provider work with a behavioral health consultant, when appropriate, to address a woman’s combined emotional and physical needs.

So, rather than going to a 50-minute therapy hour which occurs in isolation from a patient’s physical care, WHS patients can meet with an on-site behavioral health consultant in conjunction with their medical appointments. Typically, treatment is completed in one to three 15 to 20 minute sessions. This integrated health approach has been proven to improve outcomes for a variety of health and behavioral conditions including diabetes, chronic pain, depression and anxiety, while improving both patient and provider satisfaction.

Practitioners providing integrated behavioral health are Denise L’Heureux, MD and Carolyn Tjoland, LPCC.  Carolyn Tjoland is currently accepting new patients upon referral by a WHS primary care provider.

Gynecology

Due to WHS’ emphasis on and dedication to women’s health and our understanding that women’s reproductive organs are not independent of the rest of her body, most WHS practitioners provide gynecological care as part of their primary care practice. This approach allows our providers to examine the often interconnected health issues women experience during adolescence, the childbearing years, and menopause. Standard care includes annual gynecological exams, pap smears, breast exams, birth control, infertility counseling and treatment, STD prevention and testing and menopausal therapies.

Staff Gynecologist Dr. Cecelia de La Vallee provides specialized gynecological services and procedures, including colposcopy and endometrial biopsies. She provides treatment for abnormal pap smears, abnormal bleeding, urinary incontinence as well as providing diagnosis and consultation on a wide range of reproductive organ problems.

Practitioners providing standard gynecological care and currently accepting new patients at WHS are: Julie Craig, MD, Naomi Landau, CFNP, Jennifer Pierce, MD  and Cristy Wickman, CFNP.

Menopausal Therapies:

At WHS, many of our health care providers have chosen to place special emphasis on helping women cope with peri-menopausal, menopausal and post-menopausal symptoms and are knowledgeable and respectful of conventional and bio-identical hormone replacement therapies and alternative approaches, including Yoga and nutritional and herbal approaches.

Practitioners providing menopausal counseling and treatment and currently accepting new patients at WHS are: Julie Craig, MD, Naomi Landau, CFNP, Jennifer Pierce, MD and Cristy Wickman, CFNP.

Bone Density Testing

As people age, the amount of bone in their bodies steadily decreases. Women are especially prone to developing thin bone because they don’t develop as much bone as when they were younger and their rate of bone loss is greater than in men. Osteoporosis, the name given to the condition of thinned and weakened bone, occurs in post-menopausal women as a result of estrogen deficiency (Type I) and in women and men (but about two times more frequently in women) as a result of aging and calcium deficiency over many years (Type II). Patients with osteoporosis have a higher risk of bone fractures.

The most accurate way to test for osteoporosis is to have a bone density test, or a DEXA scan. This type of test can show early changes in bone density (it’s sensitive enough to register decreases as small as 3%).  WHS conducts on-site bone density testing to determine bone health. The test takes less than one hour and must be scheduled in advance.

Acupuncture

WHS partners with Southwest Acupuncture College; appointments at WHS will be available in summer.