Our practice was founded in the Washington Metropolitan area by Dr. Brockett Muir Jr. in 1970. A tradition of great medical care was established by emphasizing strong personal relationships between patients and physicians. As time would tell, we understood that this relationship combined with a constant effort to update our skills and services was the source of our practice’s success. In the 40+ years since, the changes in healthcare have been quite a challenge, but we have negotiated these difficult waters with additions to our group in both personnel and skills which have expanded our traditions and our success.

Our group has grown quite a bit in the last 20 years since Dr. Albert Simmonds joined the practice, after training at Georgetown University. We began serving Damascus then, in addition to our office in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and providing care at Shady Grove Adventist Hospital. Five years later in 1997 Dr. Cara Simmonds, who also trained at Georgetown University, joined the practice, and the Frederick office was added. Thus, we were better able to serve our patients in Frederick County. Then in 1999, Dr. Thomas Martin, after training at Vanderbilt University, joined, and we were able to expand our service in Frederick County by caring for patients at Frederick Memorial Hospital. Then, Dr. Kalpana Helmbrecht, a Montgomery county native who trained at Georgetown University, joined the group and again expanded a tradition of excellent care. Over the next several years we have been joined by several other talented providers and a fourth office in White Flint was opened to better serve those of our patients nearer to Washington, DC. Since then, our practice has welcomed Drs. Skinner, Holtzman, Brenner, Ott, and Olson.

The growth in providers and locations has had many benefits. It means that we can provide appointments with little or no risk of cancellations due to daytime deliveries. As well, with four office locations from Rockville to Frederick, usually you will travel no more than 15-20 minutes to reach us. In having a larger number of professionals, we learn from each other as we have trained or taught in programs all over the country such as Pennsylvania Hospital, Bethesda Naval Hospital, and the University of Chicago in addition to those mentioned above. We have kept the pace of this growth at a reasonable rate so that you, our patient, will always receive personalized care.

Several years ago, we realized that certified midwifery care in our area was going to disappear unless we did something. So we started Midwifery Care Associates which is staffed by experienced and caring Certified Nurse-Midwives. This division of the practice provides an option for “low-risk” obstetric patients to consider. Backed up by our physicians, these midwives provide patients with prenatal care and delivery services, while insuring that an adequate safety net exists should the care of a physician be needed. We have worked with midwives for many years and find that collaborating with midwives makes our practice the best for both low risk and high risk patients.

Through constant attention to continuing our medical education and training, we have added high definition ultrasound, minimally invasive surgery, office based operative hysteroscopy and comprehensive antepartum testing. To better serve all of our patients, we were the first OB-GYN practice in the area to begin using an Electronic Health Record (EHR). This has allowed us to improve both the timeliness and completeness of our care for all of our patients. In order to better understand our patients’ needs and our performance, we have contracted with a professional survey company for many years in order to obtain your opinions of us. While we love to hear the praise and compliments, we find the real value in this effort comes from the criticisms we receive. Such criticism, even though sometimes difficult to hear, presents us an opportunity. By evaluating this feedback we can continuously improve our service to you. We believe that it is our constant effort to improve which distinguishes our practice from the rest. And the work of improvement is never finished.

Whether you are a new patient joining our practice or an established patient who has been with us for 40 years, be assured that our commitment to you has never been stronger. Both our training and experience tell us that listening to you is the first and most important step towards providing you with superb medical care. And then teaching you so that you understand the problem is the best way of beginning a treatment that will be successful. Because we care that our service to you is the best that you will ever find.

Welcome.

We Listen. We Teach. We Care.