Legacy physician, indeed

The executive medical staff at Enloe Medical Center has selected a third-generation Chico doctor to receive its prestigious Physician Legacy Award. He’s Dr. Joseph Chiapella (pictured), a rheumatologist who serves as medical director of Enloe’s Hospitalist Program, which he helped to establish in 1995, as well as director of its Los Molinos Family Health Clinic.

Hospitalists are hospital-based physicians who manage and coordinate inpatient care for hospitalized patients on behalf of their primary-care and subspecialty physicians. They also care for hospitalized patients who do not have personal physicians.

Chiapella, a Chico native, has been affiliated with Enloe since 1979. The award recognizes his “exceptional service, leadership and performance in medicine and the community,” according to a press release. His late father and grandfather were both Chico doctors.