Everett Hills, MD, is the Medical Director of the Rehabilitation Hospital at the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical
Center. He joined the Hershey Medical Center in August 2004 after a 6 year stint in private practice with Physicians of Rehabilitation,
Industrial & Spine Medicine, PC (PRISM) in Mechanicsburg, PA.
Before moving to central Pennsylvania in 1998, Dr. Hills was an assistant professor of rehabilitation medicine at the
Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA. Dr. Hills earned his doctor of medicine degree from the George
Washington University School of Medicine in Washington, DC. He completed his residency in physical medicine and rehabilitation
at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia and has been board-certified since 1991.
From 2000-2006, Dr. Hills was a member of the Program Planning Subcommittee that is in charge of creating and producing
the annual national meeting of the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. On the local level, Dr. Hills
was president of the Dauphin County Medical Society (2005) and remains active as a Delegate to the Pennsylvania Medical Society.
Dr. Hills is an Aviation Medical Examiner for the Federal Aviation Administration.
Understanding a spinal cord injury requires a holistic approach to the patient. Most SCI patients are young, healthy
individuals who experience an unimaginable (to me) change in body image, go through an intense grieving process, and then
pick up the pieces to make a new life for themselves. As I grow older myself, more and more I find myself impressed with those
individuals in the SCI community who have overcome diversity to become survivors. Helping them is an honorable vocation.
I guess I'm too old to make any brilliant contribution to the cure for SCI and I certainly don't have the single-mindedness
necessary to become a top-notch researcher. But I do enjoy the interplay between engineering and medicine (I was an engineer
in my "previous" life). My contribution will be the joining of engineering concepts and technology to solve real world biomedical
problems affecting the SCI population.
Dr. Hills is married with three children. He strives to maintain an equilibrium between personal and professional obligations
by supporting the kid's extracurricular activities and puttering around the house. Someday, he would like to finish his pilot's
license.
