Dr. Nancy Hickam Cook, MD

I was a patient of Dr. Cooks a few years ago while pregnant with twins from IVF. I was high risk patient due to my age. During my first appointment she told me ,"If you would have come to me sooner, I would have suggested terminating one of the babies to give you a higher success rate of carrying to term:". I was floored,hurt and frightened that those words came out of her mouth. Please stay away from this doctor. She does not care about patients.

When I was 10 days post date, I went in for my regular check up and was told by a male partner of Dr. Cook's that I "had been pregnant long enough", and then instructed me to come in the next day for an induction, which every professional in the office should have known would be a mistake. At age 25, I certainly did not. There were no reasons to induce, the baby and I were scoring well on the NSTs, he just said "let't get it over with". I had no dilation, no effacement, no contractions, nothing at all to show we were ready for labor and delivery. After 24 hours, Dr. Cook came in from being out of town, angrily looked down at me in the bed where I had been hoping for some progress since the morning prior, and declared , "I don't do two day inductions", and instructed the pitocin to be cranked quite high. It was not long before I was in what is called "titanic contractions", where there are no breaks and the intensity is severe. By the mid day, I was passing out in pain, and requested… demerol to ease it. It did little, and I ended up with an epidural to get through. This of course put me flat on my back. This use of pitocin is called "pit to distress", meaning it will most likely cause the baby distress, as the contractions are so extreme. Once the baby was distressed, it would be easier to convince a tired, laboring mom of the need for a c-section. It did cause my baby distress, and he passed meconium in the womb. Between that, his being OP (sunny side up, so likely not best positioned against the cervix), and the pitocin giving me a fever (a common side effect when dosed that high), I was told after two hours of pushing that "if this were the days of people traveling west by wagon, there would be two gravestones, one for me and one for my baby", unless I had a c-section right then. When I asked for a bit more time, she called in my husband and parents, scared them to death, and they all told me I had no choice. So he was born via c-section. And that led to three more, with my other three children, even with VBAC attempts. We can never know the absolute cause and effect of this poor chain of decisions, but I can know how I was made to feel, and how uncaring it all seemed, and how now, that I am in school to be a Certified Nurse Midwife, I know how these scenarios can unfold, and that the worst way a woman can feel is that she had no choice. This practice took my choice by denying me critical information, like simply how an unfavorable induction may go down. I was given no potential adverse effects, no statistics, no other side of the story. I can assure you if I had, I would have never made the choice to begin the induction. The one positive outcome is that I've kept such a passion about what happened, that I am now in training to hopefully give other families what I was not afforded. Education, information, and choice.

Dr. Cook has been my doctor for over 20 years. I have always found her to be an excellent doctor that truly cares about her patients.

Cold, rushed, gives inaccurate information...I left this practice several years ago after a string of bad experiences with Dr. Cook and the office staff, and I'm so glad I did. There are well organized offices and skilled, compassionate providers in town, there is no need to put up with this. If you want to see what burnout looks like in a physician, Dr. Cook is a great example.

Blargh. People in this office are rude and uncaring. Called with a concern before surgery and was YELLED at. Not joking. This was only the coup de grâce of the awful performance. Why did I go through with it? Dire straits -- ie not enough time to choose another doc. Please avoid. This doc/practice really does not care about bedside manner. Just awful. Oh, yeah, and never contacted me after surgery.

Dr. Cook was a horrible doctor. I am an ICU nurse, and my father, mother, and sister all are family doctors who have delivered hundreds of babies themselves. I'm saying this because I want people to understand that Dr. Cook was a horrible doctor who does not care about the patients--it is simply a well-paying job for her. Furthermore, she will order absolutely unnessesary tests that have no medical indication for you and threaten you and twist it to say that she is looking out for the baby that you need to have a test done. For a test that could have been easily done in her office for free to me, she had me come to the hospital on the weekend when she was on call--she did not tell me that I would be admitted to the hospital and therefore incur a HUGE bill for a simple non-stress test (I was not even 41 weeks pregnant and everything was normal). Furthermore, two days later, I had to come back to the office and take the same test with a sonogram even though Saturday's test was… normal...so then I tried to ask her why the saturday test was even necessary and she wouldn't return my calls--she only had the billing office call me and obviously they were no help.

Dr. Cook is nice only to high-risk patients, as she collects more from their insurance. I found her to be cold, uniterested in me, always hurried, and just the classic non-carring modern doctor. The other doctors in her practice, however, are all very nice. The contrast was drastic.

Dr. Cook is caring, knowledgeable and all around a great doctor. I recommend her to any woman who would like a doctor they can count on and who is personable. She has an excellent personality!