Medical practice takes care of its own

The staff at Intercoastal Medical Group, one of the largest physician practices in the Sarasota-Manatee area, recently turned a difficult situation for an employee into a company-wide rally cry.

The quandary: Jean Mingari-Davis, the company's IT director, gave birth to a baby boy while her husband, Paul Davis, a captain in the U.S. Army Reserve, was on a year-long deployment in Afghanistan. The 400-employee practice, which includes 70 physicians, took care of Mingari-Davis and the baby while Paul Davis was overseas. Employees did everything from babysit to cook meals for Mingari-Davis.

Intercoastal earned a Patriot Award from the U.S. Department of Defense for its support of Mingari-Davis. The award is normally for companies that support employees who are in the National Guard and Reserve, but in this case it's for a reservist's wife.

“The folks at Intercoastal rallied around Jean and gave her time to meet the family obligations that were thrust upon her,” says Paul Davis, the commanding officer of the 810th Military Police Company in Tampa, in a statement. “They truly went above and beyond the call of duty.”

Davis worked with Task Force Scorpion, a NATO effort that helps train Afghan police officers. He was stationed in the Kandahar Region from April 2011 to April 2012. That's when the baby was born. Mingari-Davis, meanwhile, has been employed with Intercoastal for 15 years.

The award is officially called the Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve Patriot's Award. “It means so much to all of us because we feel it's very important to support our servicemen and servicewomen,” Intercoastal spokeswoman Ricki Lindsay tells Coffee Talk. “This was one small way to do it.”