Select Health of South Carolina appoints three new medical directors
February 21, 2017
NORTH CHARLESTON, SC – Select Health of South Carolina, the state’s oldest and largest Medicaid managed care organization, appointed three new medical directors: Roger O. Beardmore, Psy.D., Melissa Pearce, M.D., and Leigh Spicer, M.D. Select Health is part of the AmeriHealth Caritas Family of Companies.
Beardmore, a clinical psychologist specializing in health psychology, and child and family psychology, will lead behavioral health initiatives. Pearce, a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist, will oversee utilization review, care management, and provider education areas, as well as the Bright Start® prenatal program. Spicer, a board-certified family practitioner, will lead Select Health’s outpatient utilization program.
Beardmore brings more than 20 years of behavioral health care experience to Select Health. He spent the majority of his career with PerformCare in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, primarily serving as a managed care psychologist advisor to health plans in Indiana, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina. A significant amount of his time was spent working with Select Health, and Beardmore also served as a member of Select Health’s Behavioral Health Quality of Clinical Care committee before officially joining the health plan.
He earned an undergraduate degree in religion at Duke University, master’s and doctoral degrees in psychology at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, and earned his post-doctoral residency at Pennsylvania Counseling Services. Originally from Dayton, Ohio, he currently resides in Summerville, South Carolina.
Roger O. Beardmore, Psy.D., Melissa Pearce, M.D., and Leigh Spicer, M.D.
Pearce brings more than 12 years of health care experience to Select Health. She has spent her entire career in South Carolina and comes to Select Health from Summerville Medical Center (SMC) where she served as an obstetrician hospitalist. She also served as a physician member of Select Health’s Quality of Clinical Care and Quality Assessment and Performance Improvement committees before joining Select Health.
In 2015, SMC’s parent organization, Hospital Corporation of America, honored her with its Frist Humanitarian Award, recognizing volunteer work in the community and abroad. She actively volunteers with several charitable initiatives in the tri-county including Charleston Area Therapeutic Riding, Helping Our Precious Equines (H.O.P.E.) Acres Rescue in Summerville, and Feline Freedom Coalition of Ravenel. She also makes an annual health mission trip abroad, having traveled with OneWorld Health to Uganda in 2014 and Nicaragua in 2015. Her next trip in April 2017 will take her to Vietnam with Vets with A Mission, where she will provide humanitarian and medical aid.
Pearce earned an undergraduate degree in exercise and sport sciences at the University of Florida. She completed her medical degree from University of Florida College of Medicine and her residency at the Medical University of South Carolina. Originally from Rochester, Pennsylvania, she currently resides on James Island.
Spicer brings 11 years of health care experience to Select Health, having spent her entire career practicing medicine in the Charleston area. She owned and operated the Palmetto Primary Care Physicians — Daniel Island location — before joining Select Health.
She completed her undergraduate degree in biology at the University of North Carolina – Asheville, her medical degree at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC), and a family practice residency at Trident Hospital in North Charleston and MUSC. Originally from Sullivan’s Island, she currently resides in Mount Pleasant.
Since 2010, Spicer has volunteered two Fridays a month to operate a health clinic as part of the Adopt-a-Doc program at the Daniel Jenkins Creative Learning Center within the Charleston County School District. She was voted Best Physician in 2014 and 2016 in the Charleston City Paper’s annual Best of Charleston awards.
About Select Health
Select Health of South Carolina, part of the AmeriHealth Caritas Family of Companies, contracts with South Carolina’s Department of Health and Human Services to offer First Choice, the state’s oldest and largest Medicaid managed care health plan, in all 46 counties statewide. First Choice by Select Health is the top-rated Medicaid health plan in South Carolina, according to the National Committee for Quality Assurance’s (NCQA) Medicaid Health Insurance Plan Ratings 2015-2016, and has been since 2010. First Choice is the first health plan in South Carolina to earn NCQA’s Multicultural Health Care Distinction, an honor it has achieved three times since 2011. For more information about First Choice by Select Health, visit www.selecthealthofsc.com.
