Dr. Vernon Palmisano, a board-certified family medicine practitioner specializing in vertigo treatment, has joined the St. Tammany Physicians Network primary care clinic in Mandeville. He is the ninth physician associated with the Mandeville practice.
Dr. Palmisano, now in his 33rd year of practice, comes to St. Tammany Health System after 27 years with Ochsner Health. Most recently, he has been instructing family medicine residents as part of LSU School of Medicine’s Rural Family Medicine program in Bogalusa.
The move to western St. Tammany Parish brings him closer to his two granddaughters – 2 years old and 2 months old – but that’s not the only reason he joined STHS.
“I’m a people person. It was an easy decision for me,” Dr. Palmisano said. “The long-term relationships, the contact with the patients, the intimacy, the friendship aspects of it, for sure.”
In that regard, he’s somewhat “old-fashioned,” by his own description.
“Where medicine is going now, we’re being evaluated on whether we’ve ticked off all the boxes and we’re not really listening to the patient,” he said. “I’m old-fashioned. My goal and my drive is to treat ‘the least of these.’ You know that great Bible verse? ‘When did we feed you? When did we clothe you?’ That verse has been my main verse most of my career.”
Dr. Palmisano is a respected authority on vertigo, a field he entered after a traumatic fall several years ago that left him with lingering dizziness.
While researching vertigo, the Metairie native – who graduated from De La Salle High School, Millsaps College and LSU School of Medicine – learned that one of the more effective therapies for dizziness is table tennis. So, he took it up. Today, when not working, he can be found polishing his table tennis skills as a player on the National Table Tennis Tour.
“I fish and hunt a lot, too,” he said, “But my love is table tennis. … I play the best of the best of the best, any age,” he said. “I played the number four and five women in the United States not long ago. They kicked my butt, but it’s fun.”
Dr. Palmisano and wife Judie live in Mandeville. They have three children.