This feature originally ran in The Standard-Times on Dec. 30, 2003.

By Nick Tavares

In the time most people are sitting down to their breakfasts, Brian Pettiford is getting down to business in the operating room.

It's a heck of a way to start the day. But that's how Dr. Pettiford starts most days.

And he wouldn't have it any other way.

"Well, I generally arrive here between 6 and 630 (a.m.)," says the newest cardiac surgeon with the Southcoast Hospitals Group. "We walk around, see patients, make sure everyone is stable, and we're in the operating room by 730. Within a half hour, we're in an operation, and after that, we're out of the room anywhere from 11 a.m. to 12."

Dr. Brian Pettiford, 33, standing over 6 feet tall, speaks with a slight southern accent that reveals his Georgia roots. Despite the rigors of being a cardiothoracic surgeon -- and being the new guy on the job -- his demeanor is of great calm.

In addition to open heart surgery, Dr. Pettiford specializes in minimally invasive thoracic surgery, including surgery for lung cancer and esophageal reflux.

He came to Fall River's Charlton Memorial Hospital in early October, and has quickly made himself comfortable in the settings of the new cardiac surgery program. hospitals performed their first open-heart surgery in April 2002, and Dr. Pettiford is the third surgeon to join the ranks of specialists treating those with heart disease.

Dr. Thomas Carr, who along with Dr. Paul Hatton helped build the cardiac program from the ground up, says a third surgeon was essential for keeping the program growing.

"With only two doctors, it's hard to be on call for 26 weeks out of a year," he says. "It can become tiresome; it's hard to take a vacation. Also, though we can perform heart surgery on patients at all three of the hospitals in the group (including Tobey in Wareham and St. Luke's in New Bedford), our operative practice is here at Charlton, and we wanted to perform heart surgery and lung surgery at all three facilities.

"We did not want to be in the position of being spread too thin, because that's not giving the patient optimal care. But now with three of us we easily cover vacations, plus we can perform thoracic surgery at all the hospitals."

The call went out for a new surgeon, and soon Dr. Carr and Dr. Hatton had found the doctor whom they felt was the perfect person for the job.

"After getting the word out," said Dr. Carr, "we narrowed our field to eight or nine individuals, and it was clear after talking to them that Brian was our top choice."

"You come as a new guy in a pretty intense field, and you expect everyone to be pretty stand-off-ish, but I've only witnessed the exact opposite," said Dr. Pettiford. "Everyone from the janitor to the president of the hospital has been overwhelmingly nice and open and I have felt extremely welcome here. Dr. Carr and Dr. Hatton, as well as everyone on the staff, have gone above and beyond the call of duty to make sure I had a smooth transition."

Dr. Pettiford seems to handle the daily stresses with ease, though he did let his guard down to reveal how pressurized it can be.

"Oh, every day is hectic," he exclaims. "In our field, we deal with extremely sick people, and we're under a microscope, the most scrutinized of all professions. That alone creates a lot of pressure, and you couple that with this being a new program, and you're the new guy on the block, that microscope turns into, I don't know, a satellite.

"When you're in training, you see the case but ultimately it's the other guy who's responsible. When you're the person the patient is looking to, and they're saying 'Dr. Pettiford this' and 'Dr. Pettiford that,' you realize that you're responsible for this person's life. It's pretty sobering and it's pretty humbling."

Dr. Pettiford received his training at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, and after graduating in 1996 he moved directly into a residency at the Medical Center.

While studying, he was the recipient of several awards, including the Walter K. Sieber Medical Student Award in Pediatric Surgery and the Pittsburgh Surgical Society Medical Student Award.

"It (the latter) was an award that went to the person who showed the greatest interest, the most enthusiasm in surgery," said Dr. Pettiford.

Dr. Pettiford developed his enthusiasm for medicine at a young age. His mother was a registered nurse and often came home and relayed her experiences in the hospital. Dr. Pettiford noted that the early death of his grandmother to heart disease spurred his motivation to become a cardiac surgeon, as well as, oddly enough, his father's profession.

"My father and grandfather and uncle were all auto mechanics," Dr. Pettiford says. "You know, folks would bring a broken-down car and they're asked to fix it, and if they couldn't fix it, nobody could fix it. So I used to always work around the gas station with them and take motors apart, put them back together, that sort of thing.

"I think for the past seven years I've been so focused on surgery that I couldn't fix anything else now. If anything breaks around the house my wife has to fix it."

Dr. Pettiford now lives in Portsmouth, R.I., a 15-minute ride away from Charlton Memorial, with his wife, Patricia, and 23-month-old son, Jacob.

"We don't have too many acquaintances in the neighborhood, but hopefully that will change with time," he says. "My wife seems to be incredibly overjoyed with the move."

Dr. Pettiford continues to get up with the sun every day to treat people in the area, and he has an intense appreciation for that.

"There's not too much that can top being able to someone who's extremely ill, being able to literally touch and fix their heart, and see them become exceedingly better within the matter of a couple of hours. There's nothing greater than that.

"I feel privileged to be in this field, and that's what sets this discipline apart from most others. It doesn't get any better."

This story appeared on Page B1 of The Standard-Times on December 30, 2003.