Dr. Raman Ashta is hardly the first person to move south to Vero Beach in order to spend her time doing what she loves. Retirees have been doing it for a century.
That said, Ashta didn’t move all that far south and she’s still very much working full time.
A family practice physician who has an office in Vero Beach but works for Sebastian River Medical Center, her southward trek only took her from Melbay Healthcare in Melbourne to a fountain-facing office on 11th Circle, off 37th Street.
The move has not changed the fact that Ashta is, as she says, “passionate about health maintenance and the prevention of lifestyle-related diseases such as obesity, hypertension and diabetes.
“I want to do primary care,” she says. “I’ve experimented a little bit with different styles of practice and this is what I started with, this is what I’m good at, and this is what I’m going to stick to.”
Ashta says she has no intention of “running around seeing 100 patients a day,” in her new location. Instead she prefers to focus intently on each patient, getting to really know what makes them tick.
And that’s not always easy.