About Us
Our goal is to provide the highest quality of medical care to infants, children, and teenagers.
Our Mission
The mission of Upper Valley Pediatrics, as a Patient Centered Medical Home, is to provide pediatric and adolescent patients with comprehensive and respectful care in a timely manner and in a safe environment.
We take pride in and place an emphasis on quality of care, accessibility and a trusting relationship between the providers, staff, and the patients we care for. We offer access to evidence-based care and self-management support incorporated into quality health care services. Our care will not vary in quality because of personal characteristics such as gender, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, immigration status, geographic location and/or socio-economic status. We strive to foster a sense of community.
Meet Our Providers
Rebecca L. Yukica, DO
Dr. Rebecca grew up as a Jersey Girl. She moved to Massachusetts for college, and although she has moved many times since, she has landed in the Upper Valley to stay. Dr. Rebecca graduated from Smith College and then spent two years teaching high school chemistry at National Cathedral School in Washington DC before heading to medical school. She graduated from Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine in 2001.
Following her internship year at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, Michigan, Dr. Rebecca transferred to New Hampshire to complete her residency at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center. She stayed to do a Chief year and then moved to Baltimore, MD, to help start a hospitalist program at Johns Hopkins Medical Center. After two years in the city during which she was married and had twins, her family found it was time to return to the Upper Valley. It was in 2007 that Dr. Rebecca first joined Upper Valley Pediatrics as an attending pediatrician. She left once more to work in Washington State, but after 13 months decided that the west coast was never going to be home. So, she returned to VT and shortly after took over ownership from founding physician Mark Harris, MD.
When not at work, you will most likely find Dr. Rebecca skiing, mountain biking, hiking or pursuing some other adventure with her husband and three sons.
Samantha Ingerick, ARNP
Samantha Ingerick is a Pediatric Nurse Practitioner who earned her RN/BS degrees in 2013 from the University of Rochester in upstate New York. She started her career as a pediatric neuro-oncology NP at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford University in California. She completed her Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree in 2019 from the University of California, Fresno State/San Jose State. She has since switched to primary care and moved back to Vermont where she is originally from.
Having grown up in the Upper Valley, Samantha is quite familiar with the area. She lives with her husband, her daughter, and an Australian shepherd named Ozzie.
Ellen Bando, PA
I’ve been so lucky to do what I most love the past 20 years: providing primary care to families and their children in rural and remote communities. I have worked 12 years in family medicine and 8 years in pediatrics.
My first job after graduation from PA school was in a remote area of the Navajo Reservation where I worked with a team of physicians and PAs in clinic and the ED to deliver primary care from birth through end of life. On other parts of the Navajo Reservation, I provided primary care and community health screenings on a mobile health unit at locations from schools to community gatherings to rodeo grounds! Before I returned to Vermont last year to be closer to my extended family, I was seeing pediatric patients in a hospital-based clinic for same day visits and preventative care from newborns through young adulthood. Since my return to Vermont to be closer to my extended family, I have continued to provide care to children in central Vermont.
Interests include pediatric and adolescent health; prevention of obesity and prediabetes in children and young adults; cross cultural medicine; medically underserved communities.
Most important to me is that my patient and their family leave their visit feeling listened to without bias or judgement, and that together we have found or are working towards a solution they feel comfortable and confident with. Our goal is to have a trusting partnership.
- National Commission on Certification of Physician Assistants, most recently certified 2018 through 2028
- Licensed by Vermont Board of Medical practice as PA-C in Vermont