Longtime Robbinsville dentist reflects on career thus far
Dr. Patrick Kelley
Robbinsville – Aside from Saturday being the first day of the New Year, there was another milestone: for the first time in more than 33 years, Patrick Kelley did not own a dental practice in Robbinsville.
Dr. Kelley sold his practice to his associate, Dr. Kelsey Cody.
Calm down, now: Dr. Kelley will continue to practice for the time being.
He just won’t be in charge.
Dr. Kelley has treated generations of Graham County residents in his dental chairs, including Dr. Cody.
“It’s been a labor of love,” Dr. Kelley said about the time he spent since bringing dentistry back to Graham County.
He started the practice August 1988. Robbinsville had been without a dentist for about a year and a half when a 29-year-old Californian decided to start a practice from scratch.
“Within two weeks, I was running as fast as I could go,” Kelley said.
His goal was to try to improve the quality of life “for the incredible people of Graham County.”
Cody became Kelley’s associate in July 2019. The two began discussing her buying the practice over the summer.
“It was always something I wanted to happen,” Dr. Cody said. “He wanted me to continue his vision.”
“I am going to be the employee and she’ll be the boss,” Dr. Kelley said. “She trusts me enough to ask questions.
“I’m proud of Kelsey. She stuck to it; she’s one in a million. It’s a rarity to have someone of her caliber to come back home.”
Road to Robbinsville
Dr. Kelly was raised along the shores of Shasta Lake, a resort in Northern California. His father, Andrew Kelley, was in the Navy starting in the Korean War, serving as an underwater demolitions team diver, an elite unit of the Navy that later became known as Navy Seals.
After leaving naval service, the senior Kelley became a resort manager, which is how young Patrick knew him until the father started sharing some of his war stories when Patrick was in his 40s.
Kelley got his dental degree from Loma Linda University, a private Seventh-day Adventist health sciences university in Loma Linda, Calif. After dental school, he practiced in High Point for about three years, before his search led him to Robbinsville in 1988. In addition to the private practice he started in Graham County, he also helped establish the dental clinic run through the Graham County Health Department.
The practice employs 10 people, including some who work part-time. Several have been with him for 30 years or more.
His office provides precisely 102 procedures from cleanings and fillings to root canals and Invisalign, a type of orthodontia that Dr. Cody brought to the table.
Kelley has been married 40 years. He and his wife Mig have three adult children, all of whom have gone into medical-related fields. His oldest daughter is a physician’s assistant for a heart surgical team in Asheville.
When she was four years old, she accompanied her father into the office for an after-hours emergency tooth extraction.
“Is that bloods?” she asked her dad at the time.
Now 89 years old, Andrew Kelley lives with his son Patrick and daughter-in-law Mig in Robbinsville. In 2010, Dr. Kelley published a book about his fathers (his biological father and his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ), titled “My Father in Me.”