The latest Edge coverage from the Chattanooga Times Free Press, part of our Business section.
Business
Growing up in Raleigh, North Carolina, Dr. William Blalock always had an interest in science and medical TV shows, including one called "Medical Center" that featured the day-to-day challenges of the protagonist, Dr. Joe Gannon.
As Chattanooga continues to build momentum as a destination for business growth, talent development, and innovation, the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce welcomes a leader whose career has been defined by expanding opportunity and strengthening workforce pipelines. Dr. Rebecca Ashford, president of Chattanooga State Community College, has been named Chair of the Chattanooga Area Chamber Board of Directors for the 2026–2027 term.
Everyone's career starts somewhere, and for Dr. Matthew Bernard, it started after more than a decade of training.
In his book "The Psychology of Money," Morgan Housel argues that "every decision people make with money is justified by taking the information they have at the moment and plugging it into their unique mental model of how the world works." As an example, he attempts to generate a rationale for why the "lowest-income households in the U.S. on average spend $412 a year on lotto tickets, four times the amount of those in the highest income groups," and comes up with this imagined monologue:
There's a moment every new AI user eventually hits. You ask ChatGPT a perfectly reasonable question about a court case, a book chapter, a historical figure, and it answers with total confidence. Then you go verify it, and the source doesn't exist. The case is made up. The book has no such passage. The person never said that.
On the second floor of an office building on Cherry Street, several bags hang from a metal rack in a room sealed with a fingerprint-controlled padlock.
Mission
Every week seems to bring another breakthrough in artificial intelligence. AI can summarize medical records, analyze X-rays, answer patient questions and even help physicians diagnose diseases. While these advances will transform health care in remarkable ways, they won't replace what matters most. In fact, as AI becomes more capable, the uniquely human side of health care becomes even more valuable. AI won't replace health care, but it will amplify what humans contribute most.
Jennifer Nicely grew up in a family devoted to philanthropy. Her parents chaired both the local United Way and Heart Association campaigns.
Many rural counties in Tennessee are considered health care provider shortage areas, with zero to three primary care providers and even fewer service providers specializing in areas such as occupational therapy, nutrition and social work.
When you practice general surgery for nearly 40 years, the numbers really start to stack up. By the time he retired in late 2025, Steven Paynter had performed more than 5,000 gallbladder surgeries, 2,000 hernia operations, 2,000 breast operations, 1,000 colon surgeries and 500 hiatal hernia procedures.
