If you are searching for a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA, Gastroenterology Center of Northern Virginia (GC of NoVA) cares for patients from across the Fairfax area at two offices east of the city. We do not have an office inside the City of Fairfax. What we have is an Annandale office roughly four miles east, in the Woodburn Medical complex, and an Arlington office farther out, next to VHC Health. For most Fairfax patients the choice is simpler than it is elsewhere in Northern Virginia, and this page explains why, what digestive care we provide, and how to schedule.
Where a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA actually practices
Fairfax has an unusual amount of medical care around it and comparatively little inside it. The City of Fairfax covers about six and a quarter square miles and roughly 25,000 residents, which is small enough that most specialty practices serving it sit in the surrounding county rather than within the city limits. That is worth saying plainly instead of implying otherwise. When you look for a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA, you are generally choosing among practices in Fairfax County that are a short drive from wherever in Fairfax you start.
Our two offices sit almost due east of the city on nearly the same line. The Annandale office is about four miles out, and the Arlington office is roughly nine and a half. Unlike some parts of Northern Virginia, where two offices bracket a community and the choice comes down to which direction you already drive, Fairfax has a clear closer option. Annandale is it for most patients, and Arlington is the sensible second choice when scheduling or your commute favors it.
The City of Fairfax and Fairfax County are not the same place
The single most confusing thing about this search is that Fairfax names two jurisdictions of wildly different size. The City of Fairfax is an independent city under Virginia law, with its own government, school division, and tax base, and it is not part of Fairfax County. About 25,000 people live in it. Fairfax County, the separate jurisdiction wrapped around it, has roughly 1.14 million residents and is the largest local jurisdiction in Virginia. A great many of those county residents have a Fairfax mailing address without living in the city at all.
The county seat makes the point better than any map. The Fairfax County Circuit Court sits at 4110 Chain Bridge Road, inside the City of Fairfax, even though the city is not part of the county it serves. Meanwhile the county's main Government Center stands at 12000 Government Center Parkway, with a Fairfax, VA 22035 address, several miles outside the city. Both are correctly addressed Fairfax. Neither tells you which one a patient means.
So when someone says they want a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA, they may mean the blocks around Old Town Fairfax and Chain Bridge Road, or they may mean Fair Oaks, Burke, Oakton, or the stretch out toward Centreville. Those are meaningfully different drives, and they can point toward different offices. The practical answer below is written for both readings.
Our Annandale office, the closer of the two for Fairfax patients
For patients in and around the City of Fairfax, the nearer of our two locations is Annandale by a wide margin, and it is where most people searching for a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA end up being seen. It is at 3299 Woodburn Road, Suite 220, Annandale, VA 22003, in the second building of the Woodburn Medical complex, and the phone number there is (703) 560-6106.
The geography is straightforward. Route 236 runs through the City of Fairfax as Main Street, becomes Little River Turnpike as it heads east, and carries you toward Annandale on one road with no complicated transitions. The office sits about four miles from the center of the city in a straight line, which in practice is a short local drive rather than a highway trip. For patients coming from the western and southern parts of the county with Fairfax addresses, the Beltway and Braddock Road approaches reach the same complex.
Woodburn Medical Park is a large medical office campus of more than forty practices, about a block from Inova Fairfax Hospital. If your care involves lab work or imaging alongside the consultation, having those services concentrated in one campus keeps a workup from becoming several separate trips. Our full Annandale gastroenterology office page covers parking, hours, and what a visit there involves.
One detail matters for anyone whose address reads Fairfax but sits in the county: the Annandale office is itself in Fairfax County. Most people searching this way are being seen by a practice inside their own county, which can simplify referrals and record sharing with other county physicians.
Our Arlington office, and when it makes sense
Our Arlington office is at 1715 North George Mason Drive, Suite 403, Arlington, VA 22205, adjacent to VHC Health in Zone C, with patient parking in Parking C. You can reach it at (703) 522-7476.
For a Fairfax patient this is the longer trip, roughly nine and a half miles east, and it is usually not the default. It becomes the better option in three situations: when you already commute toward Arlington or the District and an appointment near that route saves you a separate outing, when the Arlington schedule has an opening sooner than Annandale, or when your other physicians are already on VHC Health campus. Our Arlington gastroenterology office page has the specifics.
You are not locked into one location. Many patients are seen at whichever office had the sooner opening and follow up at the other, and the physicians are the same group at both.
Colon cancer screening for Fairfax adults
Screening is the most common reason people in this area look for a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA. The American Cancer Society recommends that adults at average risk begin colorectal cancer screening at age 45, and colonoscopy is the only screening test that can find and remove polyps during the same exam.
Fairfax screens near the regional average and sits below the national goal. In the CDC's PLACES local estimates for 2022, 65.2 percent of adults aged 45 to 75 in the City of Fairfax were up to date with colorectal cancer screening, compared with 63.1 percent across Fairfax County. Both fall under the Healthy People 2030 target of 72.8 percent. Notably, the city and the county track each other closely here, within about two points, so a Fairfax address does not predict much about screening status one way or the other. Read either number in reverse and roughly one in three eligible adults in a well insured, well resourced area is not current.
The reason this matters is timing. Colon polyps and early colorectal cancer usually produce no symptoms at all, which is the entire argument for screening on a schedule rather than waiting for something to feel wrong. We cover that pattern across the digestive tract in our page on digestive conditions that often have no symptoms, and go deeper on the tissue itself in colon polyps and colorectal cancer.
If you are weighing a colonoscopy against a stool-based test, our comparison of colon cancer screening options in Northern Virginia lays out what each test does and does not do. If a colonoscopy is already on the calendar, our guides to colonoscopy prep, sedation and anesthesia, and what to expect on the day walk through it start to finish, while your colonoscopy results explained covers what the report means afterward. Cost questions are addressed in does insurance cover a colonoscopy.
Digestive conditions a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA evaluates
Screening is one lane of the practice. The other is symptoms, and what we see from the Fairfax area is the ordinary range of adult gastroenterology. That includes GERD and acid reflux, irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory bowel disease, celiac disease, diverticulitis and diverticulosis, hemorrhoids, gallstones, and liver conditions such as fatty liver disease and hepatitis.
Many patients arrive with a symptom rather than a diagnosis, which is often the more useful place to start. Ongoing abdominal pain, blood in the stool, chronic constipation, chronic diarrhea, persistent bloating, and difficulty swallowing each have their own workup, and each is a reason to be seen rather than to wait. Evaluations frequently involve upper endoscopy or colonoscopy, though not every visit leads to a procedure.
Where procedures are performed for Fairfax patients
When a procedure is recommended, it is done at an affiliated facility rather than in the office. Those facilities are VHC Health, Inova Fairfax Hospital, and Woodburn Endoscopy Center. Which one is used depends on the procedure and on your circumstances, and your physician's office will confirm the location and the preparation instructions with you before the day arrives.
For a patient coming from Fairfax, the two facilities in the Annandale and Merrifield corridor are on the same eastward run as the Annandale office, so the procedure is generally not a longer trip than the consultation was. Beyond routine colonoscopy and endoscopy, the practice also performs ERCP, endoscopic ultrasound, capsule endoscopy, hemorrhoid banding, and breath testing for H. pylori and SIBO.
Primary care or a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA
Not every digestive symptom needs a specialist, and your primary care physician is a reasonable first stop for most new ones. The situations that genuinely call for a gastroenterologist tend to be symptoms that persist after a first-line treatment, symptoms that return each time treatment stops, findings that need explanation such as unexplained anemia or abnormal liver enzymes, and anything where the sensible next step is a scope or a biopsy. Screening at age 45 is its own reason and requires no symptom at all. Our page on when to see a gastroenterologist rather than your primary care doctor works through that decision in detail, and unexplained weight loss covers one of the findings that should not wait.
The physicians who see Fairfax patients
Our practice is a group, so choosing a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA means choosing among five physicians rather than one, and Fairfax patients are seen by the same physicians at either office: Gabriel B. Herman, M.D., Pradeep K. Gupta, M.D., Truc T. Trinh, M.D., Diego I. Kuperschmit, M.D., and Rachana Potru, M.D. Each bio covers training, focus areas, and clinical interests, which is worth reading if you have a preference about who you see.
What to bring to a first appointment
A first visit goes more smoothly with a few things in hand: your insurance card and photo identification, a current list of your medications and supplements including anything over the counter, recent lab work or imaging if another physician ordered it, the date and findings of any previous colonoscopy or endoscopy, and a short note on your family history of colorectal cancer, polyps, or liver disease. Family history changes screening timing more often than patients expect, so it is worth asking relatives before the appointment rather than after. Our guide to your first gastroenterologist visit covers what the appointment itself involves.
How to schedule with a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA
To request an appointment, call the office that suits you. Annandale is (703) 560-6106 and Arlington is (703) 522-7476. Both are open Monday through Thursday from 8:30am to 5:00pm and Friday from 8:30am to 4:30pm. We accept new patients at both locations, whether your primary care physician referred you or you are reaching out on your own. If you are not certain which office to choose, say where in the Fairfax area you are traveling from and our team can point you to the closer one. Our page on becoming a new patient explains referrals and intake, and patients elsewhere in the region may want our Falls Church page instead.
Frequently asked questions about gastroenterology care in Fairfax
Do you have an office in Fairfax, VA?
We do not have an office inside the City of Fairfax. Patients looking for a gastroenterologist in Fairfax VA are seen at two nearby locations: our Annandale office at 3299 Woodburn Road, Suite 220, in the Woodburn Medical complex, and our Arlington office at 1715 North George Mason Drive, Suite 403, adjacent to VHC Health. The Annandale office is in Fairfax County and is the closer of the two for most people with a Fairfax address.
Which office is closer to the City of Fairfax?
Annandale, by a clear margin. Our Annandale office sits about four miles east of the center of the city, reachable on Route 236, which runs through Fairfax as Main Street and becomes Little River Turnpike heading east. The Arlington office is roughly nine and a half miles out. Arlington still makes sense if you commute that direction or if it has a sooner opening. Call (703) 560-6106 for Annandale or (703) 522-7476 for Arlington.
My mailing address says Fairfax but I live in the county. Does that change anything?
Not for your care, though it can change which office is convenient. The City of Fairfax is an independent city of about 25,000 people, while Fairfax County around it has roughly 1.14 million residents, and a Fairfax mailing address is used across a wide area of the county. Patients from Fair Oaks, Oakton, Burke, and the surrounding communities are welcome at either office. Tell our team the cross streets you are coming from and we can identify the shorter trip.
At what age should Fairfax adults start colon cancer screening?
The American Cancer Society recommends that adults at average risk begin colorectal cancer screening at age 45. People with a family history of colorectal cancer or advanced polyps, a personal history of polyps, or inflammatory bowel disease may need to start earlier or repeat screening more often. That determination is individual, and it is one of the things a first appointment is for.
Where would my colonoscopy or endoscopy be performed?
Procedures are performed at facilities affiliated with the practice rather than in the office. These are VHC Health, Inova Fairfax Hospital, and Woodburn Endoscopy Center. The facility depends on the procedure and your circumstances, and our team will confirm the location and the preparation instructions with you in advance. For patients traveling from Fairfax, the Annandale and Merrifield facilities are on the same route as the Annandale office.
Are Fairfax residents up to date on colon cancer screening?
Close to the county average and short of the national goal. The CDC's PLACES local estimates for 2022 put colorectal cancer screening among adults aged 45 to 75 at 65.2 percent in the City of Fairfax and 63.1 percent across Fairfax County. Both fall below the Healthy People 2030 target of 72.8 percent, which means roughly one in three eligible adults locally is not current.
This article is for general education and is not medical advice. Screening timing, symptom evaluation, and whether a procedure is appropriate all depend on your history, your risk factors, and your examination. Talk with a qualified gastroenterologist about your symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment options.
