| Baptist Hospitals | |
| Baptist Health | |
|---|---|
| Geography | |
| Location | Jacksonville, FL, USA |
| Organisation | |
| Care system | Medicare/Medicaid/Public |
| Hospital type | Community |
| Affiliated university | University of Florida |
| Services | |
| Emergency department | Level II Trauma Center |
| Beds | 1,000 |
| History | |
| Founded | 1940s |
| Links | |
| Website | e-baptisthealth.com |
| Lists | |
Baptist Health, based in Jacksonville, Florida, is a network of five hospitals, affiliated with 34 primary care offices located throughout Northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia. All Baptist Hospitals have the MAGNET designation, the highest honor a health care organization can receive for excellence in patient care.
Contents |
For more than 50 years,[1] Baptist Health has provided residents of Northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia with care. The original Baptist Memorial Hospital in downtown Jacksonville was opened in the 1940s, and is the flagship hospital for Baptist Health.
During the 1990s, for-profit health maintenance organizations such as Columbia/HCA captured a large share from non-profit hospitals. Baptist Health merged with rival St. Vincent's HealthCare in 1995 to become the dominant healthcare provider in northeast Florida and control rising costs. Baptist/St. Vincents Health System had a 40% market share and had cut operating costs by $100 million in three years.[2] However, the marriage didn't last, and both groups went their separate ways in 2000.[3]
In the early 1990s the hospital's name was changed to Baptist Medical Center Downtown. The facility is a tertiary referral hospital in downtown Jacksonville on the south bank of the St. Johns River next to Interstate 95. Baptist Downtown provides services in cardiology, oncology (including gynecological), women's health (including obstetrics, gynecology and a Women's Resource Center), orthopedics, pediatrics, ophthalmology, emergency care (including Life Flights air ambulance, a children's emergency center and hyperbaric medicine), intensive care medicine, bloodless surgery, pulmonary services (including an adult/pediatric sleep disorders lab), pastoral care, radiology, rehabilitation and psychiatry/psychology. They also have the following regional referral centers: Jacksonville Orthopedic Institute (located in the Reid Medical Building) and Baptist Cancer Institute (located in the Edna Williams Cancer Center).
A full-service hospital opened in Fernandina in 1942, relocating in the 1970s to Lime and South 18th Streets. In 1994, it was acquired by Baptist Health. The hospital converted to an electronic medical record system, one of a handful of community hospitals in the nation to do so.
Morris David Wolfson (father of Louis Wolfson), made a $500,000 donation in 1946 to create a children’s health care facility in Jacksonville. The facility opened in 1955 as a wing in the Baptist Memorial Hospital with 50 beds and gradually grew to the point that the decision was made in 1971 to consolidate the services into a separate facility with the name, Wolfson Children’s Hospital (WCH). The University of Florida College of Medicine-Jacksonville Pediatric Residency Program uses the hospital as its main pediatric teaching facility.[4]
Beaches Hospital originally opened in Jacksonville Beach in 1961, but when it could not keep up with expanding needs, it was replaced by the First coast Medical Center in November 1988. In 1990, Baptist Health bought the tax-supported facility and changed its name to Baptist Medical Center Beaches. They have continued expanding the hospital, including adding additional floors, wings and buildings and making available new services, such as maternity care.[5]
To meet the expanding needs of southern Duval and St. Johns counties, Baptist South was constructed and opened in February 2005. In June 2007, began the construction of a patient care tower that will further increase its patient capacity, including a new Newborn Intensive Care Unit[6]
In 1985, the Baptist Health Foundation was created to assist Baptist Health’s commitment to care by assisting in fundraising.[7]
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||