At Shands HealthCare, we remain committed to caring for all patients in our communities, including those requiring basic health care services and those with little or no health care insurance.
On Sunday, we relocated services and staff from Shands at AGH to Shands at UF. That same day, we also moved our emergency services from both Shands at AGH and the Shands at UF North Campus to the Shands Critical Care Center, located on the new Shands at UF South Campus. Prior to the transition, the combined emergency room capacity at Shands at AGH and Shands at UF enabled our emergency teams to treat about 75,000 emergency patients a year. Emergency teams at Shands Critical Care Center now have the capacity to treat about 100,000 emergency patients annually. In addition, opening Shands Cancer Hospital and Medical Center (on the south campus) resulted in a net increase in available staffed inpatient hospital beds in Gainesville.
All family medicine inpatient services from AGH, including those staffed by UF faculty and community-based private practitioners, also moved to Shands at UF, as did the AGH obstetrical service. And we relocated the well-respected Forensic Nurse Examiner Program, the area's only such program for victims of sexual assault, from the AGH emergency department over to the new Critical Care Center.
Regarding ongoing care for east Gainesville, the UF and Shands HealthCare system has the largest health care presence on the east side of Gainesville with the UF Physicians Southwest Fourth Avenue family practice clinic and the UF Shands Eastside Community Practice.
The plan for Shands Cancer Hospital was established four years ago in response the growing demand for cancer care at Shands at UF. One in seven adult patients at Shands at UF has a cancer-related condition. In 2009, Florida will have more than 100,000 new cancer cases, giving our state the nation's second highest rate, after California. Here in north central Florida, there are at least 4,500 new cancer cases each year. Opening the cancer hospital will allow UF and Shands to expand oncology care and other specialty services to meet our patients' and community's health care needs.
Meanwhile, we're pleased to say that we have retained the vast majority of AGH employees and provided them with new positions within the Shands system. As major employers and health care providers, Shands and the UF College of Medicine together make a $2.5 billion impact on Florida's economy. At a time of severe economic crisis and unemployment throughout Florida and the nation, Alachua County benefits from employers such as UF and Shands. And as the area's only not-for-profit health care system, Shands reinvests all earnings back into operations, programs and services to support our mission and serve our patients and communities.
We remain committed to our social mission to improve community health. Alachua County has engaged the WellFlorida Council to conduct a comprehensive health-needs assessment. Shands is funding a portion of the total cost of the project, along with the Alachua County Health Department, Choices, North Florida Regional Medical Center and Palms Medical Center. Collectively, we identify short-term and long-term health requirements based on community needs, community growth and health care trends.
Timothy Goldfarb is the CEO of Shands HealthCare.
