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Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center A Brief History

Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center   Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center, located in downtown Knoxville, traces its beginnings to May 29, 1919, when a charter was received for a new hospital to be built on the site of the Civil War Battle of Fort Sanders. As construction proceeded on Fort Sanders Hospital later that year, cannon balls and Indian relics were found on the building site. That same year, an affiliated school of nursing accepted its first students. Fort Sanders School of Nursing is still in operation, with about 80 students enrolled in the Fall 2003 semester. In 1954 the hospital's management was assumed by Knoxville Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church U.S., and the name was changed to Fort Sanders Presbyterian Hospital. The relationship remained until 1979 when an organizational restructuring changed the name of the institution to Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center which included the hospital, several clinical specialty programs, the School of Nursing and the Patricia Neal Rehabilitation Center (opened in 1978 and named in honor of actress Patricia Neal, a Knoxville native and survivor of three massive strokes). During its "growing years," Fort Sanders hospital became a comprehensive facility that offered the community some important "firsts" - in the 1920s, the first ambulance service in the area, and in the 1940s, the first private hospital to have the new "wonder drug" penicillin available. In the 1970s, Fort Sanders began the first hospice in Tennessee and obtained the first linear accelerator in the area for cancer treatment. In the 1980's and 90's Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center began to respond to changes in the healthcare environment by affiliating with other organizations to develop a coordinated system of care. It entered a lease agreement to operate Sevier County Medical Center and its affiliated nursing home in 1981. In 1984 hospital officials restructured the organization to create a parent company named Fort Sanders Alliance. In 1985 Fort Sanders Alliance created Preferred Health Partnership, a managed care organization that has become PHP Companies, Inc., the largest locally owned managed care organization in the area. Through PHP, Fort Sanders created other managed care organizations, including Tennessee Behavioral Health, a statewide behavioral health network, and Tennessee Health Partnership, a managed care organization operated jointly with UT Medical Center. In 1986, employees and the community mounted a fund raising drive for the construction of the Thompson Cancer Survival Center, an outpatient cancer treatment center. In 1987, Fort Sanders West, an outpatient medical mall including physician's offices, retail stores, a fitness center and child care facility, was begun. Loudon County Hospital Joined the system in 1989 as Fort Sanders Loudon Medical Center, and in 1990 Fort Sanders acquired HCA Parkwest Medical Center, which changed from a for-profit organization to a not-for-profit affiliate, Parkwest Medical Center. In 1992 the health system began an affiliation process with Peninsula, a division of Parkwest Medical Center in the area of behavioral services, later assuming full ownership. A freestanding maternity center became part of the system in 1993, and Overlook Center, Inc., an outpatient behavioral services organization, affiliated in 1994. Also in 1994, Fort Sanders began the Community Health Improvement Initiative, a program in which community councils of interested citizen form partnerships and share resources to address local health care issues. Fort Sanders provides the staff and resources to facilitate communities coming together to deal with issues such as substance abuse, neighborhood violence, teen pregnancy, and access to care. In 1996, Fort Sanders Health System and MMC HealthCare System (headquartered in Oak Ridge) consolidated and formed a new organization, Covenant Health, with an emphasis on building healthy communities and delivering quality health care to the people of East Tennessee. In January 1998 American Transition Hospital-East Tennessee, a new long-term acute care hospital located at FSRMC, leased space to care for patients with complex medical problems who require intensive care. (36-beds) Today, Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center a 541 bed hospital (445 Acute care beds, 72 Rehab, 24 Skilled Nursing Care) is a regional referral center for neurosurgery, neurological disorders, orthopedics, oncology, cardiology, obstetrics and rehabilitation medicine. The hospital offers a variety of specialized services such as a 24-hour Chest Pain Center, one-day surgery, electrodiagnostics, a Sleep Disorders Center, a Diabetes Center, prenatal education, and sports medicine. Through shared leadership and resources Fort Sanders Regional and Parkwest Medical Centers work to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of acute care services in Knox County.

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