GAYLORD, MI -- As Otsego County has continued to grow, a hospital has grown right with it.
Below is information sent out by hospital staff about the 60 year anniversary of the hospital being in Gaylord.
Otsego Memorial Hospital (OMH) is celebrating 60 years of service in 2011. Founded in 1951, the hospital has undergone numerous renovations and additions in order to maintain its ability to serve the public, and has also received several accolades for the organization’s hard work and dedication.
In 60 years, Otsego Memorial Hospital has grown from a county hospital, to a small health system comprised of the main hospital, the OMH Medical Group, Oncolgy & Infusion Therapy Center, N’Orthopedics, MedCare Walk-In Clinic, and the Montomorency Medical Clinic which serves patients located in and around Lewiston. OMH also operates the Specialty Center located in Gaylord that houses offices for providers making regular visits to the Gaylord area, and works in cooperation with several other healthcare organizations to provide dialysis services through Dialysis Services of Gaylord.
Over the past few years, both the Hospital and the Medical Group have received awards for their hard work and dedication to innovations in healthcare. Most recently in 2010, OMH was named to Hospital & Health Networks “Most Wired” list for their continuous implementation of the latest in healthcare information technology, and had been named the previous two years to the, “Most Wired – Small & Rural” list, and was identified as a best practice organization according to Professional Research Consultants’ (PRC) 2010 National Patient Benchmarking Database for Patient Satisfaction.
“OMH is dedicated to providing the best patient care possible by increasing quality and patient safety through the use of technology,” said Tim Hella, Chief Information Officer at OMH. “With ongoing upgrades and enhancements to our leading-edge technology, we have made high quality advances in not only our clinical areas, but our financial and administrative areas as well.”
On April 1, 2010 OMH launched its newly renovated website, myomh.org, designed with the patient’s needs in mind. Most recently, the OMH Medical Group developed an online patient portal, designed to provide OMH Medical Group patients with easy access to appointment and prescription refill requests.
Otsego Memorial Hospital continues to work hard to bring the latest and greatest to the communities within its service area. Renovations have taken place over the past decade to meet the demands of the patient population, including a complete reconfiguration of the obstetrics department, renamed the Birthing Center in 2001 to reflect a family-centered approach to childbirth, and in 2002, the Professional Medical Building was constructed to provide office space for multiple physician specialties. Between 2005 and 2006 the Hospital underwent more renovations to provide more space for its growing outpatient services population.
Most recently, in 2010, the OMH Radiology Department underwent a technology upgrade, and now provides digital mammography services and a 64-slice CT scanner with low-dose radiology technology.
“The digital images that we have now with the equipment at OMH are the best images in northern Michgian,” said Ryan Hoenicke, MD, a diagnostic radiologist with Northern Imaging Associates. “These images are cutting edge, top of the line, and I’m really happy to be reading them and excited to be moving forward with the technology.”
Otsego Memorial Hospital has recently begun hosting provider presentations on a variety of topics that are free and open to the public as part of their ongoing Community Benefit program. Presentations, as well as, the hundreds of hours staff spend with high school and college level students interested in the field of medicine, are all part of OMH’s bigger vision; to be the champion for better health at all levels.
“Providing services outside of direct patient care is critical when trying to build healthy communities,” said Christie Perdue, Director of Marketing at Otsego Memorial Hospital. “We hope to provide the education, support, and training that the community needs in order to be proactive in their healthcare needs.”
Otsego Memorial Hospital would like to thank the community for their continued support and patronage of their services, and looks forward to being the champion for better health for many years to come.
For more information about OMH and all of the services offered, please visit them online at MyOMH.org, or call (989) 731-OMH1. Tours of the Hospital may be arranged by calling the Marketing Department at (989) 731-2342
