St Mary's Hospital

Description

About St Marys
St Marys Hospital is an acute care facility with 127 Certificate of Need CON approved beds located in Streator Illinois approximately 90 miles southwest of Chicago St Marys Hospital is sponsored by the Hospital Sisters of St Francis and is one of 13 affiliates of Hospital Sisters Health System HSHS a multiinstitutional healthcare system that owns and operates eight hospitals in Illinois and five in Wisconsin To learn more about HSHS click here

St Marys Hospital is a regional provider for a sevencounty area in Central Illinois and one of the largest employers in LaSalle County

The hospital offers a comprehensive range of healthcare services including 24hour emergency services cancer treatment cardiac rehabilitation cardiovascular services diagnostic imaging general surgery home health obstetrics and gynecology pediatrics physical and occupational therapies same day surgery skilled nursing facility speech and hearing facility supportive care and ongoing community and patient education

History

St Marys Hospital has a rich history of commitment to the community it serves and a long list of quotfirstsquot in offering the most advanced procedures and technology to its patients

In 1886 Col Ralph Plumb and Father Henry OKelly who died in 1923 after serving as pastor of St Marys Parish for 40 years approached the Hospital Sisters of the Third Order of St Francis The following year Father OKelly submitted his plan of a Streator Hospital to the authorities in Springfield The field was declared favorable and Sisters Crispina Topp Bonaventura Speckhart and Methodia Overmann were dispatched to help realize the undertaking This was July 26 1887

They opened a temporary hospital after renting and later purchasing the AR Van Skiver residence on the northwest corner of Bloomington and Sixth Streets This was a twostory dwelling and mining accidents were frequentthus the need to expand was necessary

The present site for the hospital was selected and the first lot was purchased from Fawcett Plumb nephew of Colonel Ralph Plumb and a prominent real estate dealer in Streator for the sum of 4750 The cornerstone was laid and work began It was designed after the original St Johns Hospital of Springfield and let to the firm of A Laughlin and Sons on Oct 22 1887 at the cost of 75000

On October 7 1888 the doors of the new threestory building were opened The hospital had 12 private rooms and two wards accommodating 25 patients According to hospital records 34 patients were cared for during the first year but a great deal of nursing was done by the Sisters in the homes of community members

On June 24 1904 the hospital opened a large addition to the east of the first building It contained a modern operating room dressing room and 25 patient rooms

1904 The first xray equipment was installed

In 1914 another addition was added to the south of the old buildings It contained an xray department laboratory laundry modernized surgical suite chapel 28 patient rooms and pharmacy

In 1925 a fireresistant south wing was completed and brought the bed capacity to 120

1929 The physicians requested the addition of a dietician to the staff

In 1937 St Marys Hospital celebrated its 50th anniversary with an Open House and a Baby Homecoming More than 150 people born at St Marys attended

On that occasion Bishop Schlarmann Leader of the Diocese of Peoria remarked to the Sisters quotFifty years ago when Bishop Spalding dedicated this house and your chapel he said in the name of the Church This day is salvation come to this house Fifty years ago Christ said as He once said to Zaccheus I must remain in your house You accepted the honor and during the 50 years Christ has been the honored guest and the principal patient in your hospital You treated Him well in the sick who came to your doors And today after 50 years sojourn with you He repeats I must remain in your housequot

1945 The Hospital purchased a superficial therapy unit for treatment of skin disease and cancer located close to the body surface The device was similar to an xray machine that uses xrays to kill cancerous cells

1952 The superficial therapy unit was upgraded to treat deepseated tumors with a higher energy of xray within the body

1963 With the dedication of the new hospital St Marys was one of the few hospitals in Illinois that offered a cobalt unit for radiation treatment of cancer The unit was considered an essential feature of a modern hospital and reflected the hospitals philosophy of bringing the best of new advances in healthcare to the Streator community

The machine emits gamma rays a type of high energy radiation that can penetrate far into the body striking deeplying tumors while sparing the skin and adjacent tissue The radiation can be concentrated on a small area by a builtin collimator of lead bars

1966 The Hospital was the first in the area to install a cardiac monitor in order to observe a patients heart rhythm

1967 St Marys was the first area hospital to have an Intensive Care Unit ICU for close observation of critical and potentially critical patients

1970 St Marys took the lead among the area hospitals in education A cardiac care course was required of all nurses working in the ICU The class evolved into a semester course taught by one of St Marys ICU nurses in conjunction with Illinois Valley Community College and offered to area nurses

1972 St Marys provided 24hour Emergency Room services before other area hospitals offered the service

1973 St Marys was the first hospital in the area to install a telemetry system on the cardiac monitoring system This enabled the nurses and physicians to monitor patients on either the 4th or 5th floor of the hospital from the ICU

1973 The Hospital was the first to open a Step Down Unit Constant Care among other area hospitals This Unit was for intermediate care between the ICU and the General Patient Units

1975 St Marys now welcomed a Vascular and noncardiac Thoracic Surgeon He performed a permanent pacemaker surgerythe first when compared to the area hospitals He also performed thoracic surgeries lung esophagus and vascular surgeries aneurisms bypass that yearall firsts for the area

1979 Home Health was formed reviving a tradition started by the original three Sisters The service took the nursing care from the hospital into the patients home

1979 The first CAT Scan CT prototype was introduced to the world in 1974 and St Marys purchased one soon after Prior to that the closest hospital with a CT Scanner was located nearly 50 miles from Streator

1982 St Marys was the first area hospital to have an organtissue procurement program This was in conjunction with the national program

1984 St Marys opened a Cardiac Rehab program before the surrounding hospitals began a similar program This was an outpatient supervised exercise program for patients recovering from a cardiac episode

1988 The Hospital purchased a 4million electron volt linear accelerator Patients would not have to travel long distances for cancer treatment as this machine was used for deep seated tumors such as brain head and neck lung breast and pelvic tumors

1989 St Marys was the first area hospital to perform a balloon angioplasty to reduce the plaque around an artery

1991 St Marys was the first area hospital to perform eye surgery to replace the volume of the orbit when the eye must be removed The implant used was a spherical hydroxyapatite made of coral

1992 The IDPH approved St Marys to train emergency medical technicians from area fire departments and ambulance services to use semiautomatic defibrillators Prior to this people had to travel nearly 50 miles for training

1992 St Marys again made history with the first videoassisted thoracoscopy in the area The procedure used modern technology for resection of the lung

1994 One of 146 linear accelerators in the state the Cancer Treatment Centers machine is the most powerful unit available with a twobeam option in a 13county area surrounding LaSalle county We now will be able to treat about 99 percent of all cancer cases on an outpatient basis

1999 St Marys is the only hospital in the area to offer lithotripsy as an inhouse procedure rather than in a mobile unit Lithotripsy is the most advanced technology for treatment of kidney stones using highpressure shock waves to fragment kidney stones

2000 In May an operating room at St Marys was home to the areas first Total Ankle Replacement TAR on both ankles of a patient This procedure is done most commonly for posttraumatic arthritis degenerative arthritis osteorheumatoid arthritis or bilateral ankle arthritis At the time it was the second case of bilateral total ankle replacement performed in the state of Illinois

2000 St Marys was the first area hospital to perform Carticel Chrondrocytes Implantation for repair of damaged knee cartilage The procedure uses the patients own cultured cartilage

2001 A Laparoscopic Nephrectomy kidney removal was first performed at St Marys Hospital in August 2001 This marked the first time the procedure was performed at any of the Illinois Valley hospitals

At the time the urologist was one of the top three physicians in Northern Illinoisincluding Chicagoto have performed this number of laparoscopic nephrectomies

The procedure is the removal of a diseased kidney and is accomplished by making several small incisions in the abdomen This process is much simpler than the traditional method of at least a 12inch incision

This advanced method offer a shorter recuperation period less pain and minimal blood loss

2002 In January St Marys was recognized as the first hospital in the area to perform Khyphoplastya procedure that relieves back pain in candidates suffering from spinal injury as a result of osteoporosis

This minimally invasive surgical treatment offers candidates pain relief and a faster recovery time

With this new method of treatment an instrument called a tamp or balloon is inserted through a small incision in the skin and vertebra The balloon is then inflated to raise the collapsed portion of the bone creating a void in the spine The tamp is then deflated and removed leaving a defined cavity The cavity is then filled with a special bone cement to fix the fracture and prevent further collapse of the vertebra

2005 St Marys was the first hospital in the area to perform a Coblationassisted tonsillectomy The new procedure removes tonsils by disintegrating tissue at a low temperature resulting in less postop pain and quicker recovery time for patients