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Description

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ABOUT US
Union Hospital exists to serve our patients with compassionate healthcare of the highest quality

Union Hospital Union Hospital Clinton and our network of primary care physicians join together to provide comprehensive care to residents of west central Indiana and eastern Illinois Our facilities include two hospitals and 14 primary care physicians

As a notforprofit health care system we are committed to providing advanced quality health care to our communities Since our beginnings in 1892 we have continued to improve and expand our services facilities and the skills of our employees to provide care to all residents of the Wabash Valley regardless of their ability to pay

Mission
The mission of the Union Hospital Foundation is to support advances in medical care that benefit the patients served by Union Hospital and initiatives that promote the health and wellness for those residents who live in the Wabash Valley

The Foundation fulfills this mission by raising charitable gifts and grants providing effective stewardship for gifts received and by awarding grants to Union Hospital and to select other organizations through which improvements in medical care and community health are realized The Union Hospital Foundation receives charitable support from individuals corporations foundations and organizations who share the Foundations vision for a healthy vital community

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History

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Doctors Benjamin F Swafford and Leo J Weinstein opened the Terre Haute Sanitarium on 11 August 1892 Swafford was one of the oldest and most respected physicians then practicing in the area a man who interestingly never subscribed to the germ theory A North Carolina native born in 1833 he had graduated from the Rush Medical College of Chicago and had served as a doctor in the Union army during the Civil War He continued to practice medicine until his death in 1901 Weinstein had been born in Ohio in 1848 and had practiced several trades before deciding upon the medical profession After attending Miami University of Ohio he settled in Terre Haute He served on the board of health and was elected to both the city and county councils He practiced privately before 1892 and made extra money as the examiner for the New England Life Insurance Company

Weinstein dreamed up the idea of founding a second hospital in Terre Haute The citys only medical facility in 1891 St Anthony Hospital could not take in all the people who needed aid and did not have a maternity ward When Weinstein approached Swafford about the idea Swafford scoffed but after he had to house and care for a pregnant patient a few days later because she had nowhere else to go he became committed to the idea Swafford and Weinstein bought a twostory wooden frame building at the northwest corner of what was then Seventh and Scott Streets A short time later they appointed five other doctors to the twentybed hospital as assistant staff members

In 1895 Weinstein and Swafford donated one half of their holdings in the sanitarium to a group of interested citizens representing several Protestant denominations and the Jewish faith The name of the medical facility was then changed to Union Home for Invalids to signify the collaboration between religious groups for the care of the sick A short time later after a bequest by C W Williams the designation was altered to Williamss Union Hospital It was shortened to its present appellation sometime later

Sister Johanna M Baur a nurse with Bethesda Deaconess Hospital of Cincinnati was hired as the superintendent of the building and constituted the entire nursing staff in 1896 She remained with the hospital until 1903 In 1900 Baur organized the Training School for Nurses a center that remained open until 1965 and graduated more than nine hundred nurses throughout its lifetime In the beginning the nurses were taught by the doctors on staff but eventually the school served as a training ground for nursing students at nearby Indiana State University

In 1902 a new twentyfivebed wing north of the original building was completed at a cost of 20000 Seven years later the original wooden frame edifice was razed and a 40000 threestory brick structure rose in its place The new building included seventyfive beds an operating room and wards for men and women Along with the new section of the hospital a power plant and laundry center was constructed in 1909 The upper two stories of the power plant housed nurses At the time many of the employees were not paid well but they were given housing and sometimes board to make up for the low salary and for the long twelvehour shifts In 1937 most of the nonmedical staff went on strike The strike ended peacefully three days later with higher wages and an eighthour workday in place

During World War I several doctors and nineteen nurses traveled to Europe to help the Allied forces After their return in 1918 the staff of Union Hospital faced a massive influenza outbreak By the winter of 1918 no hospital in Terre Haute had any space left to house the sick The city and county councils were so distressed by the rate of infection and the unavailability of space that they appropriated money to build an influenza hospital on the grounds of Union Hospital The American Red Cross provided equipment to the new onestory wooden frame building which was completed in December 1918 When the emergency subsided after 1919 Union Hospital bought the building from the city and county governments and used it for general patients later refurbishing it into a nurses home

As Terre Haute expanded the hospital grew in size In 1922 a new addition provided the hospital with six floors a basement and a seventhfloor solarium At first only the first two floors and the basement could be completely prepared for patients with the money raised for the project but over the next several years the rest of the hospital was filled raising the number of beds to 188 by the end of 1931 Gifts in 1923 allowed the maternity floor to be completed and in 1924 the surgical ward was finished As the hospital grew materially its administrative structure changed to a more modern format The position of superintendent was eliminated and several divisions were created each with its own director who reported to a central administrator By the end of the 1920s the hospital was admitting more than twice the number of patients than it did in 1900

During World War II many of the doctors and fortyseven of the nurses at the hospital traveled with the armed forces helping to set up military hospitals and mend the wounded After the war the number of patients coming to the hospital increased significantly rising from 4817 in 1940 to 7520 in 1950 By the end of the 1950s the medical staff at the center was treating more than 11000 cases a year As with most of America Terre Haute and the citys second oldest hospital grew with the prosperity brought about by the postWorld War II economic boom

In 1953 renovations and a new wing brought the total number of beds to an even two hundred The new rooms were made to accommodate the latest equipment enabling Union Hospital to open one of the states first intensive care nurseries in 1968 During the early 1950s the hospital benefited from the HillBurton Act of 1951 which gave the medical center 600000 in matching funds and allowed the hospital to erect a 12 million addition that displaced the 1902 and 1909 wings of the complex The new facility contained lobby space offices a beauty shop a coffee shop an operating wing recovery rooms an obstetric department and autopsy rooms Also built in the 1950s were a residence hall for nurses and a laundry center After 1957 with the help of the Ford Foundation a fourth floor was added to the newest building which held the psychiatric ward By the end of the 1950s the hospital had added several new services and had a 250 bed capacity

The heavy growth of the 1940s and 1950s slowed in the 1960s but it did not disappear altogether In 1969 Indiana State University opened the Nursing Clinical Education Building at the hospital once again filling the halls with students Six years later Union Hospital and the Indiana University School of Medicine reached an agreement that sent medical students to the institution making it a teaching hospital for both nurses and doctors In conjunction with the new agreement with Indiana University the Family Practice Center opened to provide residency placement and training for future family physicians

In 1965 Ellen Church the nations first airline stewardess and a captain in the Army Nurse Corps in World War II retired as the hospitals administrator after fourteen years of service Frank Shelton took the post in 1971 and guided the medical center through its longest period of sustained growth Beginning in the early 1970s and stretching into the early 1990s Union Hospital underwent a fourphase building expansion program At the end of the new construction all administrative functions were transferred to the 1922 building and all patient care took place in the new complex The new space and the agreements that allowed it to become a teaching hospital meant that the institution could develop into a center for experimental research and specialized training In 1976 the hospital launched a residency program in family medicine In 1983 the areas only chronic renal dialysis center opened at the hospital as did a child development program and an employee daycare facility

More specialized treatment areas opened on the hospital campus in the years after 1983 In 1989 the Hux Cancer Center the Transitional Care Unit and the Sports Medicine and Outpatient Physical Therapy Center opened Three years later medical care was extended to the east side of Terre Haute through the construction of an offsite professional plaza which housed the Center for Occupational Health and HealthCheck a convenient shortterm medical care facility In order to keep up with the demands of new technology a foundation was set up to cover the rising costs of equipment and research In the 1990s the hospital developed into the largest medical center between Indianapolis and St Louis a regional referral center that served a fifteencounty area in Indiana and Illinois By 1991 Union Hospital was serving 11000 inpatients per year and more than 150000 outpatients Six years later the hospital joined with Clarian Health Partners Incorporated to form a statewide nonprofit health network to compete for managed care contracts