A Year of Firsts

Richard Aubut

South Shore Hospital advanced its charitable mission of healing, caring, and comforting by achieving a number of firsts for our community in 2005. These milestones included:

  • Becoming the first and only hospital in our region to offer
    24-hour access to life-saving emergency coronary angioplasty to treat heart attacks. Prior to November
    2005, we had successfully offered emergency angioplasty
    at least eight hours a day, five days a week. The 24-hour availability
    of our service now makes it possible for us to save more than twice as many lives.
  • Becoming one of the first Massachusetts hospitals to receive state Department of Public Health (DPH) designation as a provider of primary stroke service. DPH introduced primary stroke service licensure regulations to assure definitive care to patients experiencing acute
    stroke symptoms. Emergency medical service providers now bring patients to DPH-designated primary stroke service hospitals like ours because we are better equipped to safely evaluate and treat those experiencing stroke.
  • Acquiring the region’s first 64-slice CT scanner — the fastest, most sophisticated computed tomography scanner available. Our lightning-fast 64-slice CT scanner can produce a 3-D image of the human heart and
    all of its surrounding arteries in the time it takes a patient to draw and hold a single breath. The technology will be invaluable to our medical professionals when we open our $13.5 million Cardiovascular Center
    in Fall 2006.
  • Entering into a clinical affiliation agreement with Brigham and Women’s Hospital, the first relationship of its kind in our region. Our two organizations are now collaborating on specialized surgical, cardiovascular, cancer, primary care, and women’s health services to meet our community’s most pressing health needs.
  • Remaining our region’s first choice for care. We treated patients who made 75,629 visits to our emergency room, making us the second busiest emergency department in Eastern Massachusetts. A total of 3,834 babies were born in our hospital, making us the region’s most popular maternity program. We performed 15,378 surgeries and provided care to 27,806 patients requiring hospitalization.

Outpatient and home health visits exceeded 275,000. Our patient care quality and safety also earned public recognition this year. Highlights included:

  • Designation as one of the nation’s 100 Top Hospitals by Solucient, a national health care information company. Only five hospitals in Massachusetts were named a "100 Top Hospital" in 2005.
  • Winning the 2005 Leadership Award for Clinical Excellence by
    VHA, Inc., a Texas-based national health care provider alliance. The award recognizes our exemplary performance in preventing surgical infections. South Shore Hospital is one of only 92 hospitals in the United States to achieve this milestone.
  • Earning re-accreditation by the American College of Surgeons’ Commission on Cancer, signifying that South Shore Hospital meets national standards established to assure that our cancer patients receive top-notch care at the local level. Only 25 percent of US hospitals earn Commission on Cancer approval.

Community support of our charitable mission resulted in a record-breaking $4,039,000 in cash donations — the largest amount that South Shore Hospital has ever received in a single year. Our many generous supporters are recognized in this report. I thank and commend the Board of Trustees of South Shore Health and Educational Foundation, who worked tirelessly throughout the year to generate support for our mission. More than ever, we depend on charitable support. Donations bridge the ever-widening gap between the care our patients need — and what we are paid to provide the level of service our community deserves.

Outstanding leadership is at the heart of our success. Our community is well-served by the wisdom and dedication of our volunteer Board of Directors, led by John C. Doody, Board chairman.

I also thank and recognize several other volunteer leaders: Dr. Edward Nalband, whose two-year term as medical staff president concluded this year; Elena Kirkiles, who concluded a three-year term as chairman of our Foundation Board of Trustees; and Lois Bisson, who served a two-year term as president of The Friends of South Shore Hospital. Their generous gifts of time and talent have immeasurably benefited our organization and those we serve.

Perhaps the most important step we took this year was to engage our team of 3,500 employees, 730 doctors, and 500 volunteers in the pursuit of a Culture of Excellence. Our goal is to consistently demonstrate that There is a Difference at South Shore Hospital by offering you an unmatched level of care and service.

Richard H. Aubut
President and Chief Executive Officer
South Shore Hospital and
South Shore Health and Educational Corporation