St. Elizabeth Health Center kicks off yearlong centennial

Photo by: Robert K. Yosay

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Robert Shroder, Humility of Mary Health Partners president and chief executive officer, reads the proclamation of the purpose of St. Elizabeth Health Center during ceremonies Wednesday kicking off the hospital’s yearlong centennial celebration. The celebration will culminate on Dec. 8, 2011, the date in 1911 when the Sisters of the Humility of Mary started the medical facility.

Photo by: Robert K. Yosay

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Pieces of ribbon, scissors and a program are mementos of the kickoff of the centennial. Other activities are planned throughout the next 12 months.

By WILLIAM K. ALCORN

alcorn@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

The handful of Sisters of the Humility of Mary at Villa Maria, Pa., who started St. Elizabeth Hospital nearly a century ago would no doubt be stunned today at what they have wrought.

The dream of a Catholic hospital in Youngstown started July 19, 1909, when a group of prominent laymen and clergy from the city’s parishes met to pursue the idea.

Two years later, on Dec. 8, 1911, St. Elizabeth Hospital opened in frame buildings on the Fitch property atop a hill at the corner of Belmont Avenue and Burke Street.

Today, a hugely expanded St. Elizabeth Health Center still exists on Belmont where St. Elizabeth leaders, staff and alumni Wednesday kicked off a one-year celebration of those humble beginnings and what the hospital has become nearly a century later.

Today, as a member of Humility of Mary Health Partners, St. Elizabeth, which Robert Shroder, HMHP president and chief executive officer, calls the hub or “battleship” of HMHP, has opened the St. Elizabeth Boardman Campus and numerous auxiliary facilities in the Mahoning Valley; is affiliated with Akron Children’s Hospital of the Mahoning Valley; and has a sister hospital in Warren, St. Joseph Health Center.

The hospitals and other HMHP facilities in the Mahoning Valley — started and operated by a few religious women — have grown to 5,300 employees who serve many thousands of patients each year, Shroder said.

The key to St. Elizabeth’s longevity is keeping on target with its original mission of “extending the healing ministry of Jesus” and striving to improve the health of the community with special attention to the poor and underserved, said Sister Marie Ruegg, senior vice president of mission integration for HMHP.

“The staff have good hearts, and I’m proud of them,” she said.

One of the longtime staff members is Rosalie DelMonte, who first sought a job at St. Elizabeth at 15.

“I entered the south part of the building, and a nun asked me what I was doing there. I said I wanted a job. She asked my age and I said 15. She said come back when you are 16,” DelMonte said.

When she came back a year older, DelMonte went to the director of nutrition services who asked her why she wanted a job and what experience she had.

“I said I needed the money, and I was a baby sitter. She said, ‘You’re hired,’” said DelMonte of Poland Township.

The 1957 graduate of Youngstown South High School, who started as a tray girl in the kitchen and has been with St. Elizabeth in various capacities ever since, is now environmental department secretary.

“It’s bigger now, and you don’t know everybody like you used to, but the caring attitude of the employees about the patients and each other is the same,” DelMonte said.

The watchwords for St. Elizabeth and HMHP health ministry is service to the community, said Donald E. Koenig Jr., executive vice president.

The hospital changes to meet the needs of the community, but does not stray from the original mission of the Sisters of Humility of Mary, he said. “We stand on the shoulders of giants,” he added.

It’s an honor to carry on their name and commitment to the people of the Mahoning Valley so the residents will be able to gather in another 100 years and celebrate St. Elizabeth’s bicentennial, Koenig said.

“It’s kind of nice to see an organization whose purpose has been exactly the same for a century,” Shroder said.

“The more we provide for the poor, the more successful we are. It doesn’t make any business sense, but it works. I truly believe there is divine intervention,” he said.

St. Elizabeth Hospital opened under management of the Sisters of the Humility of Mary “blue nuns,” as opposed to the “grey nuns” of the Sisters of Charity from Cleveland on Dec. 8, 1913 . Other significant dates and events in the history of St. Elizabeth Health Center, which the group behind formation of the hospital had planned to call Good Samaritan, include:

Dec. 8, 1914: First class from St. Elizabeth School of Nursing graduated.

Jan. 14, 1915: St. Elizabeth’s permanent structure, now the North Building, opened with 200 beds.

1924: Sisters of the Humility of Mary assumed ownership of Riverside Hospital in Warren and renamed it St. Joseph Riverside Hospital.

1927: Sisters of the Humility of Mary assumed ownership of St. Joseph Hospital in Lorain.

Feb. 3, 1929: Opened second addition to St. Elizabeth, now the South Building, bringing bed capacity to 309 beds and 50 bassinets.

June 30, 1956: Dedicated West Building, bringing St. Elizabeth to 500 beds and 63 bassinets.

September, 1961: Opened Cardiovascular Department.

October 1966: Announced plans to establish an intensive coronary-care unit.

May 4, 1970: For the first time, laymen are elected to the St. Elizabeth Board of Trustees. Charles Cushwa Jr. is chairman.

March, 1972: Opened West Extension Building, which included a 32-bed intensive care unit and 63 bassinets, bringing the hospital’s total bed count to 747.

Sept. 26, 1976: Opened South Extension Building, which included a neonatology unit for premature newborns and a neurology unit. Changed the name of the hospital to St. Elizabeth Hospital Medical Center.

1984: Joined all health-care facilities sponsored by the Sisters of the Humility of Mary under the Humility of Mary Health Care System.

1986: St. Elizabeth is verified as a Level I trauma center by the American College of Surgeons.

November 1987: New neonatal facility opened.

1995: HM Health Services, an integrated delivery network, was formed under the leadership of the Humility of Mary Health Care System. It joined St. Elizabeth, St. Joseph and home-care services into one organization. St. Elizabeth and St. Joseph changed names to St. Elizabeth Health Center and St. Joseph Health Center.

1996: HM Health Services assumed ownership of Warren General Hospital and moved St. Joseph Health Center in Warren to the Warren General Hospital campus on Eastland Avenue Northeast.

July 1996: St. Elizabeth School of Nursing closed. Humility of Mary Health Care System became a region of Mercy Health System in Cincinnati, which was later renamed Catholic Health Partners.

1999: The Youngstown/Warren region is renamed Humility of Mary Health Partners.

2000: A Boardman campus is announced. The first building to open was St. Elizabeth Cancer Care Center.

2001: A 24-hour full service emergency center opened on the Boardman campus.

September 2003: St. Elizabeth Wellness Center opened in partnership with the D.D. and Velma Davis Family YMCA in Boardman.

August 2007: St. Elizabeth Boardman Health Center opened with 108 beds.

Oct. 28, 2007: Conducted ceremonial ground breaking for the Joanie Abdu Comprehensive Breast Care Center at St. Elizabeth.

Source: St. Elizabeth Health Center