VALDOSTA — When Ameris Healthcare of Nashville, Tenn., bought Smith Hospital in Hahira in 1997, no one then could anticipate what would transpire. Literally, the hospital has been moved to Valdosta and now serves thousands of people in the region since opening in a brand new facility at 4280 North Valdosta Road.

But as the hospital celebrates its fifth anniversary in the new location and its 65th anniversary as a healthcare institution, long-time employees who have worked for what is now called Smith Northview Hospital will tell you that it’s the family atmosphere that keeps them from moving to other hospitals.

“You feel at home,” said Sarah Register, chief nursing officer who has worked for the hospital for 32 years. “There’s something about being a smaller hospital. People know you. There’s more trust.”

The move to Valdosta came after Ameris Healthcare purchased the hospital and hired Robert Bauer as CEO. Bauer started the drive to relocate the hospital to north Valdosta.

The new facility opened in June 2002 on North Valdosta Road with 29 in-patient beds that were full by the end of the 24 hours of business, said Chuck Roberts, assistant administrator of support services and director of business development and community relations.

The hospital today has 31 licensed in-patient beds, 24 out-patient beds, an intensive care/critical care unit (ICU/CCU), an emergency room, a cafeteria, labs, six operating suites and not enough parking for the amount of people drawn to the facility for work or health care each day. The hospital employs more than 325 full-time workers and about 80 part-time workers, Roberts said.

“We have 2,600 to 2,700 annual admissions for in-patient care, and we see 10,000 patients per year in the emergency department,” said Larry R. Jeter, chief executive officer. “We perform 4,200 surgeries here per year. We do a lot of diagnostic imaging and lab procedures.”

Jeter moved to the hospital as CEO in March 2006.

“This hospital is experiencing rapid growth, and we are doing everything possible to meet the growing demands for healthcare in this area,” Jeter said. “I’m very happy to be a part of this organization. We’re working on a strategic plan to address the growth of services here.”

Jeter helped launch an employee orientation program to teach customer service strategies in October 2006. Now every new employee goes through the training.



Smith’s beginnings

And that’s a tradition that began in 1942 when Dr. E.J. Smith purchased two houses and converted them into Smith Hospital on Main Street in Hahira. Dr. Raymond Smith, E.J. Smith’s son, helped his father and eventually took over the operation. And E.J. Smith’s grandson — Joe Glen Smith — was administrator and owner at another stage, according to Ronnie Lastinger, chief technologist of radiology and one of Smith’s longest employees. He started at Smith 43 years ago.

The Hahira hospital grew to a 71-bed facility by the 1980s, Roberts said.

Lastinger is amazed at how much progress has occurred, technology wise, at the hospital, which has been passed through many corporate owners who included the popular Dr. Russell Acree.

“When I got into radiology, there was no ultrasound, no MRI, no CT Scan. All we had were X-rays,” he said. “Now it’s growing so fast you can hardly keep up with it. We don’t even use film anymore. It’s all sent by computer.”

Chief Nursing Officer Sarah Register started at the Hahira hospital in 1975, but may have inadvertently contributed to the inspiration that caused E.J. Smith to start a hospital in Hahira.

“Dr. E.J. Smith delivered me … I was born at home out in the country at my parents’ house in 1942,” Register said.

So how did an in-home birth delivery lead to creation of a hospital in Hahira?

“The legend is that in those days, in the 1930s and 1940s, there was no hospital. Doctors traveled to your home to treat you,” Roberts explained. “Having a baby at home was not at all unusual. But as the population grew, the physicians could see that they couldn’t meet all the needs just traveling to homes. They began to see the need for a hospital.”

Ora Wright, director of Environmental Services at Smith Northview, is glad that E.J. Smith had the foresight to start the hospital. Wright started at the hospital 36 years ago, was promoted to her current position in 1988, and still lives in Hahira.

“I came here right out of Lowndes High School. This was my first job,” Wright said. “We are just like a family. I’ve seen people come and people go, but I just enjoy working for Smith.”

Register may have been delivered into the world outside of Smith hospital, but she’s seen thousands of babies born into the world at the former and present facility. “We delivered 600 babies in 2006, which doubled over the 300 babies we delivered in 2004.”



Getting accredited

Today Smith Northview is a nationally accredited healthcare facility, having first passed its Joint Commission survey in December 2003 and its second survey in October 2006.

Juanita Skerratt, medical staff performance improvement coordinator at Smith, coordinates the achievement of improvement requirements with the Joint Commission, which is a non-profit organization based in Chicago, Ill. The commission sends in teams unannounced to observe and interview employees directly.

“The surveyors’ focus, in years past, was to talk to managers and administrators, but now the method is to talk directly to employees,” Skerratt said. “Hopefully, your staff is well prepared.”

The last survey team showed up, unannounced, on Oct. 30 and 31.

“We were very pleased. We were accredited. But like everyone else, we were given requirements for improvements,” Skerratt said.

The hospital’s new lab facilities were surveyed in March 2006 and again given accredited status. The accreditation also earns the hospital “deemed” accreditation with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. CMS has offices in Atlanta.

The accreditations are good for three years but a survey team still could appear at any time, so Skerratt perpetually helps administrators and managers focus on improvements.

“The focus is all on patient safety at all stages,” she said. “Starting in 2008, a life safety engineer will show up with the survey team to look at the safety of the building. We’re trying to do the best we can do. We’re a for-profit hospital so we don’t get much indigenous care funds from the government. Next year I don’t think we’ll get any at all.”



Scouting for talent

More Valdostans and regional residents are choosing Smith Northview for healthcare, not as any result of displeasure with the ever expanding South Georgia Medical Center, but maybe just as a result of providing a choice and providing a smaller, family-friendly environment, spokesman Roberts said.

Roberts is pretty much Smith Northview’s talent scout and has had great success finding and recruiting high quality physicians, medical staff and technicians for the hospital.

“I recruit doctors. I have one coming from New York, and another coming from California,” Roberts said. “They both had the same reaction when seeing the hospital for the first time. They couldn’t believe a small South Georgia hospital had so much to offer.”

Roberts recruited Kevin White, a radiology specialist that he found demonstrating a system used at Smith Northview at an event in Macon in 2004. Today, White is director of radiology and Picture Archive Communications System administrator at Smith Northview.

“What I love about this hospital is that they desire to keep pace and to possess cutting edge technology in the field of radiology in regards to equipment and radiology imaging,” White said.



Time to celebrate

The hospital is inviting the public to join in celebrating the anniversaries at a “Picnic On The Lawn” scheduled for 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday, June 29.