THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, January 7, 1996 TAG: 9601050227
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Random Rambles
SOURCE: Tony Stein
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
Fellow citizens, we've got a problem. It arises from the fact that Chesapeake General Hospital is about to become 20 years old, which entitles it to a rousing municipal chorus of ``Happy Birthday To You.''
OK, the first two lines of the song are generic. No sweat. But then comes ``Happy birthday, dear...'' And there is no way ``Dear Chesapeake General Hospital'' fits the music. By golly, it's almost as baffling as whether to hang the toilet paper with the end in front or in back.
Fortunately, the hospital remains more concerned with maladies than melodies. It's been that way since Jan. 26, 1976, when Chesapeake General opened. Before that, Chesapeake's medical system wasn't too far above Band-Aids in the boondocks. There were 12 doctors in the whole city, says Don Buckley, the hospital's first and only administrator. If you needed hospital care, you went to Norfolk or to Portsmouth.
And now let's hear it, folks, for our city's six-story hospital with 260 beds, more than 1,700 employees, 440 doctors on the medical staff and an annual budget of more than $175 million.
Buckley has been mother-henning Chesapeake General since late 1971. That's when he signed on as a consultant to the Hospital Authority. He had been an assistant administrator at Norfolk General Hospital in the late 1960s and was teaching hospital administration at the University of North Carolina when Chesapeake tapped him.
In 1971, the hospital was only a notion pushed by a few determined people. A concept, not a building. So the hospital planners met wherever they could beg or borrow space. Like the bank in Great Bridge.
``They had to have an employee in the bank with us, and our meetings sometimes ran from 7 p.m. to 1 a.m.,'' Buckley says. ``Finally, they told us we couldn't meet there any more because the employee was up too late.''
There was also the period when Buckley had an office in a building on Mount Pleasant Road. ``It was so small,'' Buckley says, ``that my secretary had to put her typing table right in front of the door. If we wanted to open the door, she had to move her table.''
Then there were the days when the only visible evidence of Chesapeake General Hospital was a trailer parked in the woods where the hospital's main entrance is now. ``We started out getting electric power from a generator that had to be refueled every four hours,'' Buckley says. ``I would have to load up Army surplus gas cans to keep it going.
``Our phone line ran across the turn-in for a vegetable stand. In vegetable season, cars would fray the line and we'd get a lot of static on the phone. And because the trailer wasn't heated at night, I had to pour antifreeze in the toilet to keep it from icing over.''
The first patient in the door 20 years ago was Cleo Campbell getting treatment for persistent allergies. Campbell, who lives on Centerville Turnpike, not only launched the hospital; she's still a member of the crew. She works as a volunteer in the hospice program.
Mindy Hughes, public relations lady for the hospital, notes that the anniversary week is also employee appreciation week. Part of that appreciation will be a luncheon for 22 ``charter'' employees who have worked at the hospital from Day 1. But there'll be no massive 20-year wing-ding. No two-for-one surgery specials and no caviar for dinner. ``We're a busy hospital,'' Hughes says. ``Even while we're looking back, we're looking to the future.''
As for Buckley, the guy at the helm, he reflects on 20 years of enormous change in the hospital industry. As in technology, where, for instance, MRIs and CAT scans supplement the X-rays of 20 years ago. And in patient stays that have dropped from an average of 10 days to less than five. And in the way those stays are usually paid for - by insurance companies instead of individuals.
And in the tremendous increase in the knowledge patients now bring to their care. But Buckley is also concerned that increased knowledge has brought an increased demand for perfection instead of realism.
``Fixing the human body isn't like fixing a car,'' he says.
He notes some happy constants, though. ``They are the support of the community and the Hospital Authority and the city's proud feeling of ownership of this hospital.''
So happy upcoming anniversary, Chesapeake General. But I already gave you a hearty salute a few years back when you installed hospital gowns that actually cover patients' butts when they bend. That's what I call real progress. by CNB