Mercy Top News

Video from the Emergency Department on May 22, 2011

Rendering of the new Mercy Hospital Joplin

 

Supplemental materials

• Media release
• Mercy Hospital Joplin exterior rendering
• Pediatric Patient Room rendering (Hi-res)
• Mercy Joplin Tornado and Recovery Quick Facts
• About the United Arab Emirates
• His Excellency Yousef Al Otaiba bio

The most vulnerable of Joplin, Missouri’s newborns will soon receive sophisticated care in their own community, through the generosity of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Embassy in Washington, D.C. Today, during a ceremony in Joplin, Mercy leaders and UAE Ambassador to the United States Yousef Al Otaiba announced details of a $5 million gift from the UAE Embassy that will fund a pediatric section and the hospital’s first neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). 

The NICU will provide specialized care for ill or premature newborn infants. It will be part of the pediatric section that will occupy an entire floor of the new Mercy Hospital Joplin, and that will be named to reflect the generosity of the UAE gift. The new hospital is currently being built on the city’s south side.  

The announcement of the UAE’s gift came just days before the one-year anniversary of a tornado that killed 161 people and destroyed 8,000 buildings in Joplin, including the Mercy-owned St. John’s Regional Medical Center.

Within days of the tornado, Mercy said it would rebuild in Joplin, pledging to spend nearly $1 billion on temporary and permanent structures, as well as continuing to pay all Mercy employees in Joplin. Mercy’s pledge significantly exceeds proceeds the ministry expects from insurance, creating an opportunity for others to participate in the revitalization of Joplin’s life and economy.

Mercy’s commitment to Joplin drew the interest of Ambassador Al Otaiba and the UAE government, which has a track record of medical philanthropy in the U.S., and has assisted other communities that have suffered the destructive force of natural disasters.

“The ambassador made clear in our conversations that he understands how health care is crucial to a stable and thriving community,” said Lynn Britton, Mercy president and CEO. “This is what true philanthropy is all about.”

Ambassador Al Otaiba told Britton that he not only admired Mercy’s commitment to rebuild, but appreciated the opportunity to ensure that Joplin would benefit from improved health care as part of its revival.

“The resilience of the people of Joplin is an inspiration to the entire world,” said Ambassador Al Otaiba. “Emiratis have watched this community recover and rebuild from the disaster last year, and we are honored to help Mercy deliver an enhanced level of medical care to children. It is our hope that current and future generations of Joplin residents will benefit from the hospital’s new children’s wing and NICU.”

The old St. John’s hospital did not have a NICU, forcing many Joplin families to travel during a particularly stressful time and often lengthy recovery – when caring for infants born prematurely or with life-threatening complications.

Joplin has already experienced the generosity of the UAE Embassy, which donated $1 million to provide laptops for all 2,200 of the city’s high school students. The computers are helping students cope with the disruptions caused by the destruction of their school in the tornado.

“This is the kind of relationship that our Founder Catherine McAuley would be very proud of because it connects people for the greater good,” said Sister Mary Roch Rocklage, Mercy’s health ministry liaison. “In this case, because our Middle East neighbors reached out, our babies will have access to critical care.”
 

About The United Arab Emirates

The UAE is a source of stability, tolerance, innovation and growth in the Arabian Gulf and around the globe. The U.S. and the UAE are reliable allies, with historical and present-day shared security and economic interests. In fact, the UAE is the largest export market for U.S. goods in the Middle East and more U.S. naval vessels visit UAE ports than any other port outside the U.S.

The U.S. and the UAE also enjoy growing social and cultural ties, and many U.S. institutions in education, health care and the arts have formed collaborative partnerships with UAE entities. Since its founding, a main pillar of the UAE’s foreign policy has been focused on addressing global challenges through the use of foreign aid and humanitarian assistance. The UAE has also been a major contributor of emergency relief to regions affected by conflict and natural disasters, including deploying much-needed resources after the earthquakes in Haiti, Pakistan and Japan, and to the U.S. following Hurricane Katrina. For more information visit wwwhttp://www.uae-embassy.org.

About Mercy

Mercy is the eighth largest Catholic health care system in the U.S. and serves more than 3 million people annually. Mercy includes 31 hospitals, more than 200 outpatient facilities, 38,000 co-workers and 1,600 integrated physicians in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma. Mercy also has outreach ministries in Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. For more about Mercy, visit www.mercy.net.

By Mercy's Tina Rockhold

If 40-year-old Shaquille O’Neal, weighing in at 325 pounds and topping out at 7-foot-1-inch, can join in the nation’s hula hoop craze, so too can 38,000 Mercy co-workers across Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma for National Employee Health and Fitness Day, May 16.

“As a culture, it has completely dropped out of our brains that exercise can be fun. We have forgotten how important it is to have recess as adults,” said Dr. Lance Luria, Mercy’s health and wellness vice president and medical director. “We make sure to break out our long to-do lists every day but we forget to exercise and eat healthy. Without balance in our lives, everything gets out of whack and we become very unhealthy – physically, emotionally and spiritually.”

In an effort to bring back balance and have fun, Mercy co-workers will pick up hula hoops and get moving as they are “Hoopin’ to Healthify.” Nurses, doctors, surgeons, administrators and staff across Mercy’s four states will take part in hula-hoop obstacle courses, javelin throws, giant ring tosses and traditional hula hooping contests at the Olympic-like festivities. (Last year, co-workers did 1.3 million jumping jacks across Mercy for national fitness day.)

“The message is simple: get to hoopin’ or moving. Find something you like and make it a part of your routine whether it’s rock climbing, swimming, biking, bowling or running,” said Dr. Luria. “You only have one life to live, so live it to the fullest. Make every day count.”

Healthification, Mercy’s wellness program, is designed to encourage well-balanced, healthy lifestyles through nutrition, physical activity, emotional and spiritual wellness, and smoking cessation.

“As health care providers, we have a responsibility to model healthy lifestyle choices for a nation that is sedentary,” said Dr. Luria. “We must measure up to the same expectations we teach our patients and our communities.” 

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, over the next six years the nation’s rate of obesity will continue to grow at an alarming rate.

“We’re tipping the scales,” said Lynn Britton, president and CEO of Mercy. “Many of the states Mercy serves lead the nation in obesity. Sadly, our country’s youth are following in those footsteps. Through healthification and awareness, Mercy’s goal is to reverse the trend.”

To get everyone hoopin’, Rapper M.C. Spookytooth created a toe-tapping music video with Mercy co-workers hoopin’ to the beat.

According to the American Council on Exercise, although hula hooping is a low-impact workout, it’s possible to burn 200 calories in a 30-minute session. More reasons to pick up a hula hoop include:

• It improves flexibility and balance, which reduces chances of injury in daily activities.
• It’s a lot more fun than sit-ups or side-bends and still tones the midsection.
• Regardless of a person’s level of fitness, it’s a challenging technique with real benefits.

“I haven’t hula hooped since grade school, but I encourage co-workers to join me, pick up a hoop and get moving,” said Britton. “Drop your inhibitions at the door. No hula experience is required – just a willingness to have fun.”

Mercy is the eighth largest Catholic health care system in the U.S. and serves more than 3 million people annually. Mercy includes 31 hospitals, more than 200 outpatient facilities, 38,000 co-workers and 1,600 integrated physicians in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma. Mercy also has outreach ministries in Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. For more about Mercy, visit www.mercy.net.

The startling thing in first seeing the new Mercy Hospital Joplin – the factory built, trucked-in replacement for the building destroyed by last May’s tornado – is how attractive and permanent it looks. Joplin has a new hospital as of mid-April, and this one isn’t tents or trailers.

The new facility will offer patients all the comforts and most services they would expect from a Mercy hospital. With steel construction that is sturdier than the old St. John’s Regional Medical Center, the new Mercy building is a testament to modern technology and overtime workers coming together to build a complete hospital in eight months.

The new facility includes a full-scale emergency department. Surgeons can again conduct complex, open-heart procedures. Mercy doctors can deliver babies again. Patients can rest in rooms with monitoring features, communication capabilities and private bathrooms they’d expect in any hospital. The two-story inpatient wings can accommodate more than 100 patients if demand warrants. A cafeteria, gift shop, pharmacy and chapel complete the picture.

“It’s remarkable that we were able to get this topnotch facility up and running within eight months,” said Lynn Britton, president and CEO of Mercy. “Early in the recovery, we knew the community would need a true hospital while we build for the future. So we challenged the team to do it. We have our Sisters of Mercy to thank who came to Joplin in the late 1800s and showed us what a bias for action, determination and true grit can accomplish.”

Mercy has worked hard to turn this corner. Co-workers and contractors first opened a tent hospital a week after the disaster. They followed months later with a small hospital assembled from components, which look like trailers. The new Mercy Hospital not only houses employees and patients in a handsome and sturdy building, it also unveils some of the improvements coming to a rebuilt Joplin.

The state-of-the-art hospital, for one, has imaging technology that in many cases is newer and more powerful that what was used at St. John’s, such as a new CT scanner that captures images with twice the resolution. “Mercy co-workers are motivated by the progress they see,” said Drew Alexander, director of the emergency department.

The modular construction behind Mercy Hospital has changed dramatically since it began with trailers decades ago. The hospital’s construction began in a California factory, where workers at Walden Structures engineered and assembled large slices of the structure with the same steel, concrete and drywall used in site-built construction. Joplin workers at the same time prepared the property and laid the foundation, with the simultaneous work greatly reducing the build time.

The trick is hauling the huge modules across country. Trucks and a few trains carried the 224 modules, some 60 feet long by 14 feet wide and high, with drivers having to navigate some tight corners on routes that local Mercy planners helped find. Some units arrived more than 80-percent finished, leaving workers to bolt them together and weave across pipes and wires. Exterior and interior finishes transformed the modules into a hospital that’s indistinguishable from one conventionally built.

Tornado disaster or no, state and local codes remain stringent for hospital construction. Walden had to build a prototype and accommodate inspectors as it assembled the components. “We hired about 30 percent more workers and put in a lot of overtime to meet the schedule,” said Charlie Walden, founder and owner of Walden Structures.

“The resulting structure is actually 30 percent stronger than the requirements for Mercy’s old building, and the glass is rated to withstand winds of 200 mph,” said John Farnen, Mercy’s executive director of planning, design and construction. “This building exceeds code requirements.”

The modular technology also enabled construction to squeeze into the site, which is just across the road from the ruined St. John’s. Further south, Farnen is also overseeing construction of the next Mercy Hospital Joplin, whose conventional construction is emerging on a 100-acre campus across I-44. The future building will house 600,000 square feet versus a quarter of that in the new Mercy Hospital opening this month, but hospital co-workers already sense a return to normalcy.

Employees have been scattered across, and even outside, the Joplin area as Mercy held to its pledge to keep all 2,200 co-workers on the payroll. “I hear it all the time from co-workers, how we want to come back home, how we all miss each other,” said Marilyn Welling, director of medical surgical services at Mercy Hospital Joplin. “There is also a lot of pride — it was amazing that we all were willing to step out of our usual roles and keep Mercy going. And now we have a new hospital that will bring us back together.”

Mercy is the eighth largest Catholic health care system in the U.S. and serves more than 3 million people annually. Mercy includes 31 hospitals, more than 200 outpatient facilities, 38,000 co-workers and 1,500 integrated physicians in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma. Mercy also has outreach ministries in Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. For more about Mercy, visit www.mercy.net.

Story Covered By

• St. Louis Post-Dispatch
• KSDK-TV (St. Louis)
• Cherokee County News Advocate
• Miami News Record
• Grove Sun and Delaware County Journal
• KWTV-TV (Oklahoma City)
• Miami (Okla.) News-Record
• Oklahoma's Nursing Times