A moment in the life story of a mother and a family

My thanks to Drs. Howard Weinstein and Maria Banda for their op-ed piece this week in the Syracuse Post-Standard about the quiet advantages of Community General Hospital’s Jim & DeDe Walsh Family Birth Center.

The article, headlined These patients not lost in numbers, responded to a story about two weeks ago. That story, Population boom, reported on the number of patients discharged from local hospitals last year.

It was gratifying to see the article by Drs. Weinstein and Banda talking about the advantages of Community’s maternity service, advantages that are not usually available at community hospitals.

Dr. Weinstein is the Chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Community, and Dr. Banda is an experienced house officer, one of the obstetricians who assist private doctors with C-Sections, surgeries, and the care of maternity patients at any time of day or night.

Their op-ed piece mentioned the on-site house officers. These are experienced physicians, not doctors-in-training, who are available around-the-clock for Community's maternity patients.

They also talked about 24-hour on-site neonatology coverage for every single birth, backed up by neonatologists, plus the caring, patient-sensitive nursing staff that gets high marks from patients and doctors.

Community’s maternity service typically ranks in the top quartile of all area hospitals in the annual review by the Regional Perinatal Center. And our C-Section rate is the lowest among Syracuse hospitals.

Community’s investments in maternity services date from the very start. Our very first patient on January 1, 1963 was a maternity patient!

Over the years there have been many additional investments, including recently. Some have been highly visible, such as the award-winning Walsh Family Birth Center. Others, less so, such as the reconfiguration of obstetrical house officers last year. In each case, the investments were made to assure high quality, patient-centered care for mother and baby.

Every birth is an important, a personal moment in the life story of a mother and a family. Each birth represents a personal commitment to excellence by Community’s experienced and caring staff.

As Drs. Weinstein and Banda said: “The beauty of a smaller practice is that no one patient is lost in a multitude of numbers…”