[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 132 (Thursday, September 8, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1565-E1566]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         HONORING THE 100TH ANNIVERSARY OF ST. JOHN'S HOSPITAL

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. BETTY McCOLLUM

                              of minnesota

                    in the house of representatives

                      Thursday, September 8, 2011

  Ms. McCOLLUM. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to mark the special occasion 
of the centennial celebration of St. John's Hospital. For 100 years, 
this community hospital has provided quality health care to residents 
in the Saint Paul--Minneapolis Metropolitan Area.
  In 1911, when it first opened its doors in Saint Paul's Dayton's 
Bluff neighborhood, St. John's German Lutheran Hospital was a 25-bed 
facility. A new 65-bed fireproof hospital was built in 1914 on the site 
of the current Metropolitan State University in Saint Paul. During the 
influenza epidemic of 1918, St. John's Hospital was turned over to the 
City of Saint Paul to care for charity patients. In just one month, St. 
John's Hospital treated nearly 400 flu patients. In a turn of events, 
in 1933, due to a low patient load, the hospital was forced to close 
some floors and hospital staff took vacations without pay and a 10 
percent salary reduction.
  After weathering difficult times, in the 1950s St. John's Hospital 
underwent an expansion to 165 beds, becoming one of the first hospitals 
in the nation to create an Intensive Care Unit (ICU), and was 
recognized for its ``Progressive Patient Care.'' St. John's Hospital 
constructed a second facility in 1985 in Maplewood at its current 
location. St. John's Hospital joined the newly-created HealthEast Care 
System in 1986, along with Bethesda and St. Joseph's Hospitals. After 
75 years, in 1987, St. John's Hospital closed its hospital on Saint 
Paul's East Side.
  St. John's Hospital has implemented many innovations during the past 
decade. In 2005, St. John's Hospital was the first community hospital 
in the Twin Cities to offer the daVinci Surgical System--a robotic 
surgical system used to treat prostate cancer. In addition, St. John's 
Hospital was the first hospital in Minnesota to utilize digital 
mammography and one of the first hospitals in the state to provide 
cutting-edge artificial disc surgery for patients experiencing lower 
back pain.
  Today St. John's is an award-winning hospital and with more than 1500 
employees, one of the largest job providers in the East Metro Area. On 
an annual basis, it treats more than 41,000 patients in the emergency 
department, delivers more than 3,000 babies and performs

[[Page E1566]]

more than 6,000 surgeries. U.S. News & World Report named St. John's 
Hospital one of 2011-2012 ``Top Metro Best Hospitals in the Twin 
Cities'' and identified St. John's as one of the top hospitals in the 
country for Urology. This year, the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business 
Journal named HealthEast Hospitals, including St. John's, one of the 
``Best Places to Work'' in Minnesota for the sixth time.
  Mr. Speaker, the comprehensive and state-of-the-art health care 
services provided by St. John's Hospital are commendable and deserve to 
be celebrated.

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