The city of Seattle, Washington, United States is served by numerous respected medical institutions. The University of Washington is consistently ranked among the country's dozen leading institutions in medical research, while Group Health Cooperative was one of the pioneers of managed care in the United States. Seattle was a pioneer in the development of modern paramedic services with the establishment of Medic One in 1970.
Seattle Children's Hospital in the Laurelhurst neighborhood is the pediatric referral center for Washington, Alaska, Montana, and Idaho. Harborview Medical Center, the public county hospital located on First Hill, is the only Level I trauma hospital serving those four states. Harborview, Northwest Hospital and Medical Center in Haller Lake, and the University of Washington Medical Center are closely connected, with one physician group (UW Physicians) serving both hospitals. In addition, most Seattle Children's physicians hold faculty appointments at the University of Washington School of Medicine and are employed by the Children's University Medical Group practice plan.
Other hospitals in the community include Swedish Medical Center/Ballard (formerly Ballard General Hospital), Swedish Medical Center/Cherry Hill (formerly Providence Seattle Medical Center), and Swedish Medical Center/First Hill (Swedish's original location), as well as Virginia Mason Hospital on First Hill; the Seattle Division of the Department of Veterans Affairs' Puget Sound Health Care System on Beacon Hill; the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Cascade; and Kaiser Permanente's Capitol Hill campus (outpatient only, formerly Group Health Central Hospital and Family Health Center).
First Hill is widely known as "Pill Hill" for its high concentration of hospitals and other medical offices. In addition to being the home of Harborview, Swedish, and Virginia Mason, it is also the former location of Maynard, Seattle General, and Doctors Hospitals (all of which were merged into Swedish) and Cabrini Hospital.
In 1974, a 60 Minutes story on the success of the Medic One paramedic system called Seattle "the best place in the world to have a heart attack." Some accounts report that Puyallup, a city south of Seattle, was the first place west of the Mississippi River to have 911 emergency telephone service.
A paramedic is a healthcare professional who responds to emergency calls for medical help outside of a hospital. Paramedics mainly work as part of the emergency medical services (EMS), most often in ambulances. The scope of practice of a paramedic varies among countries, but generally includes autonomous decision making around the emergency care of patients.
The Seattle & King County Emergency Medical Services System is a fire-based two-tier response system providing prehospital basic and advanced life support services.
First Hill is a neighborhood in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is named for the hill on which it is located, which in turn is so named for being the first hill encountered while traveling east from downtown Seattle toward Lake Washington. First Hill is bounded on the west by Interstate 5, beyond which is Downtown, on the north by E. Pike and E. Madison Streets, beyond which is Capitol Hill, and on the south by Yesler Way, beyond which is the International District. The City of Seattle provides conflicting information about its eastern limit, beyond which are Cherry Hill and the Central District. Some describe it as being bounded by Broadway and Boren Avenues, while others describe it as being bounded by 12th Avenue.
The NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital is a nonprofit academic medical center in New York City affiliated with two Ivy League medical schools, Cornell University and Columbia University. The hospital comprises seven distinct campuses located in the New York metropolitan area. The hospital's two flagship medical centers are Columbia University Irving Medical Center and Weill Cornell Medical Center.
A combat medic, or healthcare specialist, is responsible for providing emergency medical treatment at a point of wounding in a combat or training environment, as well as primary care and health protection and evacuation from a point of injury or illness. Additionally, medics may also be responsible for the creation, oversight, and execution of long-term patient care plans in consultation with or in the absence of a readily-available physician or advanced practice provider. Combat medics may be used in hospitals and clinics, where they have the opportunity to work in additional roles such as operating medical and laboratory equipment and performing and assisting with procedures.
Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) is a public research university focusing primarily on health sciences with a main campus, including two hospitals, in Portland, Oregon. The institution was founded in 1887 as the University of Oregon Medical Department and later became the University of Oregon Medical School. In 1974, the campus became an independent, self-governed institution called the University of Oregon Health Sciences Center, combining state dentistry, medicine, nursing, and public health programs into a single center. It was renamed Oregon Health Sciences University in 1981 and took its current name in 2001, as part of a merger with the Oregon Graduate Institute (OGI), in Hillsboro. The university has several partnership programs including a joint PharmD Pharmacy program with Oregon State University in Corvallis.
Swedish Health Services, formerly Swedish Medical Center, is the largest nonprofit health provider in the Seattle metropolitan area. It operates five hospital campuses, ambulatory care centers in the cities of Redmond and Mill Creek, and Swedish Medical Group, a network of more than 100 primary-care and specialty clinics. It is affiliated with many other health care providers across Washington state, and had 8,886 employees and 6,023 credentialed physicians as of 2013.
Harborview Medical Center is a public hospital located in the First Hill neighborhood of Seattle, Washington, United States. It is managed by UW Medicine.
A paramedic is a healthcare professional, providing pre-hospital assessment and medical care to people with acute illnesses or injuries. In Canada, the title paramedic generally refers to those who work on land ambulances or air ambulances providing paramedic services. Paramedics are increasingly being utilized in hospitals, emergency rooms, clinics and community health care services by providing care in collaboration with registered nurses, registered/licensed practical nurses and registered respiratory therapists.
Swedish Medical Center is a 408-bed acute care hospital located in Englewood, Colorado, United States. It is a Level I trauma and burn center serving Colorado and the Rocky Mountain region.
Virginia Mason Medical Center is an integrated hospital, training and research facility located in Seattle, Washington, USA. It was the founding location, in 1920, of the private, non-profit Virginia Mason health organization; in January 2021, the Virginia Mason organization merged with CHI Franciscan to form Virginia Mason Franciscan Health, under the parent company CommonSpirit Health. After the merger, the Virginia Mason Medical Center continues under its original name.
Eastern Virginia Medical School (EVMS) is a public medical school in Norfolk, Virginia. Founded by grassroots efforts in the Southeastern part of Virginia known as Hampton Roads, EVMS is not affiliated with an undergraduate institution and coordinates training through multiple medical centers in the Hampton Roads region. EVMS campus includes the 555-bed Sentara Norfolk General Hospital, the region's only tertiary level 1 trauma medical care facility, and the 212-bed Children's Hospital of The King's Daughters, a regional pediatric referral care facility and only stand-alone children's hospital in the state. EVMS is the first institution in the US to have produced a viable fetus through in vitro fertilization. EVMS is most known for its reproductive medicine and simulation/standardized-patient education as well as research in pediatrics, geriatrics, diabetes, and cancer. In addition, EVMS is well known for its leadership in community service and medical missions as evidenced by faculty and alumni responsible for the founding of Operation Smile, Physicians for Peace, Global Brigades, and CONRAD.
In the United States, the paramedic is a professional whose primary focus is to provide advanced emergency medical care for critical and emergency patients who access Emergency Medical Services (EMS). This individual possesses the complex knowledge and skills necessary to provide patient care and transportation. Paramedics function as part of a comprehensive EMS response, under medical oversight. Paramedics perform interventions with the basic and advanced equipment typically found on an ambulance. The paramedic is a link from the scene into the health care system. One of the eligibility requirements for state certification or licensure requires successful completion of a nationally accredited Paramedic program at the certificate or associate degree level. Each state varies in requirements to practice as a paramedic, and not all states require licensure.
The University of Maryland Medical System is a private, not-for-profit corporation founded in 1984 and based in Baltimore, Maryland. It owns and operates 13 hospitals in Maryland, and has more than 2,500 licensed beds, 122,300 annual admissions and gross patient revenues of $4.4 billion annually. UMMS physicians and care teams work with University of Maryland School of Medicine specialists to provide primary and specialty care at more than 150 locations across the state, including a network of academic, community and specialty hospitals.
The University of Washington School of Medicine (UWSOM) is a large public medical school in the northwest United States, located in Seattle and affiliated with the University of Washington. According to U.S. News & World Report's 2022 Best Graduate School rankings, University of Washington School of Medicine ranked #1 in the nation for primary care education, and #7 for research.
Virtua Health is a non-profit healthcare system in southern New Jersey that operates a network of hospitals, surgery centers, physician practices, and more. Virtua is South Jersey's largest health care provider. The main headquarters are located in Marlton.
Virginia Mason Hospital is a 336-bed teaching hospital in Seattle, Washington, part of the Virginia Mason Medical Center. The hospital is accredited by the Joint Commission and the Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities (CARF). Founded in 1920, the hospital operates several accredited residency programs that train newly graduated physicians.
The University of Washington practices animal testing for a variety of purposes, including biomedical testing and paramedic training. Testing is performed by faculty from various departments across the university, and is conducted on animals including dogs, rabbits, primates, pigs, sheep, gerbils, bobcats, ferrets, and coyotes. Testing on primates is done through the Washington National Primate Research Center, which is located on campus. Animal testing at UW is overseen by the university's Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC).
Lorena Alarcon-Casas Wright is a physician-endocrinologist and an Associate Professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine who serves as the Clinical Director of the LatinX Diabetes Clinic at UW Medicine's Diabetes Institute. Wright specializes in Metabolism, Endocrinology, and Nutrition at the UW Medical Center, Harborview Medical Center, and the UW Diabetes Institute Clinic. In addition to clinical practice, Wright performs clinical research in different areas of Diabetes care. As a Latina physician serving the LatinX community, Wright is passionate about eradicating health disparities and promoting health equity.
Vin Gupta is an American pulmonologist who is a medical analyst for NBC News and MSNBC. He also serves as a senior principal scientist with Amazon, affiliate professor with the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, attending physician at Virginia Mason Medical Center, and lead officer of the Critical Care Air Transport Team for the United States Air Force Medical Service Reserves, based at Joint Base Lewis–McChord.