Cary Medical Center pledges $45K to NMCC

    CARIBOU – Cary Medical Center is the latest in a growing list of northern Maine businesses and organizations to show their support for the first-ever major gifts campaign undertaken by Northern Maine Community College.     NMCC officials have announced that the Caribou-based hospital has made a $45,000 contribution to the Campaign for the County’s College. The pledge of $15,000 for each of the next three years establishes the Cary Medical Center Advancement Fund through the NMCC Foundation. The fund is designed to support instructional technology, professional development, and curriculum development for allied health programs.
    “The Aroostook County health care community, and Cary Medical Center in particular, are direct beneficiaries of the teaching and learning that happens each and every day in the associate degree nursing program and other allied health programs offered through NMCC,” said Kris Doody, chief executive officer of Cary Medical Center. “An impressive 60 percent of our current nursing staff holds degrees from NMCC. Our recent accolades, and in fact our ability to deliver the compassionate and quality health care services that have become Cary’s hallmark, are highly dependent on the nurses and other health care professionals educated and trained at the County’s College.”
    The establishment of the Cary Medical Center Advancement Fund comes at a critical juncture at NMCC as college personnel begin work on establishing an allied health simulation center on campus. The first-of-its kind facility in northern Maine to house human patient simulator technology, the center will provide students and other users simulation-based education opportunities to enhance clinical and decision making skills during realistic patient care scenarios.
    The establishment of the center was made possible through a grant to the Campaign for the County’s College by the Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield Foundation that will provide for the purchase and installation of simulation and other needed equipment for implementation. Anthem funds will also allow for NMCC to refurbish and transform existing space in the nursing wing of the A.K. Christie Building to house the technology and instructional space.
    “The simulation center will revolutionize the way our nursing and allied health students are taught,” said Timothy Crowley, NMCC president. “This important new step forward will involve significant changes in how our faculty teach the next generation of health care professionals. The contribution made by Cary Medical Center to the campaign will help ensure that we not only make optimum use of the new technology, but that both our students and faculty benefit fully from its use.”
    Community leaders working with NMCC officials on the Campaign for the County’s College agree and see the benefit extending beyond the campus community.
    “With this sizable donation to support the Allied Health programs at the Northern Maine Community College, Cary Medical Center has demonstrated its commitment to excellence of medical service not only for our future health care professionals, but for our citizens as a whole,” said Brian Hamel, tri-chair for the major gifts campaign. “We are particularly pleased that Cary Medical Center has joined with other health care organizations throughout ‘The County’ to subsidize the creation of a first-class regional Allied Health program that will set the high standards by which others will be measured. Our citizens are the real winners when health care organizations collaborate to deliver available, affordable and state-of-the-art health care programs.”
    Cary Medical Center is a 65-bed, acute care hospital. Well known for its patient-centered services, the hospital and its staff have won numerous state and national awards for quality in both customer service and clinical performance. The Cary family includes approximately 540 employees, 60 active medical staff providers, 100 courtesy and consulting physicians, and 75 volunteers.
    In collaboration with Pines Health Services, a non-profit physician management group, Cary Medical Center services include: general and vascular surgery, pediatrics, 24-hour emergency medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics, physical and occupational therapy, neurology, one day surgery, family practice, sports medicine, cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation, occupational health, internal medicine, urology, radiology, pathology, and a wide variety of specialty clinics.
    In 2006, Cary Medical Center was listed in the top 2 percent of hospitals in the United States for health information and patient safety technology. In recent years, considerable investments in technology have been made to significantly reduce the risk of medical error and to improve access to health information.
    Cary Medical Center is also home to the first Veterans Administration Outpatient Clinic located in a private rural hospital. Additionally, on the hospital’s campus is a 40-bed, long-term care facility and a 30-bed residential care facility operated by the Maine Veterans Home.
    The Campaign for the County’s College is a year-long initiative launched by NMCC in February of 2007 to raise $2 million to support student scholarships, assist in funding instructional technology, and help the College meet emerging and immediate community needs. With three months remaining in the campaign, the College has raised nearly $1.8 million.