ChamberLink May 2012 : Page 4
4 ChamberLink • maY 2012 Trailblazer Spotsylvania Regional Medical Center celebrates growth and quality care Spotsylvania Regional Medical Center (SRMC) is nearing its second anniversary on June 7, 2012. The first two years have been character-ized by tremendous volume growth and a sincere desire to exceed patient expectations in quality care. Over the past several months, the hospital has enjoyed consistently high patient satisfaction scores, typically ranking in the top 10 in HCA, the hospital’s parent company, which is comprised of 166 hospitals. “Outstanding customer service is a product of the combined efforts of all staff at a facility,” said Tim Tobin, CEO and president of Spotsylvania Regional Medical Center. “The patient satisfaction scores of Spot-sylvania Regional Medical Center ranked at the top, not only because we have spectacular nurses, physicians and support staff, but because we have a dedicated team of volunteers focused on making sure the needs of every customer are met. I echo the sentiments of many of our staff and patients when I say that I have never encountered such a great volunteer corps at another medical facility.” SRMC was selected as “Business of the Year” by the Fredericksburg Chamber of Commerce in 2011 and is a $175 million hospital with 126-beds, providing a wide range of in-and outpatient services, including 24-hour emergency care, obstetrics, diagnostic imaging, intensive care, cardiac catheterization, surgery, and psychiatric care. Located on a 75-acre campus south of Fredericksburg on Interstate 95, the hospital plans to open a cancer treatment center by April 2013. The center will be built next to the Pogonia Medical Arts Building, an 80,000-square-foot medical office building attached to the hospital. SRMC’s growth in patient volumes created the catalyst to increase and advance many medical services. A new Sleep Lab opened March 12 on the hospital’s fifth floor, providing overnight testing for the diagnosis and treatment of potentially serious sleep disorders such as sleep apnea, excessive snoring, narcolepsy, rest-less leg syndrome and periodic limb movement disorder. As the behavioral health needs in the community have increased, Spot-sylvania Regional Medical Center has expanded its psychiatric services through a partial hospitalization pro-gram located on Courthouse Road, approximately five miles from the fa-cility. Onsite Neonatal Partners joined with Women’s and Children’s Services to offer 24/7 baby care, along with The Perinatal Center, serving women with high risk pregnancies. SRMC’s emergency room regularly cares for more than 100 patients per day while averaging wait times of 30 minutes or less. Wait times can now be viewed on one of three LED signs near the facility, online at spotsrmc. com and Fredericksburg.com, or by texting ER to 23000. The Washington Regional Trans-plant Community (WRTC) awarded the WRTC Leslie Ebert Synergy for Life Award to Spotsylvania Regional Medical Center in early 2012. The award celebrates the hard work of area hospitals that have supported organ, eye and tissue donation, but do not have a high potential for organ donation. The hospital is now in its second year of NICHE certification – which designates that staff is trained in ad-vanced geriatric care. Spotsylvania Regional operates as a community hospital, with a manage-ment team and a board of trustees who live in and are committed to the community. The board has estab-lished policies and set expectations for the hospital based on its knowledge and understanding of local healthcare issues. The Board of Trustees include the following distinguished individu-als: Margaret Lewis, Tim Tobin, Dr. Robert Weaver, Hap Connors, Shirley Gibson, Chief Chris Eudailey, Dr. Henry Wicker, Dr. Sudeep Menach-ery, Dr. Anne Truong, Kent Farmer, Dan Nickelson, State Del. Bobby Orrock, Pastor Raymond Bell, Dr. Rosier Dedwylder and Mr. David Storke. SRMC has employed more than 450 clinical and administrative staff members and it will pay roughly $1.5 million in taxes annually to Spotsylva-nia County, thereby broadening the county’s tax base. This commitment to community is a key philosophy of HCA. Each year HCA Virginia facilities provide approximately $100 million in free charity care to needy patients and pays $100 million in taxes that sup-port vital community services. Nearly 400 local physicians are currently credentialed at SRMC and offer a variety of services. HCA, SRMC’s parent company, was named among The Ethisphere Institute’s sixth annual selection of the World’s Most Ethical Companies, which highlights 100 organizations that lead the way in promoting ethical busi-ness standards. This was the third year in a row HCA has received the honor. For more information concerning services and events at Spotsylva-nia Regional Medical Center, visit spotsrmc.com. Mobile devices reshaping business marketing landscape By Chris Muldrow Back in 2002, a team of us at Fred-ericksburg.com built a mobile app that allowed you to use a cell phone to access data about real estate listings. It was pretty cool. You could put a house number into your phone and get all of the details about the house on your phone’s screen. We even filed a patent application for the app. There was one small problem. In 2002, I think about 10 people in Fredericksburg were using web brows-ers on their phones, and five of those worked at Fredericksburg.com. Times have certainly changed. If you’re trying to market your busi-ness you’ve got to be thinking about how mobile devices are changing our world. Smartphones – which are phones that have a large screen and are ca-pable of browsing the web just like a computer, as opposed to the old-style “feature phones” – are in lots of people’s hands these days. More than 15 percent of Fred-ericksburg.com’s traffic came from mobile devices last month, and the trend line continues to shoot up. North American smartphone ship-ments surpassed feature phones in late 2010, and smartphones outsold PCs in 2011. It’s a little early to fully grasp the implications of lots of tiny browsers wandering the streets, but we already know a bit about how the mobile web experience is very different from PC Web usage. For starters, we’re seeing web usage at times of the day that are not typical for other media consumption. In the past, a web site’s traffic was strongest during work hours, when people were sitting in front of their desktop com-puter at the office, pretending to get work done. Weekends and evenings were a bit of a ghost town. With mobile, however, we’re see-ing traffic growth at night, earlier in the morning and throughout the weekends. Also, shoppers are doing more pric-ing and product research on mobile, with some even price-checking on the Web while they’re standing in a brick-and-mortar store looking at a product. This doesn’t necessarily mean they’re going to buy online, but they’re much more aware of the competitive pricing landscape and of product reviews. Smartphones are also location-aware. That means consumers can find businesses close by that have what they need. It also means that marketers can say, “Hey, while you’re nearby, we’ve got coupons or a great deal. Stop in.” Finally, smartphones are much more “personal” than a personal com-puter ever seems. Users are even more sensitive to the content they consume on their phones, and misguided mar-keting messages or campaigns that aren’t well designed will fall flat and annoy people. In 2002, it was very odd to see some-one walking down Caroline Street, staring at his or her phone’s screen and pecking away at the keypad. It’s 2012, though, and businesses that want to connect with consum-ers need to add that mobile screen to their marketing mix. Chris Muldrow has been doing digital journalism, marketing and development for 17 years. He is chief digital officer of The Free Lance-Star Publishing Co. Shaw’s Carpets Mon.-Wed. 9am-6pm Thurs. & Fri. 9am-8pm Sat. 10am-4pm Custom Window Treatments Blinds • Slipcovers Fabrics by the Yard Carpet • Ceramic Luxury Vinyl Tile • Laminate Easy-Care Hardwood Interior Design Services 4424 Lafayette Blvd. • Fredericksburg 540-898-4993 Shaw’s Carpets
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