MIDDLEBURY — Porter Medical Center officials late last week identified the University of Vermont Health Network (UVMHN) as their choice for affiliation, if the Porter Medical community opts to eschew independence for a partnership with another health care organization. Here are some details about UVMHN, culled from the organization’s website, www.uvmhealth.org:
• Service area: Covers 20 counties (14 in Vermont and six in New York) spanning 18,953 square miles, serving a population of around 1 million.
• Combined staffing (2015): 1,188 physicians, 2,783 Registered Nurses, and a total of 7,995 employees. Inpatient discharges: 26,124. Operating room cases: 26,124. Staffed beds: 768. Emergency Department visits: 133,460.
• The University of Vermont Health Network cares for communities on both sides of Lake Champlain, from the Adirondacks to the Green Mountains and beyond. Members include: The University of Vermont Medical Center (formerly known as Fletcher Allen Health Care), Alice Hyde Medical Center, Central Vermont Medical Center, Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital, and Elizabethtown Community Hospital.
• The network was created in October of 2011 when Fletcher Allen in Burlington and Central Vermont Medical Center in Berlin signed an affiliation agreement. In January 2013, New York partners Alice Hyde Medical Center in Malone, Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital in Plattsburgh and Elizabethtown Community Hospital in Elizabethtown joined the affiliation. The network was originally called “Fletcher Allen Partners.”
• The UVMHN’s 19-member board is drawn from the membership of the organizations’ current boards, and includes seven members from UVM Medical Center; four members from Community Partners Incorporated (CPI, the parent company of Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital and Elizabethtown Community Hospital); four members from Central Vermont Medical Center; two ex-officio members (the president and chief executive officer of UVMHN and the dean of The UVM College of Medicine); and “two vacant seats to accommodate future affiliations.”
“The University of Vermont Health Network is a system of four hospitals, along with physicians and other health care providers in Vermont and northern New York, that work together to provide high quality, cost-effective care as close to home as possible,” reads a UVMHN mission statement. “Strengthened by our academic connection to UVM, our network members work together to give patients access to the highest level of care by sharing knowledge and resources and access to leading-edge technology across our region.”
Reporter John Flowers is at [email protected].