Cooper: The Story of Cooper Hospital 1887 to 2017

COOPER

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COOPER

T h e S to ry

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C o o p e r H o s p ital 1887 t o 2017

CUH-265 Cooper

Health Sciences Campus in Camden.

COOPER T he S tory

of

C ooper H ospital 1887 to 2017

Celebrating 130 years in Camden, New Jersey Dedicated to the patients who have given their trust to Cooper for over 130 years. This is the story of how a Quaker family’s vision to provide health care to the poor citizens in Camden evolved into a renowned academic medical center, committed to world-class patient care, education, and the community.

COOPER

THE STORY OF COOPER HOSPITAL 1887 TO 2017

Cooper University Hospital Camden, New Jersey 08103 856.342.2000 CooperHealth.org Jill Sayre Lawlor History Book Senior Project Manager Cooper University Health Care Beth O’Neill History Book Project Manager Cooper University Health Care Natanya Braswell History Book Project Manager Cooper University Health Care Sharon R. Clark History Book Project Manager Cooper Medical School of Rowan University Rob Levin Editor Renée Peyton Managing Editor, Archivist Bob Land Copy Editor Shoshana Hurwitz Indexer Book development by

Bookhouse Group, Inc. Covington, Georgia www.bookhouse.net Copyright © 2018

By Cooper University Health Care All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from Cooper University Hospital, Camden, New Jersey.

The front of Roberts Pavilion.

Providing world-class care with state-of-the-art technology.

Foreword T

o celebrate its first 130 years, Cooper University Hospital‑—a long-time community pillar in Camden, New Jersey—is proud to present the institution’s remarkable history.

This history traces the Cooper story from 1887 to 2017, incorporating historical

research, personal interviews, medical milestones, and hospital records to describe the dramatic transformation from its humble beginnings as a thirty-bed hospital into today’s world-class academic medical center and regional health care leader. The story documents how Cooper began as the dream of a prominent Camden family and traces its growth and expansion through times of prosperity as well as challenges. Each chapter captures the essence of Cooper through its dedicated physicians, nurses, administrators, Board members, and health care staff who guided Cooper’s growth along the way. It is these compassionate, communityminded and visionary men and women who ultimately created a thirty-block Health Sciences Campus committed to outstanding patient care, medical education, and academic research that’s still anchored in the neighborhood where it began.

Chapters 1 through 15 were originally published in 1987 as part of Cooper’s Centennial history, Cooper:The Story of Cooper Hospital by Margaret O. Kirk; these chapters are reprinted here with minor edits. With editorial assistance by Kirk and Cooper’s Marketing Department, Chapters 16 through 20 document Cooper’s transformation from 1988 to 2017, a period of rapid growth which positioned Cooper as the acclaimed academic tertiary medical center it is today.

Throughout its rich history, Cooper has remained true to its mission—to serve, to heal, to educate—and has grown to meet the medical challenges of a geographically dispersed patient population and ever-changing health care environment. This foundation has positioned Cooper to continue serving Camden and the region for the next 130 years and beyond.

George E. Norcross III Chairman Cooper Board of Trustees

Contents Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919 Chapter 1: Dr. Cooper’s Dream......................................................................................................... 13 Chapter 2: A Building, a Delay, and a Hospital in Camden............................................................ 29 The Cooper Family Finally Builds a Hospital Chapter 3: Growing Pains.................................................................................................................... 45 From 1887 to 1919, Cooper Hospital Is Established

Part Two: A Change in Philosophy—1919 to 1940 Chapter 4: The End of Free Care as Cooper Adds More Beds, Services, and Buildings...................................................................... 73 Chapter 5: Thank Heaven for the Auxiliaries................................................................................... 95 Chapter 6: Under New Management—The Doctors.................................................................. 103 Chapter 7: The Depression Years..................................................................................................... 111

Part Three:The War Years—1941 to 1950 Chapter 8: The Home Front.............................................................................................................. 121 Chapter 9: The 61st Station Hospital.............................................................................................. 129 Chapter 10: A Collision of Changes................................................................................................. 143

Part Four: A Time of Commitments—1950 to 1972 Chapter 11: A Decade of Development.......................................................................................... 151 Chapter 12: The Old Guard and the Young Turks ........................................................................ 167 Conflicts over Growth, Camden Deteriorates, the Debate Begins: Should Cooper Stay in Camden?

Chapter 13:Years of Turmoil.............................................................................................................. 185 The Young Turks Make Their Move, Cooper Resolves the Camden Question

Part Five: Moving Forward—1972 to 1999 Chapter 14: Town and Gown, a Medical School, a New Building.............................................. 205 Chapter 15: Cooper Comes of Age................................................................................................. 231 Chapter 16: Eleven Years of Challenges and Change................................................................... 257

Part Six:Transformative Years—1999 to 2017 Chapter 17: The Transformation Begins with New Leadership, Vision, and Centers of Excellence 1999–2005.............................................................................. 279 Chapter 18: A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn 2006–2010............................................................ 311 Chapter 19: Celebrating 125 Years, a New Medical School, and MD Anderson at Cooper 2011–2013..................................................................................... 343 Chapter 20: Cooper’s Future without Limits: Advancing Medicine, Changing Lives 2014–2017................................................................................ 377 Appendix................................................................................................................................................ 409 Index....................................................................................................................................................... 420

P A

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Original hospital building, c. 1880

A FAMILY AFFAIR

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The Cooper family home, 121 Cooper Street, Camden, New Jersey.

Built in 1816, it was replaced by the Cooper Branch of the Camden Public Library in 1915 (Camden County Historical Society).

PA RT

O N E / C H A P T E R

Dr. Cooper’s Dream

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n a fall day in the early 1870s, Dr. Richard M. Cooper stopped

his horse-drawn carriage in the narrow driveway, just inside the gate at 121 Cooper Street. He was home. The good doctor could practically close his eyes and still make his way up the front walk, so familiar was he with everything about this stately three-story house and the poplar trees that grew in the yards and towered above the slate roof. Dr. Cooper had lived here since the day he was born in 1816, the same year his father built the Cooper family mansion between Front and Second streets in Camden, New Jersey.

As Dr. Cooper stepped over the threshold and walked into the house, the sunlight streamed through the front door and into the foyer, ricocheting off the pier mirror at the opposite end of the entrance hall. The reflection in the mirror showed a man of medium build, dressed in a threepiece wool suit with wide lapels. He was quite serious looking, with deep-set eyes, thin and tightly drawn lips, a broad forehead, and thick, tidy beard. The hair on top of his head had fallen out, but it was still full around the sides and in the back. He walked with a bit of a limp, a telltale sign of his recurring troubles with gout.

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The Cooper family dining room, where Dr. Cooper likely discussed with his family his dreams for a hospital.

On this day, perhaps, Dr. Cooper headed straight down the hall to the dining room, where he expected to find his family waiting for him. The house was home to Richard, his twin brother, William, and their two sisters, Elizabeth and Sarah, the four surviving Cooper family siblings who never married. When their father died in 1844, he left them this box of a house, which had windows enough to let in light at every turn. Over the years, the family had made several additions to the original structure and built a carriage house out back. As the four brothers and sisters approached middle age, their lifestyles were as established and predictable as the portraits of William and Richard that hung upstairs over the love seat in the second-floor hallway, across from the maple grandfather clock.

Every Sunday at noon, for instance, the Cooper family met for Sunday dinner in the dining room where in the far corner stood Dr. Cooper’s favorite piece of furniture: a walnut buffet with elaborately carved buttons and circuitous loops, a stately lion’s head positioned at the very crest of the massive carved back.

Vintage photographs still exist to reveal intimate details of the Cooper home at 121 Cooper Street. And while no family letters or personal diaries survive to record exactly how Dr. Cooper first presented to his family the idea of building a hospital, this much is known: Dr. Richard Matlack Cooper wanted to build a hospital to provide medical care free of charge to the poor people of Camden.

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Did Dr. Cooper likely discuss his dreams for

companies, corporate bank bonds and

a hospital with his family around the dining

mortgages—land and money that belonged

room table? Probably. And though the exact

to the family by that rightful and wondrous

scene and its particular dialogue have been

legacy called inheritance. The Coopers of

lost, at least one more fact is certain: Dr.

the mid-1800s were direct descendants of

Cooper’s family members embraced their

the same William and Margaret Cooper

brother’s dream as if it was their very own.

who first settled in Camden in 1681 on a site known as Pyne Poynt. In the seventh

The Cooper Family

generation of the Cooper family were

Like the details of the family home on

Richard’s parents, Richard Matlack and Mary

Cooper Street, much is known about the

Cooper, born in 1768 and 1776, respectively.

Cooper family of Camden.

Richard and Mary had ten children—two

From the time that Camden was

who died in infancy, eight who lived to be

founded, the name “Cooper” was synon‑

adults: Sarah, Elizabeth, Caroline, Abigail,

ymous with vast holdings in real estate and

Alexander, Mary, and the twins, Richard and

investments in water works and railroad

William, born on August 30, 1816.

An 1877 city plot plan showing Cooper home (Camden County Historical Society).

Chapter 1 / Dr. Cooper’s Dream

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Richard Matlack Cooper was named for his father, a Quaker who by all accounts was a formidable figure in his day. The elder Cooper was a banker, judge, and politician, elected many times to the state General Assembly and the state Senate. For twenty-nine years, he was President of the National State Bank of Camden, where he skillfully managed and enlarged an estate worth millions of dollars.

There was hardly a block of land in Camden that wasn’t either owned by the Coopers or bordering land that the family owned. The father’s good fortune and shrewd (some would argue manipulative) business skills afforded his family the best of everything. And in the 1800s, wealth meant power: the power to pursue an education, to pursue a prestigious career, and to claim a privileged Richard Matlack Cooper, MD

position in society.

In all three categories, the Cooper twins took full

advantage of their family’s good fortune. In 1832, after a liberal primary and secondary education, Richard and William headed across the Delaware River to Philadelphia to attend the University of Pennsylvania. As an undergraduate, Richard studied literature, nurturing a love for language and arts that continued throughout his career. In 1836 he graduated with a degree from the Department of Arts and immediately entered the university’s medical school. Taking a different route William entered the university’s law school and specialized in real estate law and taxes while Richard was busy probing the mysteries of such ailments as colitis, the topic of his thesis. In 1839 the twenty-three-year-old twins graduated with their advanced degrees and returned to Camden, where William started his career in law and Richard began his career in medicine.

Fraternal twins, the brothers did not look at all alike. Richard was always the studious and meticulous one, his eyes rimmed with wrinkles and dark circles.

William was round and mischievous-looking, with broad shoulders, a barrel chest, and muttonchop whiskers that curled into a wavy beard and generous mustache. And as much as the brothers differed in appearance, they differed even more in manner.

William was the bon vivant of the family. He loved to dance at his presti‑ gious Camden Ball Club, to drink and dine in Philadelphia, and to entertain his

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

View of Camden from Philadelphia’s Walnut Street Wharf, c. 1845 (Camden County Historical Society).

friends with yet another tale of his most

William, “he greatly enhanced the value of

recent trip to Europe. He was a better-

the property in North Camden and very

than-average real estate lawyer, admitted

materially increased the amount of the

to the Philadelphia Bar in 1841 and the

estate placed under his special care and

same year licensed to practice in New

direction.” William also managed land and

Jersey. From 1844, the year their father

buildings where some of Camden’s poorest

died, William had managed the family estate.

residents lived. It’s no wonder, then, that

The elder Cooper’s considerable holdings

William acquired an unattractive sobriquet:

included land in some of the more attractive

he was frequently described as the “original

portions of the city—land around the

slumlord” of Camden.

waterfront, up and down Cooper Street,

Richard was the quieter of the twins, his

and along Mickle and Benson streets, where

public profile limited primarily to medical

some of the most beautiful houses in the

circles. He was known as a dedicated doctor,

city were built. William was not about

and a colleague once described him as “a

to let the land lie fallow. “By laying off in

physician of great skill, able to carry all the

lots much of the lands previously owned

more sunshine into the sick room by reason

by his father,” one historian wrote about

of his benevolent disposition.” Another

Chapter 1 / Dr. Cooper’s Dream

17

Conditions in Camden in the 1840s In the early 1840s, Camden had no running water, the streets were dirty, and sanitation was primitive, if it existed at all.

Yet Camden was an industrial haven, stocked with iron foundries, paper mills, and shipyards. The work in these companies resulted in countless industrial accidents, from mangled limbs and cinders in the eye to acute infections from cuts and burns. Too, the industries were often identified by their own particular hazards and illnesses: Hatmaker’s disease (where mercury and nitric acid byproducts caused severe skin problems for men who made hats); glassworkers’ disease (a form of pulmonary emphysema and lung disease caused by small amounts of powdered clay inhaled by the workers); and lead poisoning (where workers in lead manufacturing plants were exposed to, and suffered from, the ingestion of lead and its byproducts).

In addition to accidents and industrial maladies, “Camden City was never free for long from the ravages of contagious diseases,” one early writer said of Camden, where cholera epidemics in 1832, 1849, and 1854 were once compared to an “invasion.” Outbreaks of smallpox in 1871 and again in 1880 and 1881 were followed by “the most extensive epidemic of typhus fever” ever witnessed in Camden. Before the fever was brought under control, “three score unremembered paupers,” a doctor, the steward, the matron, and several assistants died in the Almshouse at Blackwood, an institution for the poor.

Dr. E. L. B. Godfrey, a noted historian and one of the first doctors in Camden, wrote, “Six times have the heavy shadows of epidemic fevers hung heavy over our devoted county, and on each occasion, the brave devotion to duty of our professional brethren has stayed the hand of the avenging angel and withheld from greedy Death the greater portion of his intended victims.”

thought of him as “the ideal physician, for he had a broad love for humanity as well as an enthusiasm for the healing art.”

Dr. James M. Ridge, a friend and colleague, often told one particular story concerning Dr. Cooper. One night, during a smallpox epidemic in Camden, both doctors visited a dying patient. As they were leaving, the story goes, Dr. Ridge turned to Dr. Cooper and asked, “Doctor, how can you remain so cheerful when death is staring us in the face?” Dr. Cooper responded, “Why, Doctor, I do not wish to worry myself to death and die before my patient.” Years later, when asked to pay tribute to Dr. Cooper, Dr. Ridge repeated the story, with his own conclusion. “I thought,” said Dr. Ridge, “that it was the most appropriate answer I had ever received from any man. He was thoroughly acquainted with his profession, and his diagnoses and prognoses were accurate, almost faultless. I never knew a man to be so charitable.”

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Medical Conditions in Camden and the First Medical Society

had a population of nearly fifty-three

In the early 1840s Dr. Cooper was no

1,000, a rate that compared to the more

doubt challenged by the medical needs of

populated and overcrowded northern New

Camden, a city with just over four thousand

Jersey cities.

people, only a handful of physicians, and no

thousand and a death rate of 22.9 per

In this state of medical disarray, Dr.

hospital (see Sidebar, “Conditions in Camden in

Cooper and his colleagues knew they

the 1840s”). Early in his career, Dr. Cooper

needed to bring some form of organization to their

worked with physicians such as Samuel Harris, Isaac S. Mulford, and Lorenzo F. Fisler in the area of South Camden,

In all fairness Dr. Cooper seems to have handled his wealth and position with more than a modicum of modesty.

profession.

“Living in distant and remote sections of the county, there was little opportunity for meeting,

where many of the city’s indigent population lived.

except as they passed on the highway,” Dr.

With no hospitals to turn to, doctors

Cooper once wrote about his colleagues.

treated their patients at home if they

Like their colleagues in northern New

could afford the doctors’ visits and if they

Jersey and in Philadelphia, the Camden

had family members who could nurse

physicians decided to organize a medical

them; those who had neither family nor

society. On August 14, 1846, at a meeting

money were forced to seek help in Phila‑

in Haddonfield, Dr. Cooper and five other

delphia, where charitable institutions such

physicians founded the District Medical

as Pennsylvania Hospital on Pine Street

Society of the County of Camden, later

offered care for the poor. And, too, Dr.

known as the Camden County Medical

Cooper and his colleagues regularly made

Society. A thin black book contained the

house calls for the indigent families and

express purpose of the society: “The

provided free care more often than they

advancement of knowledge upon all

charged for services. Still, the death rate

subjects connected with the healing art;

from infection, epidemics, and conta‑

the elevation of the character and the

gious diseases was extremely high. Dr.

protection of the rights and interests of

Sam Alewitz, in an article for the Journal

those engaged in the practice of medicine;

of the Medical Society of New Jersey, later

the strengthening of social ties among each

concluded that in the mid-1880s, Camden

other, and the study of the means calculated

Chapter 1 / Dr. Cooper’s Dream

19

The Camden City Dispensary at 725-29 Federal Street, c. 1896 (Camden County Historical Society).

Ralph K. Hollinshed with a horse ambulance.

to render the medical profession most

Society came to Camden for the first time.

useful to the public, and subservient to the

Some interpreted this show of wealth as

interests of humanity.”

rather ostentatious; others viewed it as a

In keeping with the appeal of a private club, the medical society encouraged a bit

generous gift.

In all fairness, Dr. Cooper seems to have

of socializing. The quality of these “hospi‑

handled his wealth and position with more

table, social occasions” was frequently

than a modicum of modesty. According

attributed to Dr. Cooper, who more than

to historians, Dr. Cooper held numerous

once took care of the bill. “The Nestor

positions in the County Medical Society but

of our Profession,” as one historian called

would not agree to be President until 1871.

Dr. Cooper, “saw most clearly the need

He always argued that he wanted younger

for medical men to relax and enjoy social

doctors in the leadership positions; that

hours together, smoothing away misunder‑

way, he reasoned, the organization would

standings through better acquaintance.”

be sure to flourish. Dr. Cooper represented

Dr. Cooper personally covered all enter‑

the County Medical Society in 1847 at one

tainment expenses when the State Medical

of the first preliminary meetings in Phila‑

Chapter 1 / Dr. Cooper’s Dream

21

The Cooper Family Dynamics Determine Hospital Conditions Growing up, Dr. Richard Cooper had six living Dr. Cooper knew that Elizabeth, Sarah, and William siblings. Next to his twin, William, Dr. Cooper was would back his idea, and he guessed correctly that an closest to two of his four older sisters, Elizabeth older brother named Alexander would, too. Alexander, and Sarah. As adults, the two sisters were immense, who often assisted William at his law practice, was an matronly women who dressed simply, in the tradition intelligent, genial man. After his father’s death, he had of Quakers. Neither ever married. From all accounts, turned from banking to farming at his Peach Blossom Sarah seemed the sweeter of the two sisters, while farm near Ashland, but he often brought his family to Elizabeth was decidedly more aggressive and shrewd. the Cooper mansion for a visit. Alexander and Richard Like her father and brothers, Elizabeth were close; Alexander even named his first son Richard dabbled in real estate and was very after his father and his younger brother. successful; her individual But apparently, two other estate was worth over sisters named Caroline and CUH-005 five hundred thousand Abigail were never part of dollars in 1888, a the family’s discussions sum that would to build a hospital. At be the equivalent the time, both Caroline of over $6 million Cooper Hull and nearly a century Abigail Cooper Wright after she died. were married and busy Richard and William, raising their own families.

Elizabeth and Sarah not Caroline and her nine children only lived together in the same always needed money, and often house, but they also asked the Cooper family The founders and projectors of Cooper Hospital c. 1860 took deliberate steps for financial help; so, it STANDING: Richard M. Cooper, MD, William D. Cooper, Esq., John W. Wright (nephew), Alexander Cooper; SEATED: Sarah to align their wealth seemed, did Abigail, who W. Cooper, Elizabeth B. Cooper and property to each lived on Pine Street in other. On April 24, 1855, Philadelphia, where she shortly after their sister Mary Volans Cooper died, the raised her son, John. A rather flamboyant attorney, John four sat down and wrote one of their many wills and Wright loved to speculate on land and gold out West codicils, all nearly identical. “I give and bequeath all my around Colorado. Wright occasionally loaned money goods and chattels, rights and credits and personal to his less financially secure cousins. In a poignant property of every description wherever situation,” letter that Caroline’s son, Charles Wager Hull, wrote read each will, “to my sisters (Elizabeth, Sarah, or both) to Wright, Hull thanked him for a two-hundred-dollar and to my brothers (Richard, William, or both), to be loan and said that he prayed his cousin “never had to equally divided between them share and share alike.” experience” the poverty he had known.

The wills were acknowledged with the appropriate Of all the Cooper nephews and nieces, only John signatures beside the stamp of a seal of red wax Wright ever earned enough favor from his aunts and that, over a century later, crumbled to the touch like uncles to break into the immediate family circle and dried-out clay. become an heir to the Cooper family wealth.

delphia to develop an American Medical

Othniel H. Taylor, Cooper, and Lorenzo

Association. Later, the governor appointed

Fisler appealed to the city council for funds

him to a state Board designed to study

to develop a dispensary, and were no doubt

public health issues. In 1853 Dr. Cooper and

outraged when the council refused to

other doctors established the Camden City

address the issue. Camden, in the eyes of

Medical Society, which was often called the

the physicians, was standing by and watching

younger sister of the County Society.

its poor die.

During a meeting of the City Medical

It is ironic that the money to open a

Society these physicians first discussed

dispensary for the poor eventually came

creating a City Dispensary for Camden.

from funds earmarked to send the poor

By the mid-1850s Camden desperately

to war. During the Civil War, the North

needed some kind of organized medical

Ward Bounty Association was organized

center for its poor. Over ten thousand

to raise money to pay for volunteers who

people now lived in the city, which boasted twelve doctors, ten churches, three sawmills, two iron foundries,

It is ironic that the money to open a dispensary for the poor eventually came from funds earmarked to send the poor to war.

a shipyard, and

would serve as soldiers in place of the young men of wealth.

The North Ward Bounty Associ‑ ation had three thousand dollars

glass, chemical, and drug manufacturers,

in its coffers when the war ended, and its

but no hospital. In the 1850s, outbreaks of

organizers suggested that the money be

cholera were devastating—for the patients,

used to establish a charitable institution. The

who suffered through bouts of diarrhea,

Camden City Medical Society appealed to

cramps, and vomiting, and for the doctors,

the association that the money be used for

who had no central facility in Camden

a dispensary. On April 1, 1866, the Camden

where they could treat the poor. Condi‑

City Medical Society officially opened its

tions in the city’s midwest and northern

dispensary in two rooms of a fire company

sections were so dismal that a committee

building located at 46 N. Third Street.

from the City Medical Society appealed to

The twelve doctors who purchased the

the Camden City Council for a dispensary

building pitched in to whitewash walls and

much like the dispensaries already estab‑

build several examination rooms where they

lished in Philadelphia where the poor could

could treat patients. As one of the founders,

be quarantined during an epidemic. Doctors

Dr. Cooper served in numerous positions in

Chapter 1 / Dr. Cooper’s Dream

23

the dispensary, including consulting physician, Treasurer, and Secretary. During their first year of operation, doctors treated 304 patients at the dispensary, a fact that did not go unnoticed. In 1868 the City Council finally recognized the vital work of the dispensary and appropriated three hundred dollars a year to help take care of the city’s poor. The physicians opened more rooms in the dispensary, including a ward where patients could be admitted overnight. The overnight ward proved expensive to operate, however, and the city refused to increase its contribution to include this extended care. In 1869 the ward closed. Once again, there was no hospital and no ward facility for patients who needed overnight care in Camden.

It was now clear to Dr. Cooper that the city was

William D. Cooper, Esq.

not going to take the initiative and build a hospital. So should he? Dr. Cooper knew that a hospital would do more than provide care for poor people. A hospital would provide doctors with the convenience of seeing many patients under one roof. And in a hospital, doctors would have more oppor‑ tunities for discussions, consultations, and eyewitness accounts of diseases and remedies at various stages, and be able to debate not only the origins of disease but also their practical experiences and best practices.

Dr. Cooper shared the idea with his colleagues. Dr. Taylor, a leading Camden physician who had collaborated with Dr. Cooper to establish the medical societies and the dispensary, thought the proposal was excellent. What’s more, by the early 1870s Dr. Cooper already had experience in developing a medical institution.

Granted, the City Dispensary was not the ultimate solution to the medical needs of the indigent, but it was a successful and important step toward establishing the city’s first hospital.

All that was left, it seemed, was for Dr. Cooper to discuss the idea for a hospital with his family.

Dr. Cooper Shares His Dream of a Hospital Together, the four Cooper siblings who lived on Cooper Street, along with an older brother named Alexander and a favorite nephew named John Wright, likely debated

24

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Dr. Cooper’s dream to build a hospital

out, that the hospital would cost about fifty

(see Sidebar, “The Cooper Family Dynamics

thousand dollars to build and open. Everyone

Determine Hospital Conditions”). The hospital

agreed that the land near the proposed city

would be built with Cooper family money

hall building—the block that ran north and

on Cooper family land, open day and night to

south from Mickle to Benson, and east and

provide care, regardless of any patient’s ability

west from Sixth to Seventh—would be an

to pay. Dr. Cooper had no specific designs

ideal location for a hospital.The area was

for the hospital’s structure, but he knew that

close to many of the doctors’ homes along

he wanted a Board of Managers to direct

Cooper Street, not far from the waterfront

the hospital and to hire doctors and nurses

industrial plants, and conveniently located

to staff the first hospital in Camden. He

near two important transportation lines: the

wanted the hospital budget covered through

Federal Street trolley line and the Haddon

an endowment fund set up by the Cooper

Avenue Station of the West Jersey Railroad.

family specifically to ensure the financial

With the broad sketches of the hospital laid

stability of the hospital for generations of

out, it appears that Dr. Cooper’s brother and

sick, indigent people in Camden. The Cooper

sisters soon agreed to give their financial and

estate incorporated enough land and money

personal support to his plan.

to start the hospital.

It seems, however, that Dr. Cooper’s

Dr. Cooper figured, naively as it turned

dream to build a hospital was little more than a conversation topic between family and friends when, on May 24, 1874, Dr. Richard Matlack Cooper died. He was fifty-seven years old. For years, Dr. Cooper had suffered from gout, a disease that caused his hands and feet to swell and often made mere walking a painful ordeal.

At one point, the disease forced him to stop seeing patients. And in the last several weeks of his life, his condition had deteri‑ orated to the point that he was confined to his bed, a confinement so openly discussed that his death was not surprising.

A local newspaper reported that “his condition was such as to leave no hope of his recovery.”

Elizabeth Cooper

Chapter 1 / Dr. Cooper’s Dream

25

The funeral was held five days after he died. During his service, Camden’s oldest practicing physician, who gave more than thirty years of service to the citizens of Camden, was eulogized as a “prominent and highly esteemed” physician and a “main pillar” of the Camden community. So generous had Dr. Cooper been with his time and money that he was compared to such revered philanthropists as George Peabody of New York, Steven Girard of Philadelphia, and Johns Hopkins of Baltimore. In an editorial, the Camden Democrat remem‑ bered Dr. Cooper with this tribute: When able to drive or walk, he never failed to call at the humblest home when sent for; and has given to thousands of destitute families unrequited services night or day. We remember a case, where the life of an only child was in imminent peril; but the parents being poor, and the father out of work, hesitated to send for him.

At length a mother’s fears overcame her reluctance, and we went after him late at night. Stating the circumstances, he instantly prepared to follow us, and gave the parents one of his mild reprimands for

The death of Dr. Cooper was a crucial turning point in the history of modern medicine in this city on the Delaware River.

hesitating to call him in. He spent several hours by the bed of the little sufferer, and did so many nights, until she was out of danger.

He never sent a bill to that family, and his quiet “never mind, now,” was the reply to the repeated offer to pay a “little on account.”

The members of the Camden County Medical Society voted unanimously to act as pallbearers for Dr. Cooper’s funeral. At the appointed hour, the physicians who had worked alongside Dr. Cooper placed the plain, wooden box that held his body into the lead carriage of the funeral procession. As the horses pulled the carriages through Camden in the direction of Evergreen Cemetery, many people turned and watched. Dr. Cooper was buried at Evergreen in the family plot, next to his mother’s grave and under the shade of a young maple tree. The epitaph on his tombstone was stark in its simplicity: Richard Matlack Cooper, MD 1816–1874.

The death of Dr. Cooper was a crucial turning point in the history of modern medicine in this city on the Delaware River. Many years after he died, experts allowed that his death was a “major event in Camden’s medical history,” a key factor in determining if Camden would ever build an institution to take care of its sick. But due to a peculiar historical footnote, this conclusion did not become apparent until many years after Dr. Cooper died.

In the days and weeks after his funeral, not one of the numerous reports of Dr. Cooper’s death referred to his desire to build a hospital. His last will and 26

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

testament made no mention of a hospital, fifty-eight-year-old William left his estate to a fact that forever remained a mystery. his two sisters and his brother Alexander.

Rather, Dr. Cooper left his entire estate to He was buried at Evergreen beside the his sisters and brother William, with one grave of his twin. A headstone identical thousand dollars to go to the Camden City in size and design to the one placed at Dispensary and three thousand dollars Richard’s grave soon marked William’s bequeathed to the Camden County Medical grave, too.

Society. There was no bequest for a hospital.

According to reports published long When he died, Dr. Cooper’s dream to after his death, William declared on his build a hospital could have easily died with deathbed that his dream was to build and him. But his idea did not disappear, for this one, finance a hospital in Camden. The West undisputed reason: the surviving members Jersey Press reported years after he died of Dr. Cooper’s that “William D. When he died, Dr. Cooper’s family remained Cooper, a few hours dream to build a hospital could absolutely before his death, dedicated to said it had been his have easily died with him. their brother’s purpose to erect dream.They and dedicate in the were just as determined as their late brother city of Camden a hospital and to endow that a hospital should be built in Camden. it with sufficient means to place it beyond Soon after his brother’s death, William the contingency of ever becoming a charge Cooper revised his own will to include the upon the city.” names of nine men who would serve on Whether this was literally William’s last the hospital’s Board of Managers, a form of wish, no one knows. There is no question, management that Dr. Cooper had probably however, that the surviving Cooper family discussed with William. Moreover, William members now embraced the dreams of appealed to the state legislature and the Cooper twins. It was up to Sarah, requested that an Act of Incorporation be Elizabeth, and Alexander Cooper, along with passed to establish “The Camden Hospital.” their nephew John Wright, to see that the The hospital would be directed by the Camden Hospital was built. As the West Board of Managers that William proposed.

Strangely enough, though, William made no Jersey Press reported the story, “Out of other mention of the hospital in his will. respect for William’s expressed purpose, his When he died on February 17, 1875, less sisters resolved to act.” than one year after his twin brother, the

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Original hospital building, c. 1887

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A Building, a Delay, and a Hospital in Camden The Cooper Family Finally Builds a Hospital

“P

resident Cooper in the chair.”

Less than two months after his uncle William’s death and nearly a year after the death of his uncle Richard, nephew John Wright wrote these words on the thin blue lines of a page tucked inside a brown ledger. This ledger contains the first official documentation of the coming of age of the Cooper family dream.

A hospital, the Camden Hospital, was taking shape. Wright’s legible, precise handwriting recorded the events of that memorable day, April 7, 1875, when the dreams of Richard and William Cooper came together during a meeting of nine men seated around a sparse table in the Camden law office of Charles P. Stratton.

Like stones laid for a foundation, the events of that day clicked and held. The Act to Incor‑ porate the Camden Hospital, first proposed by William Cooper and subsequently passed by the state legislature on March 24, 1875, was read aloud: “And be it enacted that the object of said corporation shall be to afford gratuitous medical and surgical aid, advice, remedies, and care to such invalid or needy persons. . . .” Seated around the table in Stratton’s office were the nine men first suggested in William Cooper’s will and now officially appointed by the state to serve on the hospital’s Board of Managers: Albert W. Markley, Charles P. Stratton, Rudolphus Bingham, Dr. Thomas B. Cullen, Joseph B. Cooper, Augustus Reeve, Peter L.Voorhees, Alexander Cooper, and

The first Board of Managers consisted of nine men as suggested by William Cooper in his final will and testament, c. 1875.

John Wright. The group elected Alexander Cooper as President and chose Wright to fill the position of Secretary-Treasurer. Dr. Cullen was on the Board of the City Dispensary; his insight into the delivery of medical care services would benefit the new hospital.

And so they began their work, with “President Cooper in the chair.” By the time the first meeting of the Board of Managers adjourned, the corner‑ stone for the Camden Hospital was figuratively in place. Cooper appointed one committee to write the by-laws for the Board. According to the minutes from this meeting, he also appointed a second committee “to visit as many of the Hospitals in and around the City of Philadelphia and elsewhere as possible for the purpose of adopting a plan for a hospital building and report to the Board of Managers at as early a day as practicable.”

The official Visiting Committee, as it was called, included Dr. Cullen, a physician; Joseph Cooper, an architect; and Bingham, a lawyer. Needless to say, none of the men had ever designed a hospital, and they took their job seriously. In less than

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

a month they visited three new hospitals in Philadelphia and one in New York: the University of Pennsylvania Hospital, by architect Thomas Richards; the Presbyterian Hospital, by John McArthur Jr.; the Jewish Hospital, recently completed in North Phila‑ delphia by Frank Furness and George W. Hewitt; and the Roosevelt Hospital in New York. At the Board’s next meeting in May 1875, the Visiting Committee delivered its decision: “The plans of The Jewish Hospital more nearly accorded with our wants than any of those visited, and that in the committee’s judgment, a building

the group with specific designs for a hospital in Camden (see Sidebar, “A Hospital in the Nineteenth Century”).

Very quickly, a number of important events took place. The Board turned to one of its own Visiting Committee members and a member of the Cooper family to design the hospital: Joseph B. Cooper, a cousin to Richard and William. A self-taught architect, the former carpenter and builder had formed a partnership with Hibberd Yarnall after the Civil War, contracting for buildings in

to accommodate about fifty beds would meet the wants of the Camden Hospital for many years.”

The Jewish Hospital, as it turned out, was the smallest and most concisely arranged of the four hospitals studied by the committee, a fact that appealed to the Board.

The Cooper family members had made it clear that they did not want an ostentatious building designed in honor of their deceased brothers, and the plans for the Jewish Hospital Camden Hospital incorporation papers. reflected their desire for simple, straight and around Philadelphia. Eventually, another lines. The Jewish Hospital was designed as cousin, John Cooper, joined the architec‑ a single building, with administrative offices tural firm of Yarnall and Cooper. The Camden in the front and lengthy ward wings in the Hospital, if the Board approved, would back; this design was certainly less expensive be the firm’s largest and most important than, say, Presbyterian Hospital, which project to date. consisted of clusters of individual buildings.

Paying great attention to detail, Joseph The Board requested that the committee, Cooper drafted the early hospital design after further consideration, report back to onto a large linen cloth and presented the

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plans to the Board at its meeting on June 9, 1875. Before the meeting was adjourned, the Board voted to accept the general ideas put forth, and said, “On behalf of Yarnall and Cooper, architects and builders, plans and elevations for a hospital building, in accordance with the recommendation of the Committee on Hospitals just accepted, were presented and also a proposition from the said firm through Joseph B. Cooper, offering to superintend the erection of the same for $4,000 including the cost of plans, drawings, specifications and also offering gratuitously their experience and Cooper Deed, 1875 benefit of discernment with the various trades in purchasing and contracting for all materials required.” With the drawings nearly complete, the builders were hired to supervise the project for a fee of $4,000.

Following a rather short meeting in June, the Board of Managers met again on July 5. Before the Board adjourned, it was clear that the dream of Richard and William Cooper was in capable hands. John Wright announced during the meeting that the Cooper family had given to the Board the land where the hospital would be built. The gift included nearly five prime acres of land from Mickle to Benson, from Sixth to Seventh; the sisters gave four-fifths of the land, and Alexander gave the rest. Stevens Street, which ran smack through the property, had already been closed by a special act of the Camden City Council.

According to Wright, the two sisters also had decided to donate $200,000 to the Board. They stipulated that $95,000 be used to build the hospital, with the balance of $105,000 remaining as an endowment fund. This endowment fund would be invested in approved interest-bearing securities, and the interest from the money would be used to cover the operating expenses of the hospital. This way, the hospital would be open without charge to the poor people of Camden.

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Before adjourning, the Board members A Hospital Is Built in Camden tossed around various comments concerning For an idea of the activity in the months the exterior stone of the building. Was ahead, the nuts and bolts of building a Chester dark and gray stone—available hospital are detailed in the minutes of the from the nearby Leiperville quarries—really Board’s meetings: “Progress in grading and what they wanted? Did they make the right flooring . . . plastering nearly completed . . decision when they approved its use at last . plastering now completed, the plumbing month’s meeting? For the serious and nearly and wood work nearly so . . . Extended to always reticent Board members, the talk Yarnall and Cooper $5,000 . . . Satisfactory seemed chatty and progress.” Within a year, casual, as though they For the first time, as the the hospital’s wonderful were finally getting used meeting came to a close, stone facade faced Sixth to the idea that they Street. When the neigh‑ there was a finality were building a hospital. borhood children stood

about their For the first time, as the meeting came to a close, there was a finality about their mission.

They had a design, beautifully drawn on linen paper. They had land, a choice square in the outreaches of Camden City, near the proposed city hall, close to transportation lines and in a neighborhood of prestigious homes. And they had enough money to realize it all.

With the conclusion of this meeting, clear roles had been established in the Cooper family. There were the twins, Richard and William, hereafter called the projectors of the Camden Hospital, the ones who dreamed of hospital plans but died before they were drawn on paper. In another role were Alexander, Elizabeth, and Sarah Cooper. They were the endowers, the ones who endowed the dream with money and land, the ones who took the broad sketches of their brothers’ dream and made them come alive.

mission.

and looked through the gateposts, they saw a magnificent building, one that seemed to contradict the Board’s instructions that “all needless ornament and expense” be avoided (see Sidebar, “The Design of Camden’s First Hospital”).

On October 2, 1876, the Board made its first mention of “applications” for resident physician, matron, superintendent, watchman, janitor, and engineer. No longer just an imposing structure of stone and plaster, the Camden Hospital now began to figure prominently in people’s lives and futures as the Board began accepting applications from those who wanted to work there.

And on December 4, 1876, the Board resolved that “a committee be appointed to inquire of the family of the late William D. Cooper whether a name change from the Camden Hospital to the Cooper Hospital would meet with their approval, it being

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Invoice showing full payment of $94,753.21 for the original hospital, November 6, 1877.

the unanimous opinion of the Board of Managers that such change would be suitable and proper and in accordance with popular expression on the subject.” The Board appointed John Wright and Charles Stratton to visit the family, to “inquire” if the family would approve a new hospital name. Wright reported back to the Board on January 8, 1877, that

the family had responded “favorably” to the name change, and the Board took all immediate legal steps to make the switch. The state legislature approved the new name on March 6, 1877, and the Board announced its revised corporate title during its April meeting.

It was official. Camden’s first hospital would be called the Cooper Hospital.

On November 5, 1877, the Board’s committee on property and building announced that the hospital building had been completed according to plans. The grounds were graded, laid out with trees and an occasional shrub, and enclosed with a stick and wedge fence.Yarnall and Cooper presented the final bill: total cost, $90,753.21; commission, $4,000; total, $94,753.21. The Board had already advanced $90,400 to the Yarnall and Cooper account, which left a balance of $4,353.21. Three days after receiving the invoice, the bill was paid in full.

On motion, the Board agreed to hire Charles Williams and pay him $30 a month to live in the building and take care of the hospital grounds. In subse‑ quent meetings, applications from several doctors were “read and ordered filed,” as were applications for the positions of janitor, watchman, nurse, and matron.

The kinks in the sophisticated ventilation system were worked out. And the keystone—the engraved stone bearing the initials “CH”—soon appeared over the front door.

Everything, it seemed, was in place. But the hospital did not open.

According to the conservative Board of Managers, there was not enough money to open the front doors. From the Board’s first meeting in 1878 the

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

A Hospital in the Nineteenth Century In the nineteenth century, the image brought to mind by the word “hospital” was death house, a place where one went to die. Medicine was still quite primitive, and hospitals generally developed around medical schools where the patients were more or less the students’ textbooks. As well-meaning as these early hospitals were, they were rife with infec‑ tions caused by a general lack of knowledge about sanitation, proper ventilation, the germ theory of disease, and proper sterile operating procedures. That these early hospitals were less than wholeheartedly embraced is an understatement: they were not trusted, and the sick generally preferred to stay at home, where family, doctors, and midwives took care of them.

“Poverty and dependence were the operational prerequisites for hospital admission,” wrote Charles E. Rosenberg, professor of history and sociology of science, University of Pennsylvania, the author of The Care of Strangers:The Rise of America’s Hospital System.

Sickness was a necessary but insufficient condition; aside from the occasional trauma victim, even the laborer or artisan preferred to be cared for at home if he had a home and family to provide that care. . . .The pre-bellum hospital was not burdened by a capital-intensive technology.There was little that could be done for a patient in the hospital that could not be provided equally well at home, at least if that home could provide food, warmth and care. And recovering at home, a patient would not be burdened by the stigma of having received charity and his or her family of having failed in their collective duty. Medical theory even suggested that a patient would do better psychologically in familiar surroundings; only the poorest would find the hospital an improvement over their normal situations.

For the poor, going to a hospital was also better than going to the almshouse—a poor house that offered shelter and limited aid to everyone from the mentally ill to the termi‑ nally ill. And because the poor and not the rich were the first to be treated in hospitals, the architectural designs of early hospitals adopted a distinct element of style: Form, it seemed, followed function. Since the patients were poor, it was determined that they needed few of the luxuries of the upper class. They certainly didn’t need private rooms, and long stretches of wards were developed. In a ward, a patient typically rested in a single iron bed with a chair placed at the footboard. Sometimes, a gaslight hung on the wall over the bed, and the next bed was literally an arm’s length away. The patient was exposed to any number of infectious conditions carried by his or her fellow ward mates, but the close proximity of the ward beds was a convenience for doctors and nurses. The patients were segregated by sex, and cloth screens were often provided if a doctor wanted to examine a patient in private.

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minutes clearly show how the members were concerned with money, or rather, the lack of it. On January 7, 1878, the Board reported that interest on endowment fund investments realized $4,753.69 during the previous year; already, the Board had determined that the investments must yield $6,000 in yearly income to support the operation of the hospital and provide free care to all the patients who needed it, which was a strict requirement of the Cooper family. The Board members no doubt studied the figures again and again, trying to determine how to expand the principal or make it earn more interest. The Board members According to the conservative would not consider opening a hospital Board of Managers, there was that was not solvent; to do so would not enough money to open the be contrary to its own conservative nature and totally against the established front doors. business practices of the day. In the late 1870s it was almost unheard of to operate a business in debt. The Quaker businessmen wanted no part of it.

The Board continued to meet, but little if any new business was discussed.

During the summer, the Board received this nugget of depressing news: effective July 4, 1878, the interest rate on the hospital’s endowment fund investments had dropped from 7 percent to 6 percent. Under the new rate, the revenue from the endowment fund investments dropped even further, below the rates for 1877.

For nearly a year, the Board debated the financial status of the hospital. Always, the decision was the same: there simply wasn’t enough money to run the hospital.

On May 5, 1879, the Board of Managers met and decided that it was “best to further postpone the day of opening until the income was sufficiently increased by a reinvestment of interest to guarantee a surplus over the operating expenses.”

Matron-elect Mary Cruth was advised to seek other employment.

For ten years, caretaker Charles Williams was the only person to ever spend the night in the building.

And Cooper Hospital stood like an albatross—an empty, stately albatross that cast its imposing shadow over the unpaved streets of Camden.

A Five-Year Delay for a Hospital to Open For five years, no one said a word.

There were occasional inquiries to the Board of Managers from various physicians

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Hospital grounds with church under construction, 1880s.

(“for the use of a room at the hospital for practical demonstrations in anatomy”) and the usual response (“it was decided to return a negative answer thereto”).And early on, the Board voted to spend $425 to paint the exterior of the hospital building. But from April 5, 1880, to March 2, 1885, the Board of Managers of the Cooper Hospital did not meet.There was not even a Board meeting to recognize the contri‑ butions of Sarah West Cooper, who was one month shy of seventy-nine years old when she died on August 31, 1880.

Sarah Cooper’s death was a sad loss for the family and for the city of Camden.

A kind person, she gave time and money to the Home for the Friendless Children in Camden, frequently sent money to her less fortunate siblings, and directed in her will that money be set aside for the mainte‑ nance of the family burial plot in Evergreen Cemetery. There were many times over the years when she seemed lost in the shadow of her younger, more aggressive sister, particularly when it came to real estate. It

Chapter 2 / A Building, a Delay, and a Hospital in Camden

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seemed that Sarah cared not a whit for houses and properties, and had sold most of her vast real estate holdings to her sister during the last several years of her life. When she died, Sarah left Elizabeth the interest of $25,000 during her natural life, with instructions that the principal sum revert to the hospital after Elizabeth’s death. Elizabeth and Alexander buried their sister in the family plot, in a grave just behind the tombstones that marked the graves of Richard and William.

When Sarah died and left Elizabeth a sizeable inheritance—money that the surviving sister certainly didn’t have to depend on—several questions surfaced that eventually begged for answers. Why didn’t the surviving Coopers just donate enough money so the hospital could open? Why did the family spend nearly $95,000 to build a hospital, and then watch as it stood empty? Even if the endowment fund wasn’t producing enough interest income to support the operation of the hospital, so what? The surviving Coopers had substantial financial resources that could have been used to either increase the principal in the endowment fund (and therefore the interest payments) or pay the difference between interest income and the cost of running the hospital. With such resources at their fingertips, no one could understand why the Coopers allowed a new, thirty-bed hospital to stand dormant, empty at a time when Camden had no hospital and desperately needed one. Consider: In 1880 and 1881 the city barely survived a typhus epidemic (a 32 percent mortality rate), a smallpox epidemic (a 19 percent mortality rate), and outbreaks of diphtheria and scarlet fever. Still, the hospital remained closed.

It wouldn’t have been so difficult, so unsettling, perhaps, if the hospital had never even been built. The empty building was a constant reminder that the hospital was going to waste. The Civil War Soldier Memorial—an architectural obelisk that stood in the hospital background after it was dedicated in 1873— had more visitors than Cooper. Just across the street, city hall was completed.

This previously undeveloped corner of Camden was poised to become what was later described as “the civic center of an enlarged Camden.” After all, Camden was flourishing in the 1880s. J. B.Van Sciver and Company was open for business at 210 Federal Street, with an imposing Chippendale breakfront in the display window. The Joseph Campbell Company was a sprawling venture, taking over a good five city blocks. Munger and Long’s Department Store was thriving, as were local banks. The shipyards and factories were growing, partly due to Camden’s promise of employment and salaries for the thousands of transients who passed through the city after the Civil War. Too, the Camden City Council was about to

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

The Design of Camden’s First Hospital The first new hospital building in Camden was 224 feet long and 46 feet wide, four stories tall, and crowned by a mansard roof nearly bursting with dormers. Richly carved cornices extended around the base of the mansard, and the exterior walls fairly danced with the random, crazy-quilt pattern of dark stones held together with mortar. The symmetrical baroque stairways, one on either side of the hospital entrance, rose gracefully to the covered portico on the second floor. The double-paneled front door was massive and difficult to lock; indeed, the key to the front door of the hospital was eventually lost. In the evening sky, myriads of chimneys and ventilating stacks rose above the dormers and created a rooftop silhouette, the likes of which Camden had never seen.

The design may have seemed fanciful, but in reality it was practical.

Original Cooper Hospital building, c. 1893

“Nineteenth-century hospital theory held that air which had been breathed by other patients was unhealthful, ‘vitiated,’ in their word,” wrote architectural historian George Thomas of the Clio Group of Philadelphia. He continued, From that they agreed that maximum ventilation was essential to good care.Thus the ward rooms had immense windows reaching nearly from floor to ceiling. Heating and ventilating systems were also incorporated with great fireplaces at the corners of the wards, and in the ward sitting rooms.The walls were honeycombed with ventilating chases, lined with steam pipes that warmed air brought directly from the outside.Those chimneys, and ventilating stacks, poked through the roof, making a fantastical roof line of massive chimneys and clustered stacks, centered around a great belvedere crowned by a pyramidal roof.

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name the members of a citywide Board of Health, a move toward a healthier and cleaner city.

Though Cooper Hospital was without question the first hospital built in Camden, it would not be the first to open. Backed by a group of Camden’s homeopathic physicians, the Camden Homeopathic Hospital and Dispensary Association opened on March 2, 1885, in a rented building at the corner of Fourth and Arch streets. According to historical accounts by George R. Prowell and published in The History of Camden County, physicians treated over 1,300 patients in the dispensary and 114 medical and surgical patients in the hospital during its first year of operation. “This institution, being the only place at present open in Camden for the care of the sick and injured, has been crowded from its start,” wrote Prowell. “Its management has been obliged to refuse so many applications for aid, that for the past year they have been seriously consid‑ ering the question of the erection of a large and suitable building.”

Enough was certainly enough. The Board of Managers of Cooper Hospital, minus two members who had died since the group last met, voted to “set in motion a plan for opening the hospital.” On June 20, 1887, the Board of Managers adopted the “Rules for the Government of the Cooper Hospital,” a sixteen-page document of rules and regulations for the entire hospital staff.

By now, the endowment fund was more than sufficient to run the thirty-bed hospital, with interest and reinvestments now totaling more than $185,000.

A flurry of activity was soon taking place at the long-silent Cooper. Workers repaired the front and rear porches, and built an exterior, iron fire escape before patients could be admitted. They built a new boiler plant and laundry behind the hospital, on the southeast corner of the property; the building’s towering brick chimney could be seen throughout the south ward of Camden, and the laundry was connected to the main building by way of an underground tunnel.

There was work to be done inside the hospital, too. In all, the new laundry and boiler plant, new steam fittings, and plumbing repairs cost $30,516.46. The Board spent another $3,671.24 for furniture and bedding to supply the two wards and scattered offices. By now, ironically, money didn’t even seem to be an immediate concern. After a ten-year wait, Elizabeth had decided to again be generous. On July 4, 1887, the Board announced that Elizabeth had donated an additional $50,000 to the hospital: the $25,000 bequeathed to her by Sarah and another $25,000 from her own coffers.

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

The Board appointed three surgeons, four physicians, and one pathologist to the hospital staff. The chief nurse reported that she had “engaged assistant nurses who would report for duty in time for the opening.” The grand opening was postponed for one week so the wooden ventilation ducts in the hospital could be replaced by ones made of galvanized iron, a precaution that made the air cleaner and safer. The Board mailed one thousand printed invita‑ tions to people living in and around Camden, including a host of leading doctors in the medical community. According to the

Board minutes, the hospital grounds were spruced up a bit, and the pharmacy was well stocked by A. P. Brown, “a capable apoth‑ ecary of Camden. In every respect, so far as the committee was concerned, the hospital buildings and grounds were ready to be opened for public service on Monday next.”

And so it did.

On Monday, August 8, 1887, promptly at two o’clock in the afternoon, Cooper Hospital opened for the first time for the public’s inspection. The press accounts of the event were positively glowing. The Camden Daily Courier reported that

Original hospital building completed in 1877. The first powerhouse built at same time proved inadequate and was replaced by the building at the right in 1886.

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Fully two thousand people took advantage of the opportunity offered yesterday afternoon for seeing the inside of the institution that stood apparently useless for so many years. . . .The visitors during the afternoon comprised of all the prominent physicians of the city . . . including the entire staff of the Homeopathic Hospital, city officials and business men, besides a large number from other cities and the surrounding country, many of whom were accompanied by ladies.They one and all expressed the one opinion, that the institution was as near perfection as was possible, especially regarding the sanitary arrangements.

The West Jersey Press noted that “after the building had been thoroughly looked over a number of the guests repaired to the managers’ room” on the main floor of the hospital for a dedication service. Here, John Wright introduced Peter L. Voorhees, a distinguished lawyer and the only non-Quaker member of the Board of Managers. When the assembled crowd was reasonably quiet,Voorhees delivered

City plot showing the hospital, city hall, and the Third Regiment Armory, which was built across the street from the hospital in 1885.

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

a dedication speech that was at once both simple and eloquent.

“Fellow citizens,” Voorhees began, We have assembled for the purpose of dedicating or setting apart for their appropriate use these grounds and

forget, the projectors of the institution were represented, too. On the walls directly over the mantels in the oak-paneled room hung two oil portraits: one of Dr. Cooper and one of William Cooper.

Voorhees continued, taking a few moments to thank the Board of Managers:

buildings, and their appliances, to the aid, care and help of such invalid and

It has been no small undertaking to

needy persons as the circumstances of

manage the details of the trust and

accident and disease may require. . . . It

carry to completion these buildings

is not an infirmary or home for valetu-

and their appliances, to furnish them

dinarians. It is a hospital, where the

for the occupation of patients. What

sufferers from accident or calamities, or

shall I say more? Today and now we

those subjects of disease whose means

give to the use of all the suffering

cannot procure proper medicines or

ones of our State these grounds, these

attention, may come and receive care.

buildings, these appliances to be used to the full extent of their capacity,

Voorhees outlined the magnanimous contributions of the Cooper family, giving equal credit to all. Indeed, he saluted Richard and William Cooper as the projectors of “this magnificent charity,” and described Elizabeth, Sarah, and Alexander as the donors and the endowers. It was evident from the beginning of his speech that he perceived the hospital as the work of an entire family, with no one individual playing a starring role in its development. It could be reasoned that Voorhees took his cue for such a speech from several people sitting in the front row of the dedication circle: Elizabeth, now eighty-three years old; and Alexander, his wife, and their four children, including a son named Richard Matlack. John Wright sat behind Voorhees. And lest anyone

in accordance with the desires of the projectors and endowers of this institution, alleviating the pains and curing the disease of our fellow man.

This institution will stand when you, my friends, and I, shall be gathered to our fathers, and will ever, as it stands, tell in more eloquent terms than I, of the goodness, kindness and love of its projectors and endowers.

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Original hospital building as seen at Benson Street entrance, c. 1900.

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Growing Pains From 1887 to 1919, Cooper Hospital Is Established

S

even people came to Cooper Hospital for treatment on Wednesday, August 10, 1887,

the day the hospital officially opened. According to the Camden Daily Courier, “Cooper Hospital is doing good work.” The next day, the hospital staff recorded two more firsts on its second full day accepting patients: a morning operation to remove a tumor, and the admission of the first overnight patient.

According to hospital records, Martin Kenney was the first person to be admitted overnight at Cooper Hospital.The twenty-three-year-old Irish immigrant was diagnosed with intermittent fever and taken to the men’s ward on the second floor, where he rested on a mattress covered with clean white sheets and a simple cotton blanket. No doubt, Kenney had few if any visitors. He was single, and his closest relative was a sister named Maria who lived in New York. On his admission papers, Kenney listed his occupation as “laborer” and gave his address as 102 Bridge Avenue.

Dr. Alexander M. Mecray, one of eight physi‑ cians on Cooper’s first staff, took care of Kenney (see Sidebar, “The First Staff and First Residents of Cooper Hospital”). At Dr. Mecray’s side was a young nurse, dressed in a starched blue-and-white-striped uniform with mutton sleeves, covered by an equally starched white apron. She wore her hair pinned up, covered with a cap.The nurse, under the keen eye of Matron Jeannie Wilson, would strictly adhere to the Rules for the Government of the hospital. Indeed,

Women’s Ward, c. 1887

this little gray bible of hospital protocol instructed that all Cooper nurses were “expected to remain standing when speaking to the Physicians and while they are in the wards, and to conform strictly to the uniform worn in the Hospital. No jewelry is to be worn.”

Kenney may have been the first patient admitted to the hospital on August 11, 1887, but the Camden Daily Courier reported that many more sought the hospital’s help. According to the newspaper account, Cooper Hospital was, from the day it opened, “besieged by people known to the profession as ‘hospital beats.’ These are persons who make the rounds of the hospitals, staying at each as long as possible.

Sometimes they are inflicted with incurable diseases, or they may only pretend to be afflicted.”

The hospital’s Board of Managers moved quickly to gain control of the situation.

After all, as Voorhees had pointed out in his dedication speech, Cooper Hospital was “not an infirmary or home for valetudinarians,” a Victorian-era word meaning persons excessively concerned with their poor health, namely hypochondriacs. According to

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

The First Staff and First Residents of Cooper Hospital Cooper Hospital opened with eight doctors on staff. There were four physicians: Dr. H. Genet Taylor, the son-in-law of Alexander Cooper and the son of Dr. Othniel H. Taylor; Dr. Alexander M. Mecray; Dr. D. P. Pancoast; and Dr. William A. Davis. There were four surgeons: Dr. E. L. B. Godfrey, Dr. Onan B. Gross, Dr. J. F. Walsh, and Dr. R. Dowling Benjamin. And there was one pathologist, Joseph H. Wills. The duties of the medical and surgical staffs were outlined in Cooper’s government rule book; according to these rules, one physician and one surgeon made rounds “each day during the forenoon, and at such other times as may be necessary for the faithful performance of their duty.”

Two resident physicians reported to the doctors: Dr. Burr W. MacFarland and Dr. Harry Jarrett, recent graduates of a “regular medical college in good standing.” The residents lived in the hospital for free and were not allowed to accept fees from the patients. According to the rule book, the residents were required to “visit the patients under their charge in the various wards, at least every morning and evening, and frequently in severe or urgent cases, and administer to their relief to the best of their skill.” The residents were under the strict supervision of the physicians.

Jarrett, the first resident hired by the hospital, missed the hospital’s opening day because he was sick with “malarial fever” and in bed at his home in Norristown, Pennsylvania. Within a few days, though, he reported for work. Jarrett and MacFarland were good students, and real pranksters.

Apparently in fine spirits one afternoon, they took a life-sized skeleton from Dr. Benjamin’s office near the operating room.

Once outside, they put the skeleton between them, placed a straw hat on its skull, held its boney fingers in their own hands, and with concerned looks on their faces, posed for the camera.

In 2013 this picture of Jarrett and MacFarland is displayed in a corridor at Cooper that leads into the Roberts Pavilion, 126 years after Cooper’s first two CUH-021 residents posed for the photographer.

Dr. Burr W. MacFarland and Dr. Harry Jarrett, the first residents of Cooper Hospital.

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

47

the newspaper, in order to deal with the hospital beats, “Cooper Hospital has shut down severely on all such applications for admission.The rules forbid the admission of incurables or of persons having any infections, contagious or venereal disease, or mania a potu.”

Cooper did, of course, accept a range of patients needing care. As the newspaper reported, “Persons suffering from severe accidents shall be admitted to the hospital at all hours, the rules say, provided

“Cooper Hospital has shut down severely on all such applications for admission.”

—Peter L.Voorhees

the accident or injury happened in the State of New Jersey, and that the patient be brought to the hospital within twenty-four hours after its occur‑ rence. Other patients may be admitted between the hours of 10 a.m. and 12 M. [sic] on application to the Attending Physician or Surgeon on duty.

Although The Cooper Hospital is a free institution,

paid patients are admitted, and a number of private rooms are set apart for such.”

There were some early procedural problems to work out in the hospital. By November 7, 1887, the Board of Managers gave this report: It has been ascertained that some important rules for the government of the hospital were not being carried out by all the members of the medical staff, the secretary was directed to forward the following communications to the secretary of the medical staff with the request that he call a special meeting for the purpose of laying said communications before them: 1. A patient who is able or accustomed to pay for the services of a physician is not admissable on the charity of the Hospital. Such patients however may be admitted to a private apartment or to a public ward. Such patient, if he be in a private apartment, may have the medical attendance of any member of the attending medical staff of the hospital, but if he be in a public ward he must be under the sole charge of the attending physician or surgeon on duty.

2. No operation involving risk of life or limb shall be performed without previously making every possible effort to secure a consultation of all the attending surgeons, including a full examination of the patient, and a full discussion of the proposed operation.

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

The minutes do not discuss or even hint

may have been overlooked in the early stages

at the specific problems that prompted the

of operation, and that private patients did not

Board of Managers to make these decisions.

make appropriate “contributions.”

Concerning the first matter, the Board

Concerning the second issue, it seems

never intended that Cooper Hospital would

probable that the Board was concerned

provide “charity” care for any patient who

with reports of either unnecessary surgery

could afford to pay. Granted, the hospital

or surgery conducted without peer review

did not yet have a formal rate schedule, and

and consultation. Cooper clearly wanted

there is no mention of the word “payment”

neither. It was imperative in the early stages

in the hospital’s initial rule book. But any

of the hospital that all surgery be monitored.

patient admitted to a private bed was

After all, the hospital was primarily a surgical

required to pay for his or her medical care.

center because patients who needed anything

As stated in the rules, “Patients who desire

less still preferred to remain at home.The

private apartments, extra service or articles

early patient record books show that a great

not usually furnished in the Hospital, may

preponderance of patients were admitted

be accommodated upon their making such

for surgery. Indeed, it is rare when a patient’s

contribution to the Hospital funds as the

name is not followed by “date of surgery.”

Visiting Committee may deem reasonable in

It seems completely appropriate that

view of the extra accommodation furnished.”

the Board debated such procedural and

The Board’s action indicates that this policy

ethical questions at Cooper Hospital after only three months of operation.With few hospitals to study and emulate, the early days of Cooper were no doubt filled with procedural confusion in everything from ward admittance to surgical room protocol.

Early Board members questioned much and overlooked little. And they soon gave their full attention to two very important matters: the need for a nurses’ training school and an outpatient department.

When it opened, Cooper operated with fewer than twelve nurses.The hospital needed more. It seemed, too, that Cooper

Alexander M. Mecray, MD, member of the first medical staff at Cooper, with his son, Paul M. Mecray, MD, resident physician, c. 1892.

needed nurses who were trained in the hospital, by the hospital’s own staff. On

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

49

Inside Camden’s First Hospital The ten-year wait to open Cooper Hospital did not spell disaster for the architectural plan of Yarnall and Cooper. Indeed, the hospital design based primarily on the Jewish Hospital in Philadelphia held its own during the long interlude. Consider, for a moment, how the hospital looked inside.

According to architectural reports, the ground or basement level provided support spaces for what architects would later call “service space” for the blue-collar workers. In front, on the south side of the administrative section, were the professional employees’ dining rooms, while the north side contained the matron’s office and a waiting room. During the first winter the hospital was open, Matron Wilson lived here with her only daughter (Mrs. Wilson had asked that her daughter be allowed to live at the hospital until she married in the spring; the Board unanimously approved the request). To the rear, past a broad corridor that opened through wide doors onto the grounds, stood the washrooms, pantry, storerooms, kitchen, and dining room for the help. A bakery with a great oven occupied the last third of the long ward wing.

Historians have noted that the hospital interior reflected the era’s own stiff protocol for respect to social positions and hierarchy. The professional staff and the head matron shared common space that rose floor by floor through the front or administrative block, which also contained a few private patient rooms. The nonprofessional staff had their spaces and dining room under the ward wing, which, not surprisingly, housed the indigent patients. The baker’s room was set apart from the other staff, suggesting what historian George Thomas later called a “distinct mid-level status for such artisans of the flour bin.” The original laundry room had been moved to the new power and laundry building, to the southeast of the original building.

From the basement, a black cast-iron stairway led to the second floor, which was actually the main floor. The front, arched doorway opened into a vestibule, followed by a second set of doors that opened on the left into the Board of Managers’ room. Next came a corridor with tall ceilings and expansive windows, set back just a few yards from the rest of the building to create a narrow hall. Just past this corridor were two additional rooms—an apothecary on the left and the resident surgeon’s office on the right. This adjunct corridor space continued out of the administration block and into another transitional space that contained wardrobes and washrooms. At this point, the building again broadened. There was a stairway on the north side and an elevator on the south side, followed by a nurses’ office and several work spaces.

At the very end of the corridor was the entrance for the men’s ward.

The male ward, much like the women’s ward just above it, was a veritable runway of undistinguished space with two rows of white iron beds set up along opposite walls. Patients

50

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

faced into the middle of the room. A small table stood between each bed, and there was a wooden chair at the footboard. Patients’ charts hung from a hook on the wall behind their beds, placed just beneath a gaslight so the nurses could easily read them at night. Two sets of double-paneled shutters covered each window. Behind the glass-paneled doors at the end of the ward, patients enjoyed a dining room, a large sitting room, and a rather delightful sunporch that wrapped into a threesided bay window.

The women’s ward on the back portion of the third floor was nearly identical to the men’s ward.

The beds were divided into two long rows that faced each other, a table between each bed. Unlike the plain wooden chairs in the men’s ward, the chairs in this ward were painted white. The front portion of the third floor contained private rooms and an operating room. Much like the operating room at Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia,

the Cooper operating room was situated in this lofty area to make use of various skylights and spaces that opened through to the fourth-floor ceiling; this way, sunlight was cast directly onto the operating table. The side elevator was used to take the patients back to the second floor as soon as the operation was over; the floor plan left no space for a recovery room.

The fourth floor contained storage space and cramped but adequate bedrooms for the nurses. The entire building was heated by steam, a system that incorporated the necessary venti‑ lation structure, which in turn helped the hospital fight infection. The new laundry building was big enough to provide “disinfection and mattress picking rooms ventilated into the boiler stack.” A mortuary “for the preparation and preservation of pathological specimens” was located in the gatehouse alongside Mickle Street.

The men’s ward was situated much like the women’s ward with two rows of white iron beds set along opposite walls with the patients facing into the middle of the room.

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

51

November 20, 1887, the Board of Managers ruled “on the motion of Dr. Benjamin [Dr. R. Dowling Benjamin, one of Cooper’s first surgeons] that a committee be appointed to formulate a plan for establishing a school for training nurses in connection with The Cooper Hospital.”

Next, the Board looked to the issue of outpatients, those patients who showed up at Cooper’s front door and needed medical assistance but not hospitalization.

By December 1887 the problem of admitting outpatients “without method” was acknowledged by the Board. Barely four months into operation, the hospital was simply not equipped to admit patients who would not be staying overnight.There were no waiting rooms, no examination rooms, and no regular schedule for doctors to be present and look after these patients.The nurses and residents already had their hands full with the thirty ward patients, not to mention the few private patients.

It was immediately proposed that some sort of clinic or “out door” or “out-patient” department be established.

Cooper’s First Year of Operations From August 11, 1887, to December 31, 1888, Cooper Hospital treated 370 patients; 45 of the patients died, and an additional 16 deaths were accounted for as the “number of patients whose cases were hopeless when admitted and who died shortly after admission.” Each patient stayed an average of 19.3 days.There were 165 medical cases and 205 surgical. In the Outpatient Department, there were 663 medical cases and 603 surgical.

One of Cooper’s first surgeons, Dr. E. L. B. Godfrey, wrote a history about the hospital’s early days. “As soon as the wards of the Cooper Hospital were thrown open to patients,” Dr. Godfrey noted, “the members of the attending medical and surgical staff were confronted with the gravest medical and surgical problems.” From August 1887 to December 31, 1888, 70 operations were performed in the building, with nearly a third of the operations involving an amputation. Of these surgical patients, 51 were discharged as cured, One of the first Tabular Statements written by residents to report number of patients admitted.

52

and the remaining 19 died.The statistics on those who died are not pretty.They included a breast

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Men’s Ward, c. 1897

When the hospital overflowed with patients, beds were often moved to the outside porch to allow more space.

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

53

The Deaths of a Hospital Founder and a Supporter It is not known when Elizabeth Cooper made her last visit to Cooper Hospital, or if she ever sought care in the hospital her family made possible. On October 21, 1888, at her home on 121 Cooper Street, Elizabeth Cooper died of pulmonary exhaustion, another name for pneumonia. She was eighty-three years old.

Though her name was not listed in the original family plot at Evergreen Cemetery, Elizabeth was buried there, in a prominent position right beside William on the edge of the plot. Her vast estate incorporated many of the choice real estate holdings in Camden, most of it inherited from her father, her two brothers, and her sister Sarah. Elizabeth left the majority of her estate to her nephew John Wright; she instructed that if he died “without issue,” the proceeds of the estate would go to Cooper Hospital. Elizabeth left her servants, Bridget Carr and Thomas Jones, “each the sum of one hundred dollars on condition that they continue to be in my employment at the time of my decease.” Too, she left fifteen thousand dollars in a special trust, and directed that the interest be paid “yearly and every year to Eliza Glover Jenkins (who has resided with me as a friend and companion for a number of years).” When Eliza Jenkins died, the principal would be forwarded to Cooper Hospital.

Elizabeth Cooper’s obituary noted that she had “a retiring disposition and manner. She made no display of her benevolence, but in acts not words did all that was possible in her sphere.

Elizabeth Cooper, c. 1888 Her ancestors laid down the plan of the town of Camden, but it remained for her to perpetuate the name in an institution whose doors open wide at the call of the suffering and distressed, and within whose walls the poor and the needy are cared for without money and without price. She with her brothers have, in The Cooper Hospital, a monument that will serve to keep alive their memories so long as a vestige of the edifice shall stand.”

Two years after Elizabeth Cooper died, John Wright, the seemingly favorite nephew of the Cooper founders, passed away, too. He died on January 26, 1890, in Colorado Springs after a “lingering illness of nearly two years.” When Wright died, the Board of Managers lost its meticulous Secretary, whose legible handwriting recorded the early days of the hospital.

“Be it resolved,” the Board announced, “that in the death of John W. Wright this Board has lost a valued and respected member and the community a useful, influential and philan‑ thropic citizen.”

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Surgeons in early operating room.

amputation, several railroad injuries, three

doctors would see nonemergency cases from

amputations at the thigh, one amputation of

10 a.m. to 11 a.m.; cases that required surgery

both thighs, and one amputation of both arm

would be routinely handled from 11 a.m. to

and thigh. One patient died from “exhaustion

noon.There was no official building for this

following an exploratory laparotomy for

“out-patient department,” but the tradition

carcinoma,” or cancer, hospital records show.

of treating patients who did not have to be

An operation for a “pseudo aneurism of the

hospitalized was officially established. Before

forearm” was successful, but the patient died

long, three outpatient clinics designed for

from shock.

medical, surgical, and gynecological patients

When the hospital released these

(the last one was originally called the “clinic

statistics, the Board of Managers also decided

for the diseases of women”) operated in the

to act on both the outpatient and nursing

basement of the hospital.

school dilemmas. In early 1888 the hospital

By the end of 1888, after consulting many

established “office hours” for patients who

times with Dr. Benjamin, the Board approved

needed medical attention but did not need

“The Training School for Nurses at the

to be admitted. Every day but Monday, the

Cooper Hospital.” Throughout the coming

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

55

Nurses and others on the front lawn of Cooper Hospital.

year, the Board studied plans and considered training procedures for the new school.

In 1889 the Board of Managers finally completed its plans to open the nursing school.

Borrowing from the earlier suggestions of Dr. Onan B. Gross, the Board had agreed that Cooper’s attending staff would also be the faculty of the training school and provide lectures in twelve different topics. On October 4, 1889, the Board voted to provide a “room, desk, chairs, skeleton, manikin, blackboard for the purpose of the teachers which lecture the pupil nurses in the hospital . . .They shall have regular courses of lectures, which lectures should be delivered twice a week. . . .” The students were also expected to work in the wards, and to assist the doctors and nurses in the care of the private patients.

At Dr. Godfrey’s suggestion, the nursing school opened at Cooper in cooper‑ ation with the Camden City Medical Society, and its members often assisted in providing lectures. Some of the early lectures and topics included Dr. Godfrey on “Medical Nursing,” Dr. Benjamin on “Obstetrical Nursing,” Dr. Daniel Strock on “Dietetics,” and Dr. Gross, another Cooper surgeon, on “Anatomy and Physi‑ ology.” The first courses were offered to four students in the spring and fall of 1890. When the school began, there was no tuition; in fact, the students were trained free of charge in exchange for working at Cooper, and their free labor

56

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

helped keep operations costs down. The

increase,” the Board reported. The

student nurses could not be married when

annual report emphasized the need for

they entered the school, and they would

“a building for the outpatient department,

be dismissed if they married while they

entirely separate from the Hospital proper,

were in training. The first students lived in

containing a receiving ward; an isolated ward

sparse accommodations on the fourth floor

for the care of such contagious cases as may

of the hospital.

develop and a fund for providing a library,

The first class of four nursing students graduated from Cooper in 1890 under

both profes‑

It should be pointed out that the hospital of the late 1890s continued to play a marginal role in caring for the sick.

sional and literary, for the use of the officers and nurses.”

the supervision

It should

of Miss Rachael Bourke, the new superin‑

be pointed out that the hospital of the

tendent of the training school. In the coming

late 1890s continued to play a marginal

years, the graduation ceremonies would

role in caring for the sick. In an article

include guest speakers and special awards

titled “The American Hospital Roots of

for distinguished students. Eventually, a new

Conflict,” medical and hospital historian

tradition began at Cooper: each nursing

Charles Rosenberg explained that nearly

school graduate received an armful of

every aspect of the hospital’s operation

beautiful, long-stemmed red roses.

was unsophisticated, from medicine to

In 1892 the Board of Managers started

management. Wrote Rosenberg,

another tradition. That vanguard of financial spreadsheets—the annual report—was

Lay trustees still felt it was their duty

published at the end of the year for the first

to oversee every aspect of the hospi-

time in the hospital’s history, a ninety-two-

tal’s internal life. Physicians could

page booklet that described the first five

do little to intervene in the patient’s

years of hospital operations. From opening

biological reality and almost as little to

day to December 31, 1892, according to

shape the quality of life on the ward.

this annual report, Cooper Hospital treated

Nurses and attendants could not be

1,871 patients in the wards and 11,671

presumed to identify with medical

patients in the Outpatient Department, with

men and medical values, and available

a total of 25,287 different visits.

therapeutics could ordinarily do little to

“As the work grows, the needs

alter the course of a patient’s illness or

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

57

Class of 1893, Cooper Hospital Training School for Nurses. Hospital staff in back, Dr. Onan B. Gross, far right. the quality of his hospital experience. Stays were lengthy and most inpatients were not critically ill; keeping moribund patients alive was simply not an option.

Cooper Hospital continued to struggle to meet the needs of the community when, in late April 1893, the Board regretfully announced the death of its President, Alexander Cooper.The eighty-four-year-old gentleman farmer, who liked nothing more than a day of farming when he wasn’t directing the course of Cooper Hospital, had died suddenly on April 29, 1893.The Board pointed out that before he died, Alexander Cooper was “the last survivor of that family of brothers and sisters to whose beneficence it owes its existence.” Elizabeth Cooper had passed away in 1888, and nephew John Wright died in 1890 (see Sidebar, “The Deaths of a Hospital Founder

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Setting the Record Straight: A Family Affair When the Camden County Medical Society gathered to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary on February 11, 1896, Augustus Reeve, Cooper’s second Board President, provided tours of Cooper Hospital for the society members. That evening, in an eloquent speech which recognized all of the founders of Cooper Hospital, Reeve paid tribute to the entire Cooper family.

The day began at Cooper Hospital. According to records, “A pleasant half hour was passed in conversation and examination of the hospital building, following which the Board of Managers ushered their guests into the dining room, where an elaborate luncheon was enjoyed.” All the Board members were present. After the one o’clock luncheon, the physicians decided to pose for a group picture on the south side of the hospital, in the ivy-covered nook of the stone building.

Among those who posed for the portrait were many of Camden’s most distinguished physicians, including Onan B. Gross, Grant E. Kirk, Taylor, Godfrey, Benjamin, and Henry Huber Sherk.

The doctors then made their way to an afternoon of “public exercises” at the Temple Theater in Camden. Here, with much music and fanfare, the group presented the busts of the founders of the society—Dr. Richard Matlack Cooper and Dr. Othniel Hart Taylor. These two physicians, everyone recognized, had done more than any other doctors to bring organized medical services to the poor of Camden. After the presentation and appropriate speeches, a six-course dinner began with appetizers of raw oysters, followed by celery and aspic soup flavored with sherry, quail on toast with watercress, Saratoga chips, chicken salad a la medicale, and venison. Appropriate wines were served throughout dinner, followed by an assortment of fancy dessert cakes, ices, and champagne. Coffee, chocolates, and cigars were being offered as Reeve walked to the podium and delivered a toast to the Cooper family: It has been a great pleasure for me to be present with you this evening.The members of this Society are making history, and I ask of you that the history should be a correct one. Perhaps you are not all aware of the exact condition of The Cooper Hospital, and I want to call your attention to this fact, that to Dr. Richard M. Cooper belongs, in a large measure, the honor of that institution . . . and not alone to Dr. Cooper belongs the honor and credit, but a great proportion of it belongs to two ladies.To Sarah Cooper and Elizabeth Cooper are due the honor of enabling us to make The Cooper Hospital what it is today, and what we hope to make it. By the means they placed at our disposal, we have been enabled to do what we have; and we therefore ask you that in the future you should give them the honor which is justly due them.

For a moment, the crowd of nearly one hundred physicians and friends was silent. Though the evening was designed to distinguish one member of the Cooper family, the development of the Cooper Hospital was, as Reeve pointed out, a family affair. Richard, William, Elizabeth, Sarah, Alexander, and their nephew John were equal partners in their commitment to build Cooper Hospital, a family allegiance reflected in the wording of their wills to “share and share alike.” The projectors and endowers acted as one body, not as individuals. With his words on this occasion, Reeve put the notion forward as fact, to be recognized and recorded.

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

59

New Nurses’ Home built in 1903.

and a Supporter”). “In his death,” the Board announced, “this hospital has lost a most active and enthusiastic Trustee, who never tired of doing what he felt was for its best interests.”

Cooper Hospital Moves Forward without Its Founders After Alexander Cooper’s death, the Board of Managers elected Augustus Reeve, one of the charter members of the Board of Managers, to be the second President of the hospital. Reeve led a Board that now included Richard H. Reeve, Augustus Reeve’s nephew, who was Secretary and Treasurer; David M. Chambers; Rudolphus Bingham; Alexander C. Wood; Peter V.Voorhees; Richard M. Cooper (the son of Alexander Cooper); and Dr. H. Genet Taylor, who was married to Alexander Cooper’s daughter.

As head of the Board of Managers, Reeve did more than work to preserve the hospital’s past. During Reeve’s tenure as Board President, Cooper Hospital embarked on a building program that radically changed not only the way the

60

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

hospital looked but the services it offered.

architecture themes. At last, the nurses

Between 1903 and 1911, three major

moved from their cramped, fourth-floor

additions were made to the hospital, all

quarters in the main building to a home with

designed by Walter Smedley, an experienced

separate bedrooms and classrooms.

Philadelphia architect who designed a Quaker

The John W.Wright building, or the North

meetinghouse in Camden and the Friends

Wing, was the gift of Wright’s estate; Smedley

Hospital in Philadelphia, not to mention the

added this structure to the north side of the

Hotel Dennis in Atlantic City. In a departure

main building in 1907.The building triggered

from the original hospital structure, Smedley

the long-awaited expansion of the so-called

utilized newer construction systems of steel

Clinic for Diseases of Women with a new

frames and reinforced concrete in all three

Obstetrics Department, a women’s medical

buildings. In 1903 he built the new nurses’

ward, and an operating room.

home, a separate two-and-a-half-story building that borrowed from colonial revival

And in 1911 Smedley completed the outpatient building, some twenty years

New Nurses’ Home interior common room.

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

61

Outpatient Building, 1911

after the Cooper doctors first mentioned that it was “greatly needed.” The threestory wing, which joined the hospital on the south side of the original building, was the first addition to Cooper Hospital to be financed with money raised by “public subscription”; in other words, the Board of Managers appealed to the public for money to build the addition. By now, the Board recognized that the endowment fund was “barely sufficient to pay for the maintenance of the work” of the hospital, much less pay for costly expansions. By the end of the hospital’s first public campaign, generous donors had contributed nearly fifty thousand dollars, and the long-awaited outpatient building was completed.

The first floor of the new building housed medical and eye, nose, and throat clinics, as well as gynecological and surgical clinics.There was an ample waiting room, where up to sixty people could wait until the doctors could see them. On the second and third floors, private and semiprivate rooms were designed for the care of private patients.The hospital’s annual report noted that the new private patient rooms “will relieve the main building of the hospital of a great deal of congestion and enable us to take care of private patients to great advantage.”

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Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

This emphasis on rooms for private

rationale that in 1911 reflected the public’s

patients was something altogether new for a

changing attitude toward hospitals. As medical

hospital that was founded to provide medical

practices advanced and sanitary conditions in

care for the poor.The Board of Managers

hospitals improved, wealthier patients realized

recognized this seemingly incongruous turn of

that hospital care surpassed the quality of

events and offered several explanations to the

care they could receive at home; what was

public, all foreshadowing a desire to attract

once only good enough for the poor was now

private patients who could pay for their care:

actually preferred by the upper and middle classes. Again, form followed function in the

It may not at first appear that the

changing hospital design.Those who could

providing of facilities for the care of

afford to pay for their hospital visits wanted

private patients is in any sense a chari-

their own rooms, or at the very least they

table work, but careful consideration

wanted roommates who paid, too; a ward bed,

of the circumstances shows that it is

and a neighboring indigent patient, was not

a necessary part of the work, for the

considered acceptable.

As they began to embrace the medical

following reasons: First: In order to obtain the services

institution, this new class of paying hospital

of nurses in the training school, it is

patients was needed to support the hospital’s

necessary that the hospital care for

ever-expanding budget. “Clinical laboratories,

private patients in order that these

X-ray apparatus and more sophisticated

nurses may acquire the experience

surgical facilities inflated hospital expenses as

necessary in private work, which in many

they changed the hospital’s public image.” In

respects differs from that of the work of

a paper titled “The Shaping of the American

the wards.

Hospital” Rosenberg explained, “To alert

Second:The physicians of the staff

and ambitious physicians, the hospital was

who devote a great deal of time to

becoming the only appropriate place for the

visiting ward patients and attending

highest level of clinical practice.Their patients

the outpatient department without any

gradually came to share this view.”

recompense whatever, are greatly inter-

With the addition of the outpatient

ested in having facilities in the hospital

building, Cooper Hospital had more than

for the care of their private patients.

tripled the number of beds it had offered on opening day.The hospital grounds had

Had they chosen to do so, the Board of

changed, too.The original Cooper building,

Managers could have offered a third reason

a long stretch of a building on an expansive

for adding more private patient rooms, a

city block, was now flanked by additions on

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

63

both sides.The trees planted shortly after the hospital opened had grown tall and lush in the past two decades. Cooper Hospital looked like it belonged in a suburban environment with its shade trees, freshly cut lawns, and curving sidewalks.

Medical Advances Reflected at Cooper Inside the hospital, Cooper physicians were also making progress and advancing into new medical practices.

In the late 1890s Dr. Henry Hubert Sherk emerged as a well-known expert in cataract surgery.To train for the procedure, he had practiced for years on the delicate membranes of cows’ eyes, working to perfect his technique until he felt confident enough to operate on a human eye. Before surgery, he carefully sprinkled cocaine into the cloudy, diseased eye to numb it.Then, with a scalpel, he removed the cataract tissue and helped restore the patient’s vision.

Dr. H. Genet Taylor was responsible for the first issue of the Journal of the Medical Society of New Jersey, a monthly publication that debuted in September 1904. As medical director of Cooper Hospital from 1898 until his death in 1916 Dr. Taylor continued to support the publication, a forerunner to more sophisticated medical journals.

The widely admired Dr. Benjamin first discussed X-ray as a cure for cancer in the early 1900s. From his experiences at Cooper, Dr. Benjamin told his colleagues, “Practical tests show the X-ray does modify cancers and that it stands today as the only thing outside caustic or the knife that will remove the disease.” But he warned that X-ray was too new for its permanent effects to be known.What’s more, Dr. Benjamin was one of the first doctors in New Jersey to recognize the importance of sterilizing his hands before any operation. He endorsed the so-called Weir method of scrubbing with green soap, then rubbing his hands and arms for five minutes with a mixture of equal parts of chlorinated lime and washing soap. Ever cautious, Dr. Benjamin once explained that “if you do not know where the assistants have had their hands, rubber gloves are safer.” Indeed, by 1911, surgeons wore gloves Edward L. Farr, Board President, 1918–1924

64

when they operated.

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Class of 1914. Cooper Hospital Training School of Nurses. Front row center, Huldah Randall, RN, superintendent of nursing school, 1911–1919, and superintendent of hospital, 1919–1935.

Dr. Benjamin developed another habit

a Quaker industrialist from Wenonah. For

that was often discussed. Before surgery

the rest of 1918 Farr would have his hands

Dr. Benjamin soaked his best A and E

full as Cooper began to reel from the

violin strings in oil gaultheria for twenty-

aftereffects of World War I. During the war,

four hours; he then soaked the slippery

the hospital was often short on supplies

but highly malleable strings in alcohol or

and became reluctant to hire new staff.

an antiseptic solution until just before

Elizabeth H. Weimann, a Cooper nurse,

he was ready to use the strings to stitch

contracted Spanish influenza while serving

tight a wound or close a patient after

with the Red Cross in France and became

an operation.

the county’s only woman war casualty. But

In 1918 the death of seventy-five-

ironically, Cooper Hospital experienced

year-old Augustus Reeve brought a new

the greatest impact from World War I

President to the hospital: Edward L. Farr,

when the war was over and the soldiers

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

65

returned home. The soldiers brought the Spanish influenza with them, and this flu virus turned the hospital inside out.

Returning to the minutes of the Board meetings, stories of the flu and how the hospital tried to cope with its victims dominate the latter part of 1918. In the minutes of the October 9, 1918, Board meeting, the flu epidemic was of such importance that all other business was “laid over.” Farr reported that because of the epidemic, “the outpatient department had been entirely cleared out and had been made into a special ward for the care of such cases.” The dire straits of the situation in the Outpatient Department were told in the black-and-white statistics for the month of September: new cases, 718; revisits, 1,555.

Years later, historians argued that Cooper Hospital responded to the community and the epidemic only when pressured to do so. Historian and Cooper physician Dr.William A. Snape suggested in an interview that “Cooper got a couple of bad write-ups in the newspapers” because it was slow to respond to the commu‑ nity’s request to deal with the epidemic. After much debate and, apparently, community outcry, the Board agreed to act.

Dr. A. Haines Lippincott took charge of the hospital’s emergency ward, where no fewer than forty flu patients were treated around the clock.Three of the interns were “more or less affected” by the disease, and twenty-two of the hospital’s nurses also came down with the flu. So many of Cooper’s own staff got sick that Dr.Thomas B. Lee and a nurse Kelly were assigned to take care of the hospital staff’s own flu victims.

Eventually, the epidemic ran its course in Camden, and the hospital returned to normal.

Cooper Hospital brochure used to raise money to build the Outpatient Building.

66

The number of visits to the Outpatient

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

Cooper Hospital and the newly built Outpatient Building, completed in 1911.

for the small, growing hospital, was still more

“The Cooper”—Like a Family and Finally Accepted

than enough.

By 1918 the Cooper family members who

Department soon dropped by half, which,

By the end of 1918 the Board of Managers

founded the hospital had long since died.

had enlarged its circle from the founding

But by now, the medical staff, nurses, and

Quaker and Camden philanthropists to

employees who worked at Cooper had

include representatives of Camden’s industry,

developed their own sense of allegiance, their

finance, and legal professions. Franklin Morse

own sense of family. For years, an atmosphere

Archer Sr., a lawyer whose leadership would

first instilled by the founding Cooper family

bring many changes to the hospital, was

penetrated the halls of Cooper.The doctors,

appointed to the Board in 1917. Under the

the nurses, the Board members, they all said

changing Board of Managers, Cooper Hospital

it: “Cooper is like a big family.” The comment

would continue to expand.

reflects not so much the environment of the

Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

67

early hospital as it does the initial structure of hospital management, from the nearly parentlike role of the Board of Managers and the superintendent to the siblinglike status of the staff and patients. “In theory at least,” Rosenberg wrote, “the web of relationships within the hospital was always seen in terms of a family writ large.”

Gradually the community embraced this “family” hospital without reservation, a rite of passage witnessed during a special ceremony on January 4, 1919, when a large crowd gathered on the front lawn of the Cooper Hospital to celebrate the presentation of the flag of the United States.The

From the day the Board of Managers decided to finally open the hospital, Cooper emerged as a hospital that responded to the changing needs of the community.

traditional red, white, and blue and its shiny new flagpole were donated to the hospital by the employees of the Camden division of the West Jersey & Southern Railroad and the Philadelphia and Camden Ferry Company.The Board of Managers arranged what they called “appropriate ceremonies” for the unfurling of the flag: the Cooper nurses sang the national anthem, and a local band played in the

background. As the new flag ruffled high overhead in the winter air, hospital President Edward L. Farr accepted the flag on behalf of Cooper.

By tradition, it seems, flags fly in front of buildings that are vital to the well-being of a community, such as a post office, a bank, a government building, a museum. By the turn of the twentieth century, this list included hospitals.

“Few institutions have undergone as radical a metamorphosis as have hospitals in their modern history,” wrote medical historian Paul Starr in The Social Transformation of American Medicine.

In developing from places of dreaded impurity and exiled human wreckage into awesome citadels of science and bureaucratic order, they acquired a new moral identity, as well as new purposes and patients of higher status.

The hospital is perhaps distinctive among social organizations in having first been built primarily for the poor and only later entered in significant numbers and an entirely different state of mind by the more respectable classes. As its functions were transformed, it emerged, in a sense, from the under life of society to become a regular part of accepted experience, still an occasion for anxiety but not horror.

Cooper Hospital was no exception to Starr’s comments.The Philadelphia Bulletin once reported that “no hospital outside the city probably is as well known to Phila‑ 68

Part One: A Family Affair—1860 to 1919

delphians as The Cooper Hospital. For

hospital care: it was a hospital for the poor

Camden’s chief charitable institution has

who could not afford medical care, and it

figured almost daily in the news reports of

was a hospital for those who demanded and

accidents and injuries for nearly a generation,

could pay for the best. From 1918 to 1940

and while other and newer hospitals have

the very appearance of the hospital reflected

come into existence, ‘The Cooper,’ as the big

this dual mission.The institution grew from

institution is familiarly called, still holds first

one building dominated by its extensive ward

place in the Camdenites’ esteem.”

facilities to a veritable hospital campus. For

From the day the Board of Managers

the Board of Managers, this period of growth

decided to finally open the hospital, Cooper

brought with it many additional responsibil‑

emerged as a hospital that responded (albeit

ities. Not only did the Board have to budget

slowly at times) to the changing needs of the community.

In turn, the community responded favorably to the concept of a hospital.

Throughout the social transformation that defined Cooper’s earliest days, Cooper maintained a firm position in two aspects of hospital care: it was a hospital for the poor who could not afford medical care, and it was a hospital for those who demanded and could pay for the best.

enough funds to keep the hospital running, but Board members had to learn how to support the hospital with

When ward patients used the hospital more

enough staff and necessary medical equipment

than anyone else, Cooper catered to these

when a depressed economy dictated that

patients and offered the best medical care it

virtually everything else shut down.

could possibly provide.That care mirrored

Not long after Cooper officials raised

the pressing medical needs of the day—from

the new flag that January morning in 1919,

industrial accidents to influenza and smallpox

the Board of Managers at Cooper decided

epidemics. But when the hospital concept

to take an important step to bring the thirty-

was accepted by the community and made as

two-year-old institution into the mainstream

much a part of the culture as the American

of U.S. institutions.The patients at Cooper

flag, Cooper responded by building more

Hospital would continue to get sound medical

rooms for private and semiprivate patients.

care, a clean bed to sleep in, and decent

Throughout the social transformation that defined Cooper’s earliest days, Cooper

food to eat. Only now, they would have to pay for it.

maintained a firm position in two aspects of Chapter 3 / Growing Pains

69

P A R T

1999

S I X T

O

2017

TRANSFORMATIVE YEARS

An aerial view of the Cooper campus looking east toward Route 676, 2010.

276

277

This statement from Proverbs, first placed in the old Board Room by former CEO Kevin Halpern, would soon hang in the new Board Room overlooking the Cooper Health Sciences Campus.

PA RT

S I X / C H A P T E R

1 7

The Transformation Begins with New Leadership, Vision, and Centers of Excellence 1999–2005

I

n 1999, Cooper officials began a trans‑ formation that would ultimately result

in a dramatic and permanent turnaround for the medical center, a turnaround so complete that it was nothing short of miraculous. By the end of 2005—bolstered by an influx of renowned medical experts to anchor the hospital’s new Centers of Excellence, solid finances, a new advertising campaign starring a South Jersey native–turned-television-star, and the emerging leadership of two executives named Sheridan and Norcross—Cooper had transformed from a financially strapped, scandal-tarnished hospital into a formidable, expanding medical center that was unabashedly pursuing the addition of a four-year medical school.

Only two things, it seemed, stayed constant during these dramatic six years: Cooper physi‑ cians and nurses never wavered in their ability to deliver excellent medical care to the people of Camden and South Jersey. And Cooper never abandoned the city where it began.

Albeit relatively swift, Cooper’s trans‑ formation was not painless. It would not happen until hospital officials experienced near bankruptcy, resorted to layoffs, reduced programs, and struggled to serve a community that needed it more than ever before. From 1999 to 2005 the leadership in both the hospi‑ tal’s executive office and on the Board of

Dr. Steven S.Yocom performs minimally invasive neurosurgery at Cooper.

Trustees would change hands more than at any point in the past thirty years.

Cooper now demanded and sought visionary leaders with exceptional fiduciary expertise and management skills to lead the health center forward—to create the superior, world-class medical center that the founders envisioned.

A Hospital in Critical Financial Condition Begins to Heal Cooper’s transformation began in 1999 with the anticipated departure of two of Cooper’s most visible and once-revered leaders, two men nonetheless tarnished by a financial crisis they simply could not undo.

After announcing in January 1999 that Cooper now faced a second round of layoffs that would reduce its workforce by another fifty positions, Board Chairman Peter E. Driscoll and CEO Kevin Halpern announced that they were leaving, too. After thirteen years as head of the Board, Driscoll was named Trustee Emeritus; Raymond Meillier, Board member since 1997, was voted in as the next Board Chairman to replace Driscoll. After seventeen years as head

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Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

of Cooper, Halpern accepted the position

are resizing our programs and services

of President and CEO of the Cooper

to bring our workforce in line with our

Foundation, the fundraising arm for the

revenues,” Hirsch announced to a somber

Cooper Health System; Halpern kept the

crowd. Moreover, the hospital would try to

position for a year, and then moved on to

renegotiate its managed care contracts to

become CEO of Camden County Health

improve payment rates; enhance working

Services Center and Chairman of Camden

capital through short-term debt and

County College’s Board of Trustees.

advances on future charity care payments;

Leslie D. Hirsch, Cooper’s second-in-

and put the state on notice that Cooper’s

command for the previous eleven years, initially succeeded Halpern on an acting basis and within a few months was promoted to fill the position of President and CEO. With more than a decade at Cooper under his belt, Hirsch required no immediate learning curve; he knew exactly where Cooper had been and where it needed to go. His appointment also meant no further leadership disrup‑ tions for the somewhat beleaguered hospital staff.

For the next two years, Hirsch and Meillier focused on reversing the hospital’s bleak financial position, with Meillier tapping into his considerable business and financial background to try to find some answers. Hirsch’s first press conference, on March 18, 1999, left no doubt about the direction Cooper would have to take: nearly 15 percent of Cooper’s four thousand employees would be laid off, and nearly $30 million in programs and services would be eliminated or restructured from the $330-million-a-year operation. “We

Dr. Steven R. Peikin and his team continue expanding gastroenterology services, despite Cooper’s financial challenges in the late 1990s.

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281

Cooper nurses provide care to the region’s most critically ill newborns in its Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

ability to provide uncompensated care had been stretched too far.

“Over the past five years, Cooper Hospital and its physicians have provided more than $110 million in care for which we have received no compensation,” Hirsch said, laying the ground work for Cooper to start operating more like a business instead of a charity. “We are unique in our century-old commitment of providing care to the poor and needy without regard to payment. No health care system and physician staff does more than Cooper to provide free care.

From a social viewpoint, this is laudatory. From a business viewpoint, it is suicide. We are raising awareness about the limitation of our ability to maintain our 110-year pledge to provide whatever care is needed—regardless of an individual’s ability to pay for care.”

With no quick fix in sight, the drama played out repeatedly and quite painfully in newspaper headlines: Cooper Health System Cuts 103 Workers. . . . Cooper Losses Total $16 Million. . . . Cooper’s Debt Rating Tumbles as Losses Rise. . . . Cooper’s Loss Outstrips Industry Average. . . . In Camden, a Hospital

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Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

Finds Itself Seriously Ill.

Camden County—and then rented back

“Cooper was in dire straits,” recalls

the space for its operations with an option

Meillier, known for rarely mincing words in

to buy back the office building and garage

his descriptions of complicated situations.

in the future. “They are the county’s largest

In April, Moody’s again lowered Cooper’s

employer, and Camden’s primary health

bond rating to two notches below junk

provider,” said Deputy Freeholder Director

bond status, directly affecting $70 million

Frank Spencer, acknowledging Cooper’s

in debt. First Union Bank, which at one

desperate need to generate cash. “We can’t

point carried a $24 million outstanding line

leave them to deal with the issues they are

of credit for Cooper to stay in business,

facing without putting some effort into it.”

wanted its money back. “I called First

Unwilling to put all of the financial

Union,” said Meillier, “and reminded them

crisis blame on external forces, hospital

that we were the health care center for

executives carefully reviewed its billing

the people of Camden, and they said,

procedures, bringing in outside health care

‘Tough luck, pal, we are going to close you down.’”

Desperate to find a way out, Cooper considered every option. After

Dubocq ended up consolidating the hospital’s Intensive Care Units—a move that saved the hospital $1 million.

several make-

consultants to help fix a deeply flawed system. As Meillier worked with Hirsch to impose business principles on Cooper, the hospital closed

or-break meetings, Hirsch and Meillier

two neighborhood doctors’ offices in

convinced First Union to grant it a forty-

Collingswood and asked every department

five-day extension on its debt payment. The

to trim budgets and resources. “It was a

Camden County Improvement Authority,

tumultuous time,” said Carole A. Dubocq,

in a nod of support for the city’s largest

RN, then Vice President of Patient Care

employer, authorized Cooper to receive

Services, who struggled to keep highly

$3.5 million in proceeds from a $69 million

trained intensive care nurses after the

bond sale. Merger talks continued, and

hospital’s heart programs collapsed.

rumors often floated that a deal to sell

Dubocq ended up consolidating the

Cooper was imminent. In an effort to raise

hospital’s Intensive Care Units—a move

cash and divest itself of anything outside its

that saved the hospital $1 million while

core business, Cooper authorized the sale

retaining the vital nursing staff. At a time

of 3 Cooper Plaza on Haddon Avenue to

when hospitals across the country were

Chapter 17 / The Transformation Begins with New Leadership,Vision, and Centers of Excellence

283

Cooper’s Response to Terrorism (2001) On November 1, 2001, nearly two months after the terrorist attack in New York City known forever as 9/11, all Cooper employees received an urgent letter from Ralph Dean, then Cooper’s Chief Operating Officer: a postal employee at the mail processing facility in Bellmawr, Camden County, had tested positive for a potential case of skin anthrax, an acute infectious disease caused by bacterium and often lethal. The mail processing facility was closed for environmental testing, and the “Cooper Health System is playing a major role in the screening and treatment of the facility’s 1,400 employees and some of the 6,000 other postal employees through the South Jersey region,” Dean wrote to the employees. “Beginning last evening, Cooper health professionals began staffing a temporary medical unit in Bellmawr. Nurses, pharmacists, social workers, and infectious disease personnel joined Cooper physicians and Residents in the effort.”

Being prepared for all kinds of emergencies is an ongoing task of Cooper and Cooper’s Emergency Preparedness Committee. In the past, the committee has coordinated Cooper’s response to a simulated chemical tanker spill, reviewed emergency response plans in light of the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia in 2000, and evaluated disaster plans for various scenarios that included a bioterrorism attack.

Just five days after anthrax was reported in Bellmawr, Cooper employees had screened more than fourteen hundred postal workers, referred those with questionable symptoms to Cooper’s Emergency Department, provided precautionary antibiotics to those who qualified, and offered counseling and infor‑ mation to hundreds of additional concerned USPS employees.

“It was very, very tough, emotionally, for the postal workers,” said Dr. Annette Reboli, then head of Cooper’s Division of Infectious Diseases, who helped coordinate Cooper’s response to the anthrax scare and worked closely with representatives from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “When the announcement was made that the machines had tested positive, there was a lot of emotion, but they felt good that Cooper physicians were there. The whole idea with postal workers being at risk was something new. People were afraid to touch their mail.”

Nancy Keleher, then Director of Cooper’s community outreach, agreed. “It was a shock,” she said.

“There was such panic at the Bellmawr Post Office. I had been in nursing for years and years, and what we did that first night was basically alleviate the fears as best we could. The post office was shut down, but we set up a medical unit outside at the Bellmawr Business Center, outside the main postal facility, to work with employees as they came in.”

Dr. Rick Hong, who would one day head Cooper’s Division of Emergency Medical Services and Disaster Medicine, was a resident at Cooper during the anthrax scare, working in Pediatrics. He remembers terrified postal workers bringing their children to Cooper, demanding, “I want my children treated and tested.” But, said Dr. Hong, “their exposure didn’t warrant testing with blood cultures or X-rays. This was my first real experience with emergency training, and we tried our best to reassure them.”

In all, Cooper’s response to the Bellmawr facility included seventy nurses and technicians, twenty-five physicians, twelve pharmacists, six social workers, and three nurse practitioners, all of whom volunteered their time to help. The event foreshadowed Cooper’s role in the area for disaster preparedness and response. In 2007 Cooper became the region’s Disaster Preparedness and Medical Coordination Center— outfitted with a sophisticated, secure, and technologically advanced command center deep within the hospital’s walls. In addition to serving as the command center, Cooper supplies material related to disaster medicine and provides education and training to those involved in disaster preparedness through the National Disaster Life Support Regional Training Center.

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Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

facing nursing

Transportation under former Governor

shortages,

Thomas H. Kean from 1982 to 1985.

Cooper’s situation was

Sheridan’s efforts, Cooper received an

particularly

advance payment from the state of millions

precarious.

of dollars for charity care, enough to stave

“We could not

off creditors and keep the hospital open

afford to lose

until operational money came in. “It was

the nurses while

just an advance, but it mattered, it helped,”

we were trying

recalled Sheridan, who then continued to

to revitalize the

represent Cooper on legal issues.

heart program,” John P. Sheridan Jr. played a pivotal role in keeping the hospital operational in 1999.

Due in large part to Norcross’s and

she said.

At its darkest

The stress of working in a financially unstable hospital with cutbacks at every corner took a toll on the one-thousand-

moment in the

plus nursing staff, which voted in October

summer of 1999,

1999 to unionize. “It was a very close

Cooper executives privately admitted that

vote,” said Dubocq, who had witnessed

the hospital was completely broke, with

two previous attempts to unionize nurses

only enough cash to keep the hospital

at Cooper before the union was finally

open for two business days. As Norcross

voted in. “At that point, there were issues,

recalls, “We were one payroll away from

there was the sense of betrayal through

bankruptcy.” In a bold emergency measure,

the embezzlement, and the nurses became

a handful of hospital executives headed to

convinced that management wasn’t being

Trenton to meet with representatives from

truthful. Cooper had always treated nurses

Governor Christine Whitman’s adminis‑

very well. They already had flexible twelve-

tration. To help make the hospital’s case to

hour shifts, good benefits, good educational

the Republican administration, Norcross

programs. But when there is a sense of

retained John P. Sheridan Jr., then a senior

betrayal, if they feel they don’t have a voice

partner in the Trenton-based interna‑

within the hospital, that’s what the union

tional law firm of Riker, Danzig, Scherer,

does: it gives members a voice that they

Hyland & Perretti, LLP; Sheridan, Norcross

feel they don’t have.”

knew, understood the political landscape

As winter approached and Cooper

from the inside out, having served as the

began contract negotiations with the

general counsel to the New Jersey Turnpike

nurses, the hospital’s considerable efforts

Authority and as the Commissioner of

to recover financially began to pay off.

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285

It certainly had not been easy. In just one year, a staff of 4,300 was reduced to 3,950; programs in Cherry Hill and Washington Township were closed; $18 million in operating costs were slashed with plans to trim another $10 million by the end of 2000. Hirsch continued to negotiate for more favorable contracts with HMOs and insurance companies, and improvements in Cooper’s own billing and collection operations had substantially reduced the time it took to collect payments.

For the first time in a long while, newspaper headlines about Cooper were optimistic, reflecting a hospital that appeared, at last, to be in stable condition: Finances Improving for Cooper. . . . Cooper President Says Hospital Is Over the Worst Financially. . . . Impressive Comeback Has Cooper off the Critical List.

“Cooper’s comeback is even more impressive, considering the plight of today’s health providers,” noted an editorial in the Courier-Post on November 18, 1999. “Reduced insurance payments, expensive charity care and a host of other problems mean that more than half of New Jersey’s hospitals were operating at a loss as of the middle of this year.”

The new year brought more good news. In January 2000, Cooper Trustees withdrew from merger negotiations with Catholic Health East, “in light of successful execution of final plans and projected positive bottom line” for the 2000 operating budget. “We did a lot of discussion and fact finding, and it took forever, for both of those,” said Dr. Carolyn E. Bekes, then Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs and Chief Compliance Officer, as she recalled merger discussions with St. Barnabas and Our Lady of Lourdes.

“But our goals were different. They were a series of hospitals, and we already knew that we wanted to be an academic health center.”

Businessman Samuel L. Allen III, a Board member since 1997, replaced Meillier as Chairman after the former Dr. Christopher T. Olivia joined Cooper in 2001 as President of the Cooper Physician Association.

286

Campbell executive moved to Florida.

Under Allen and Hirsch, Cooper’s

Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

restructuring efforts continued to result in positive financial milestones for Cooper in 2000. Cooper ended the first quarter in the black in April. Its outstanding credit line was reduced to zero, and its short-term debt was retired in July. Cooper’s bond outlook was upgraded and listed as “stable” in August, and Cooper ended the year with nearly $2.5 million to spare.

In December 2000, Hirsch had an important new message for reporters: “Cooper is not in turnaround mode any longer.”

Financial Security Helps Cooper Focus on the Future In 2001, Cooper officials were able to take a deep breath for the first time since the fraud, the loss of the hospital’s cardiology specialists, and the near-bankruptcy odyssey that began in the mid-1990s.

Instead of focusing on operating

Dr. Lawrence Weisberg, physician and educator, joined Cooper in 1987.

deficits, outstanding lines of credit,

floor. They started renovations to 3

and trying to fix what executives called

Cooper Plaza for physician offices and a

“the broken parts of Cooper,” hospital

Department of Surgery expansion, and

officials could now turn their attention

decided to reconfigure and renovate

to creating a new eight-bed Intensive

the pharmacy on the second floor of

Care Unit and a six-bed Intermediate

Kelemen. The Women’s Board launched a

Care Pediatric Unit for the sixth floor

new $1 million campaign in mid-summer

of Kelemen South, while renovating the

to support the eventual purchase of the

Coronary Care Unit and the Cardiac

daVinci surgical system that would allow

Catheterization Lab on the fourth

Cooper’s surgeons to perform minimally

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287

Cooper’s new helipad in 2001

invasive surgery, including cardiothoracic, uro-gynecologic, and general surgery.

The medical staff—led by Dr. Edward D. Viner, Dr. Carolyn E. Bekes, and Dr. Christopher T. Olivia, the new head of the Cooper Physician Association— focused once more on rebuilding Cooper’s medical core and attracting more patients. And at long last, the heliport relocation project, planned since 1998, was completed, moved from the Riebel Garage roof to a new helipad on the south side of Kelemen.

“We had some serious bumps in the road, but even then, I didn’t doubt that we would rebuild,” said Dr. Lawrence S. Weisberg, a former University of Pennsylvania physician who was recruited by Dr. Viner in 1987 for Cooper’s Division of Nephrology, which he would soon lead. “Ed Viner had a phenomenal reputation, and he had grand plans. He was committed to building a full-time faculty and making Cooper a bona fide academic medical center. This was a place where I could do what I wanted to do—teach and take care of patients— and be in on the ground floor. In a few years we would have 170 full-time physicians and a full-time faculty of over 400, which gives you some idea of the trajectory.”

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Public relations officials, eager to

twelve so-called safety-net hospitals in the

trumpet the story of the hospital’s

state—defined as hospitals in distressed

turnaround, called it “one of the most

urban centers or hospitals that care for

remarkable business stories in the health

a high percentage of charity care—there

care industry nationally. Cooper achieved

was a disparity in funding. For example, the

success in spite of the fact it operates as an

safety-net hospitals located in northern

inner-city hospital, in the second poorest

New Jersey received two to three times

city in the United States, during a period

the level of reimbursement that the state

of the largest reductions in Medicare and

funded to Cooper for charity care, even

Medicaid payments in the history of these programs.”

Buoyed by the good news, Cooper decided

When comparing the twelve so-called safety-net hospitals in the state . . . there was a disparity in funding.

to tackle a

though Cooper met both criteria for a safety-net hospital.

To make their case to state officials, Cooper

lingering financial thorn in its side: the

obtained more than two thousand

state’s reimbursement for charity care that

employee signatures, urging Acting

Cooper provided for the uninsured. For

Governor Donald DiFrancesco and state

years, Cooper executives had protested

legislators to increase Cooper’s funding.

the woeful charity care reimbursement

On the front lines, Cooper’s executive

from the state; from 1993 to 2000, the

management and Board leadership collabo‑

reimbursement had plummeted 55

rated on the legislative appeal, including a

percent from $18 million to $8.1 million,

public outreach by Norcross.

even though the amount of charity care

But everyone would agree that one

provided by Cooper continued to grow.

of the leading architects of the effort was

Each year, Cooper provided more than $26

Gary S. Young, Executive Vice President

million in charity care for the diagnosis

for Strategic Planning and Corporate

and treatment of local residents with no

Services at Cooper. Known widely for

health care insurance—caring for nearly 65

his intellectual prowess and his ability

percent of the city of Camden’s residents

to comprehend complicated financial

and providing more than 90 percent of the

matters, Young carefully analyzed the

documented charity care services for the

reimbursement formula and clearly demon‑

entire city.

strated the significant disparity in charity

What’s more, when comparing the

care funding in South Jersey. “They thought

Chapter 17 / The Transformation Begins with New Leadership,Vision, and Centers of Excellence

289

we were just being wasteful, but we argued that we had acute illness issues, that we have extraordinary expenses that other hospitals don’t have and that we have one of the poorest populations in the country,” said Young. “In that context, you clearly have the poorest place without adequate reimbursement.

And that analysis did work.” Hirsch called Young’s work “an extraordinary effort” and noted that “we are extremely grateful to him for discovering and communicating this issue.” Young deflected the praise and years later sought to put the moment and his health care expertise in perspective. “Cooper,” he said, pointing to decades of surviving mandated rate settings, declining managed care reimbursements, and cutbacks in federal programs and uncompensated care, “is really just a case study of the larger story in health care.”

Cooper’s recurring role in New Jersey’s health care story took a positive turn on June 29, 2001, when DiFrancesco signed a fiscal year 2002 budget that increased Cooper’s budget appropriation by $5.1 million and provided an additional $1.5 million to help relocate the helipad to the Kelemen rooftop.

Though both Hirsch and Board Chairman Allen noted that this was just the beginning in trying to achieve a fair subsidy for Cooper’s services, there was no doubting the impact of the day’s announcement. Cooper had finally broken through the political divide—real or otherwise—that many believe gave prefer‑ ential financial treatment to northern New Jersey medical centers, a political divide that for decades had failed to recognize the special role that Cooper played in South Jersey. In a rare but significant response, hospital officials proclaimed the news in big, bold type in Cooper News, the employee newspaper: “Cooper’s Voice Heard in Trenton.”

Norcross once commented that “correcting the historical inequities” surrounding Cooper’s funding and reimbursement sources was the first key step to putting Cooper on the road to a permanent recovery. The second step, he then argued, was finding the Leslie D. Hirsch, President and CEO from 1999 to 2002, helped Cooper navigate a difficult financial turnaround at the turn of the century.

290

right leaders.

Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

New Leadership, New Vision, New Directions

is the perfect time to reevaluate the future

On January 15, 2002, Leslie D. Hirsch called

fifteen years.”

direction of my career for the next ten to

a special Administrative Council meeting

Board Chairman Samuel Allen praised

in the hospital’s cafeteria. Though Hirsch

Hirsch, noting that Hirsch “grew the solid

had made regular Administrative Council

foundation for what many people now

meetings a part of his management style

refer to as the ‘New Cooper.’”

since taking over as President and CEO

Within weeks of Hirsch’s resignation

of Cooper in 1999, the five hundred

announcement, Charles E. Sessa Jr., former

employees, managers, physicians, and nurses

President of Covenant Bank and a Cooper

who gathered together

Board member since

on this particular Tuesday

1995, was appointed

already knew that

Board Chairman to

this was no ordinary

replace Allen, who

gathering. As Hirsch

welcomed the change

stepped up to the

after two grueling years.

podium, he paused, and

For the first time in

then announced his

Cooper’s history, the

resignation, effective

Board decided to exper‑

July 1, 2002.

iment and actually hired Sessa to be a full-time,

“I am very proud to be leaving Cooper in

paid Chairman. The

the strongest financial

move created consid‑

position it has been in for nearly ten years,

Longtime Board member Samuel L. Allen III served as Board Chairman from 2000 to 2002.

with its public image

erable turmoil among the Board members, and some wondered

strong and its clinical program vibrant and

how the salaried Board Chairman would

growing,” Hirsch explained to a crowd

share responsibilities with the hospital’s

that over the past two years had come to

CEO. But they wanted to create a more

appreciate the difficult and often unpopular

complete system of checks and balances

decisions he was forced to make. “With

between the Board and the administration,

the collaboration of Cooper’s Board, the

and they charged Sessa with ensuring that

executive management team, the medical

“the oversight and fiduciary responsibil‑

staff, and Cooper employees, I have

ities of the Board are carried out and that

reached my goals. At this point in my life it

approved system goals are achieved.”

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At the same time the Board hired Sessa, the Board appointed Dr. Olivia as Cooper’s transition executive to replace Hirsch.

An ophthalmologist with an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Olivia had served as President of the Cooper Physician Associ‑ ation since 2000, credited with improving relation‑ ships with both community Dr. Christopher T. Olivia, President and CEO, and Charles E. Sessa Jr., Chairman of the Board, 2002.

and faculty physicians, driving the move to open suburban satellites and

clinics to funnel patients to Camden. In a few years, Cooper physicians more than doubled their outpatient satellite offices in South Jersey, jumping from forty to over eighty. This network was vital to Cooper’s financial recovery because suburban offices helped drive insured patients to the inner-city hospital. Dr. Olivia’s expertise in medicine, business, and physician practice issues was singled out as an “important quality that will enable him to manage the complex and diverse challenges related to the operation of a large health system.” Following a national search, Dr. Olivia was named Cooper’s next President and CEO. In a very short time, Dr. Olivia was identified as one of Cooper’s staunchest defenders, someone who had enough faith in the organization to accept a job in 2000 when Cooper was still struggling financially and one of the first to say that “failure was not an option.” Why? “Because it would have been devastating to the city,” said Dr. Olivia, who recalled once loaning money from the physicians’ group to help the cash-starved hospital. “We were going to make this place work.”

His first milestone, as he tells it, was getting the physicians actively involved.

“They wanted to see the institution succeed,” he said. “But they were fighting among each other, and when faced with the circling of the wagons, Cooper was

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always very good at pointing the guns at

never wavered in terms of how they saw

each other. My job was to get the guns

their patients. “But turning around how

pointed out.”

people felt about Cooper was what I could

To facilitate a united faculty, Dr. Olivia immediately focused on Cooper’s assets:

characterize as our greatest challenge,” Sessa said.

its excellent staff, its expert medical care, its research programs, and its long history

Building for the Future

of medical education, going back decades

The new executive leadership team—

to its affiliation with Jefferson Medical

bolstered by behind-the-scenes efforts

College. Dr. Olivia’s positive attitude was

by Gary Young and Dr. Bekes in admin‑

infectious. “With his clinical background, he

istration, Dr. Viner and Dr. Tama on the

put increased emphasis on quality of care,”

medical staff, and George Norcross and

said Dr. Bekes. “He spoke the language

Joan S. Davis on the Board—began working

of physicians.”

to restore the vision of Cooper as an

Others agreed. “Chris was a wonderful

academic medical center, one that was

CEO,” said Dr. Albert R. Tama, then a Board

more medically advanced than any other

member, physician in the Department of

hospital in South Jersey. To do so, they

Obstetrics and Gynecology, and clinical

dared to put something on the table that

professor of OB/GYN. “Chris was able

no one at Cooper had dreamed about for

to establish credibility with the medical

years: Building for the Future. Consider

staff and the community. One of the

these important building blocks:

worst things that happened in this whole fraud and financial crisis is that a lot of

• 2002, Cooper executives rebranded

the faculty had lost respect for senior

the hospital, calling it “Cooper

management. The defalcation did not only

University Hospital,” and renamed

break the institution financially, but it broke

its physician association “Cooper

the spirit of the institution. The morale was

University Physicians.” Said Young:

horrible. But Olivia had the respect of the

“The idea that we started to call

faculty. He was an excellent face of Cooper.

ourselves what we wanted to

And he was not ‘Old Cooper.’ He was

become was important. When we

‘New Cooper.’”

first suggested this to the Board,

As Board Chairman, Sessa saw firsthand

they said, ‘How can you do that?

what Dr. Tama meant, but the cloud of

We are not a university.’ And I said,

a negative past never impacted the way

‘We are a university hospital. We are

doctors and nurses did their jobs—they

the clinical campus for a university

Chapter 17 / The Transformation Begins with New Leadership,Vision, and Centers of Excellence

293

medical school.’”

• By the end of 2002, Dr. Olivia, Sessa, and Norcross were talking boldly about establishing a “Health Sciences Campus” and a four-year medical school in Camden. Cooper officials had long nurtured a desire to have a medical school and expand its medical campus footprint; though Kevin Halpern’s administration had first put forth the notion of a Health Sciences Campus by suggesting the Tower project and a separate facility for a new children’s hospital, neither project had happened.

• Where to build a new cancer center was a key question for Cooper.—At the same time, there was a discussion about whether to build a cancer center in Camden or the suburbs. The Board decided to honor the founders’ vision and build it in Camden.

But now, the drive to dream big, to create a Health Sciences Campus once and for all, was bolstered by two unique factors that converged in 2002.

First, the quest to bring the four-year medical school to Cooper and Camden was inadvertently given a boost in 2002, when a highly touted report from New Jersey’s Commission on Health Science, Education and Training (known as the Vagelos report or the Vagelos Commission, in reference to report Chairman Dr. P. Roy Vagelos) completely ignored Cooper’s existing two-year clinical campus. After years of enduring and trying to correct reimbursement inequities, Cooper officials were livid—“seething” might be an under‑ statement—at yet another slight from Trenton for the South Jersey institution.

“We had to answer the Vagelos report,” said Young, who created a white paper that argued the choice of Cooper and Camden as the perfect medical school location. “Yes, we liked the report’s idea to take UMDNJ and leverage it into a statewide initiative, but we pointed out, ‘You missed something. You missed Rutgers-Camden. You missed the idea of a medical school in Camden.

You missed that we already had a clinical campus in Camden, recognized by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education as a model clinical program for 105 third- and fourth-year students from the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.

Why didn’t it occur to you to build on this?’ We made it clear to all who would listen that there is a great opportunity here. And we were going to be a fullfledged, academic medical center with the gravitas and the expertise of one of

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the finest medical centers in the country.

tives knew could jump-start their Health

There was never any drifting from that

Sciences Campus and the four-year medical

vision.”

school of their dreams.

Cooper’s challenge to the Vagelos

In seven town meetings during the

report paid off. Later that year, the Liaison

month of June 2002, Sessa, Dr. Olivia,

Committee on Medical Education, the

and other hospital executives presented

national accrediting organization for

Cooper’s new vision of Cooper. In addition

allopathic medical schools, designated

to advancing plans for a medical school

Cooper’s Camden campus as “a model

and a Health Sciences Campus, the hospital

clinical campus.” And the Review, Planning

executives announced that Cooper would

and Implementation Committee on the Proposed Restruc‑ turing of New Jersey Research Univer‑

now package its

“We made it clear to all who would listen that there is a great opportunity here.”

sities—a spin-off of

—Gary Young

the Vagelos group—

advanced medical services as “Centers of Excel‑ lence”—starting with The Cooper Heart Institute,

recommended a full four-year allopathic

Cooper Cancer Institute, Cooper Critical

medical school for South Jersey.

Care Medicine, and Cooper Bone and

The second supportive event occurred

Joint Institute. Cooper’s clinical excel‑

when the state government intervention

lence would continue to focus on critical

plan for Camden, authorized in 2002

care medicine, trauma medicine through its

through legislation known as the Municipal

Cooper Level 1 Trauma Center, compre‑

Rehabilitation and Economic Recovery

hensive pediatric services at the Children’s

Act (MRERA), designated $175 million for

Regional Hospital at Cooper (the only

Camden’s Revitalization and Rehabilitation

state-designated children’s hospital in

Initiative. In that amount, $47.7 million

South Jersey), and gradual expansion of its

was designated as a Higher Education and

expertise in vascular surgery and women’s

Regional Health Care Development Fund.

health and wellness.

With the help of Norcross’s considerable

For a hospital that had become best

political clout, Cooper received $13.35

known over the previous two decades for

million from this fund, with another $9

its trauma care, deciding on these pillars

million committed to UMDNJ/Robert

of excellence was not difficult, Cooper

Wood Johnson for the new medical

executives said. The Centers of Excellence

school—money that Cooper execu‑

rightfully mirrored the new “serious care”

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295

Dr. Carolyn Bekes, Dr. Joseph E. Parrillo, and Dr. R. Philip Dellinger receive the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Critical Care Medicine, 2003.

patient specialty areas that were considered necessary in a university hospital with an academic mission—medical centers that would help further distinguish Cooper from all other community and primary care hospitals in the area. And there was no question: these areas of medicine were designed to help Cooper attract patients from surrounding areas who had insurance, a calculated strategy that would help shore up its financial base.

Dr. Valerie P. Weil, named Vice President for Strategic Planning and Business Development at Cooper in 2003, noted that the Centers of Excellence also reflect on the answers to several important questions. “First, what is important to the community? What does the community view as critical for the hospital to provide and be good at?” she said. “Second, what is sustainable from a profit‑ ability standpoint? What can we promote that helps sustain other elements of

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care, like maternity and pediatrics, that we

“Without that, we didn’t feel that those

provide as a part of our mission to the

programs would flourish.”

people of Camden?”

Unlike the physician recruitment efforts

As these centers developed, Cooper

in the 1980s, however, Cooper was no

officials anticipated that these distinct

longer content to go after physicians who

medical services would allow Cooper to

showed exceptional promise and could

begin to compete with hospitals in Philadelphia, hoping to stop the yearly flow of an estimated $1 billion to $2 billion in health care dollars that left South

build a career at

The goal was clear, the promise was made: Cooper was going to build a worldclass, academic health care center—sooner rather than later.

Cooper. Now, with the development of a Health Sciences Campus and the quest for a medical school at stake, Cooper began to recruit leading

Jersey each year for Philadelphia hospitals.

physicians from around the country who

“The background of our vision is at the

could immediately enhance not only its

end of the day, patients in South Jersey

programs but also its reputation. The goal

who need to obtain specialty care should

was clear, the promise was made: Cooper

be able to seek those services at Cooper,”

was going to build a world-class, academic

said Sessa. “They didn’t have to go over

health care center—sooner rather than

the bridge to Philadelphia to obtain the

later.

services of a tertiary care center.”

The movement started in 2001 and 2002 with the arrival of two nationally

Serious Care—Right Here, Right Now

recognized leaders in cardiology and

To support these new centers and

critical care medicine, Dr. Joseph E. Parrillo

rebuild programs that had deteriorated

and Dr. R. Phillip Dellinger, considered two

during Cooper’s financial crisis, Cooper

of the top ten critical care physicians in

had already started to aggressively

the world. Both physicians were friends

recruit experienced academic physicians

and colleagues with Dr. Bekes; all three

in cardiology, critical care medicine,

had served as presidents of the Society

orthopaedic surgery, and radiation

of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM), a fact

oncology. “We had to make sure we

that led Cooper to once boast that it was

felt comfortable with the leadership of

the only institution with the “distinction

Cooper’s new centers,” said Dr. Weil.

of having three SCCM presidents on its

Chapter 17 / The Transformation Begins with New Leadership,Vision, and Centers of Excellence

297

medical staff.” Dr. Bekes, everyone knew, played a critical role in recruiting both physicians.

At Cooper, Dr. Parrillo was named the Director of the Cooper Heart Institute.

Dr. Parrillo was able to grow the heart program to become one of the most comprehensive cardio‑ vascular programs in the region, providing a full range of heart care from prevention and diagnosis to the most innovative nonsurgical techniques and surgical treatment. Dr. Dellinger became Director of Cooper Critical Care Medicine, providing care for the region’s most seriously ill patients with highlevel diagnostic care and Emergency Medicine Chief Dr. Michael Chansky and his team care for a patient in Cooper’s ER in the early 2000s.

technology in the treatment of sepsis, cardiogenic shock,

and respiratory failure. Together, the two physicians started the Cooper Transfer System (COTS), a program to transport critically ill patients throughout the region to Cooper for advanced diagnostic and therapeutic technology and care. COTS and other programs again highlighted Cooper’s mission to provide serious care to the area’s most critically injured and sick patients. In the first seven years of the program, over nine thousand patients were transferred to Cooper through COTS, a figure that would soon grow to nearly two thousand annually for treatment of cardiac, neurological, pulmonary, vascular, and other critical care illnesses.

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Years later, when asked why he came

genetics, and early cancer detection; Dr.

to Cooper, Dr. Parrillo didn’t hesitate.

Michael E. Chansky, well-known head

After building outstanding critical care

of Emergency Medicine since 1985 (he

programs at Chicago’s Rush University

actually created the hospital’s first official

Medical Center and the National Institutes

Emergency Department that year) and a

of Health (NIH), “I thought that some of

Cooper physician since 1983; and Dr. Viner,

the things I had learned previously could

Chief of Medicine at Cooper since 1987

apply to Cooper—both in cardiology

and a formidable advocate of bringing a

and critical care medicine,” he said. “And

four-year medical school to Cooper.

Cooper had a lot of great things about it. It

Building Cooper’s Centers of Excel‑

had a great tradition in medical history, and

lence was a dramatic and welcome change

it was the only academic medical center

from struggling to survive. But there were

in South Jersey. And at the time, because

still some surprises. Within months after

hospitals were having a difficult time finding

arriving at Cooper, Dr. Parrillo received

a way to be successful financially and

a letter informing him that the hospital

medically, I thought it was wiser to have

was in danger of losing its certification

a single site with a full-time faculty. I felt we could grow that here.”

Drs. Parrillo and Dellinger joined a

Building Cooper’s Centers of Excellence was a dramatic and welcome change from struggling to survive.

Cooper staff that

to perform heart surgery because its number of surgeries had dropped signifi‑ cantly, to 296 or less a year. Dr. Parrillo’s number-one priority

already included a critical backbone of

was to recruit a staff that could add patient

well-known experts. To name but a few:

services and increase the utilization of the

Dr. Steven E. Ross, a nationally recog‑

hospital’s facilities, which is exactly what he

nized trauma surgeon and the head of

did. Dr. Parrillo quickly recruited nationally

the Trauma Center for eighteen years

and internationally known critical care

when the renowned program celebrated

and heart specialists like Dr. Stephen W.

its twentieth anniversary in 2002; Dr.

Trzeciak, Dr. Sergio L. Zannoti, Dr. Steven

Robert F. Ostrum, head of Cooper’s ortho‑

Hollenberg, Dr. Steve W. Werns, Dr. Zoltan

paedic trauma section and a distinguished

G. Turi, and former Cooper fellow Dr.

researcher and author; Dr. Generosa

Simon K. Topalian. Cooper soon established

Grana, a medical oncologist widely recog‑

superior clinical and research expertise in

nized for her research in breast cancer,

interventional cardiology with the adoption

Chapter 17 / The Transformation Begins with New Leadership,Vision, and Centers of Excellence

299

Drs. Sarah Woodrow and H. Warren Goldman meet with Theresa Trainor (center), one of Cooper’s first Gamma Knife patients, at the Cooper Cyberknife Center in 2010.

of cutting-edge diagnostic and procedural technology. Within a few years, the number of Cardiac Catheterization Lab procedures had climbed from three thousand a year to seven thousand, while heart surgeons soon performed 500 procedures a year compared to the critical low of 296; Cooper’s Intensive Care Unit more than doubled in size, growing from fourteen beds to thirty beds with room for expansion.

Olivia, to his credit, never tried to sugarcoat what the newly recruited experts were getting into at Cooper. During interviews, Olivia would usher physicians to Cooper’s rooftop and there, looking out over the streets of Camden with the Delaware River and Philadelphia in sight, the CEO with outstretched arms would tell them about the medical school Cooper dreamed of and Cooper’s goals to expand its Health Sciences Campus.

“I would say to them, ‘All of this could be yours someday.’ And they would look down on the burned-out buildings and they would laugh at me,” said Olivia.

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“But we attracted doctors to Camden, one

only cancer center in New Jersey desig‑

of the poorest cities in America, because

nated as a comprehensive center by

we sold them on the vision. And they

the National Cancer Institute, to lead

would ask, ‘How could you put a medical

in the development of Cooper’s Cancer

school in a bankrupt Medicaid hospital in

Institute and to bring what Olivia called

Camden?’ But I never saw it as that. It was

an “integrated, comprehensive approach

and always has been an institution that

to cancer care” to South Jersey. And by

delivered great care and has been doing

mid-2004 Cooper announced what officials

that for over one hundred years. You sell

considered yet another coup: H. Warren

people on the vision. There is a saying in

Goldman, MD, Ph.D., former Chairman and

Proverbs 29:18: ‘When there is no vision,

professor of the Department of Neuro‑

the people perish.’

Kevin Halpern put that up in the Board Room during his tenure, and we never

“My neurosciences team and I are honored to join the prestigious university hospital that Cooper has become.”

took it down. We

—Dr. H.Warren Goldman

surgery at Drexel University College of Medicine and internationally renowned for his clinical research and academic

believed in it. And

leadership, had

George Norcross

agreed to develop

saw it. People don’t always see things like

Cooper’s Neurological Institute, along

the cancer center or the medical school

with a team that included Dr. Alan R. Turtz,

until it is a reality. But George was one of

a nationally recognized leader in treating

the ones who could see it.”

brain tumors, and Dr. Steven S. Yocom, a

Before long, there was no doubt that others could see it, too. Just over a year after the arrival of Drs. Parrillo and

specialist in complex spinal surgery and treating degenerative diseases of the spine.

“My neurosciences team and I are

Dellinger, Cooper succeeded in recruiting

honored to join the prestigious university

one of the leading orthopaedic surgical

hospital that Cooper has become,” said

practices in the Philadelphia region—Dr.

Dr. Goldman. “Cooper has developed into

Lawrence S. Miller and Dr. Eric Hume—

a strong health care leader, and we plan

to lead the new Cooper Bone and Joint

to build upon the solid foundation which

Institute. In the fall of 2003 Cooper

already exists within Cooper’s other

announced that it had partnered with

Centers of Excellence.”

the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, the

Olivia and Sessa considered Dr.

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301

Cooper employees with their newly branded “Cooper University Hospital” shirts.

Goldman’s recruitment the result of all that Cooper had accomplished in the past five years—and a mirror into what the future promised. “There is tremendous momentum in the growth and emergence of Cooper University Hospital as the most sophisticated health care provider in the South Jersey region, and increasingly, the entire Delaware Valley,” stated Sessa. “No other provider in southern New Jersey presents such clinical breadth and depth— from Level One Trauma to the Cooper Heart Institute, Cooper Critical Care, the Cooper Bone and Joint Institute, the Cancer Institute of New Jersey at Cooper. And now, Dr. Goldman and his team, along with our distinguished faculty, will develop the Cooper Neurological Institute. There is palpable excitement at Cooper about how we are positively impacting the entire health care system in South Jersey.”

As the Centers of Excellence grew and the recruitment of nationally recog‑ nized experts continued, Cooper officials knew that the facility also had to grow. On June 18, 2004, politicians and dignitaries from across New Jersey

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and Camden joined hospital officials and community leaders on the hospi‑

The Public Meets a New Cooper

tal’s front lawn to unveil detailed plans for

In 2005, with its finances in order and

the largest expansion project at Cooper

the backbone for its new Centers of

in nearly thirty years. The $117 million

Excellence intact, Cooper started its

endeavor included a new patient tower,

physical transformation. To make way

interior renovations, and a new entrance

for the new pavilion, the red-brick Sarah

to the hospital. When the expansion was

Cooper Building, built in 1929 and the

completed in four years, hospital officials

first home for the Cooper School of

promised, “Cooper University Hospital

Nursing, was demolished, and Stevens

will become the gateway for the city of

and Sixth streets were closed to begin to

Camden.”

make way for construction. The hospital

The excitement at Cooper was

began moving internal departments, and

noticeable. On November 19, 2004, a

a newly renovated Pediatric ICU opened

hospital-wide Spirit Day celebrated the

on the sixth floor of the Kelemen Building.

institution’s positive growth as employees

Cooper officials scheduled meetings with

wore their new Cooper University

Cooper employees to explain the design

Hospital sweatshirts and windbreakers—a

of the proposed pavilion, the new parking

special thank-you from the administration for the staff’s hard work and dedication.

As Norcross, now Vice Chairman of the Board, watched the festivities, he couldn’t help but think, how can Cooper broadcast the Cooper story?

“Cooper, for many, many years, had some of the best and brightest physicians one could find anywhere. But I don’t think many knew it,” Norcross said. And that’s when it dawned on him: “If you don’t promote what you have, if people aren’t aware of it and utilize it, what good is it?

I knew that television had a way to make things larger than life. And from then on, I was about making Cooper larger than life.”

Celebrity Kelly Ripa becomes Cooper spokesperson, 2005.

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303

garage, and new patient rooms, and began talking with various community groups to get feedback and input into redevel‑ opment plans for the Cooper Plaza and Lanning Square neighborhoods.

And on August 16, 2005, under a tent in a courtyard outside the hospital, Norcross kept his promise to make Cooper larger than life when he helped unveil three new television ads for Cooper University Hospital. The ads featured real Cooper patients who had recently received expert care at Cooper for cancer, heart, or orthopedic problems.

Kelly Ripa and her father, Joe, a longtime Cooper supporter.

And in these television spots, the patients and

their loved ones are interviewed one-on-one about their Cooper experiences

by Camden County native Kelly Ripa, the daughter of then–Camden County Freeholder Joseph Ripa and Esther Ripa. Kelly is a celebrated television star and at the time was the well-known cohost of ABC’s Live with Regis and Kelly.

After being approached by Norcross, who just happened to be a longtime family friend of the Ripa family, Kelly Ripa had initially appeared as an advocate for Cooper in several brief television spots that ran in 2004. But in this new, extensive series of ads, which aired in 2005 on network television throughout the Philadelphia market, Ripa officially embraced her new role as a spokes‑ person for the hospital. Ripa charged nothing for her work, choosing instead to donate her time to promote the hospital where her parents first met in an

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elevator in 1961, when Esther worked as

wholesome, realistic, sincere, and people

an EKG technician and Joe was visiting

trust her. She instantly elevated the brand,

the hospital to donate blood for an

bringing Cooper to another level entirely.

Army buddy.

The things that were happening at Cooper

On a summer day some forty-four

at that time were almost a secret. The

years after the Ripas first met, physicians,

public had no idea of the transforma‑

nurses, staff, patients, and Board members

tions taking place here within our Health

gathered to watch the debut of Cooper’s

Sciences Campus. People really didn’t know

new television campaign. Kelly Ripa’s

everything that Cooper was about, and this

empathy and rapport shone through, not

campaign raised awareness of our clinical

typical for health care advertising at the

expertise among all of our service lines.”

time.

Andrew Gradel, then Cooper’s

The television ads helped launch a

Director of Internet marketing, agreed.

public relations campaign so successful

“Prior to Kelly, it was Cooper on Action

that people started calling Cooper “Kelly’s

News because someone was in an accident

Hospital.” Ripa’s voice and her messages— “Serious Care Starts Here” and “World Class

“When Kelly Ripa agreed to be a spokesperson for Cooper, she put a face on the organization, something we never had before.”

Care, Right

—Jill Sayre Lawlor

Here, Right

and headed to our Trauma Center.

Kelly puts a softer face forward and allows us to talk about all of our outstanding programs. Through

Now”—became synonymous with

Kelly, we put Cooper on people’s minds in

Cooper. Soon, Ripa’s image was every‑

the same way as Jefferson or Penn, as an

where—not only on television but also

academic medical center with outstanding

promoting Cooper on billboards, on the

medical services.”

Internet, in printed advertisements, and

Norcross was euphoric—with both

on banners that unfurled from the tops of

Ripa’s contributions and the results. “In our

Cooper buildings.

quest to be the best in the region, Cooper

“When Kelly Ripa agreed to be a

is quickly becoming one of the best-known

spokesperson for Cooper, she put a face

health care institutions in the nation, and

on the organization, something we never

Kelly Ripa is one of the reasons why,”

had before,” said Jill Sayre Lawlor, Cooper

he said, giving full credit to Ripa’s contri‑

Vice President of Marketing. “She is

bution and Cooper’s marketing team. “She

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305

is now seen regularly by millions as part of Cooper’s advertising and health care marketing campaign. Kelly’s energy and sincerity are a perfect fit with a hospital that has been steadily growing and is there to serve all the needs of South Jersey residents.”

With the very public success of a

Norcross brought to Cooper a leadership package unlike anything it had ever seen.

larger-than-life marketing campaign behind him, Norcross returned once more to working behind the scenes to effect change at Cooper. After UMDNJ’s Camden Task Force unanimously

endorsed a four-year medical school in Camden in 2005, Norcross began lining up support for the proposal and putting together possibilities for academic affiliations for a medical school at Cooper. Quietly but deliberately, he also began to orchestrate several key leadership maneuvers in order to find the right fit for the emerging medical center. First, John Sheridan, the distinguished lawyer with a career in government who had repeatedly helped Cooper achieve its goals in Trenton, joined Cooper as Senior Executive Vice President in July 2005, reporting to Olivia. Second, after four years in the position, Charles Sessa resigned as Board Chairman in October 2005; Sessa returned to his career in banking and finance, and Cooper ended its four-year experiment with a paid, full-time Chairman. And third, Norcross, a Board member since 1990, agreed at last to serve as Acting Chairman after Sessa, an unpaid appointment that would become official in six months.

It would be difficult to overstate the positive impact on Cooper’s future success of Norcross stepping to center stage in late 2005 and finally embracing a very public leadership role. With his unparalleled connections in South Jersey and Trenton, with his proven business savvy and tremendous financial success, and with his laser-sharp vision of Cooper driven by a quest to honor his father’s spirit and his own “do-not-tell-me-what-I-cannot-do” mantra, Norcross brought to Cooper a leadership package unlike anything it had ever seen.

Once, when asked to explain who was responsible for rebuilding Cooper, Board member and longtime Cooper physician Dr. Albert Tama didn’t even hesitate. “The main event that happened to Cooper,” said Dr. Tama, as he pointedly took his index finger and tapped the table in front of him, “was George Norcross.”

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Technology and Its Importance to Cooper from 1999 to 2005 During Cooper’s financial downturn, the hospital continued to upgrade its technology infra‑ structure, at considerable expense and fiscal strain on the financially strapped hospital. But if the hospital was going to survive, this element of progress could simply not be overlooked.

Beginning in 1999 Dr. Simon Samaha, a former internal medicine chief resident at Cooper who became Vice President and Chief Information Officer, directed the hospital’s technology advances. Dr. Samaha helped Cooper become one of only a handful of hospitals across the country to implement an online system called Physician Order Entry, eliminating handwritten orders by physicians.

“It was one of the few things that the hospital supported” during the financial crisis, said Dr. Samaha. Not only was Cooper a pioneer for adopting the system, but it was one of only 30 percent of all hospitals to adopt the system for all of its physicians, not just a select few. The advanced system was featured on CNN, and “it was a big milestone for Cooper, from an IT perspective,” said Dr. Samaha.

Dr. Samaha credited Board members George Norcross and George Weinroth with driving Board support for continued technological progress during difficult times. Dr. Samaha also noted that the hospital’s paperless physician order system paved the way for the hospital to eventually launch a new electronic health record (EHR) system for patients. Cooper began investigating the EHR system in 2005; three years later, Cooper became the first hospital in South Jersey to adopt an EHR system in its Emergency and Trauma Departments and three outpatient sites. A hospital-wide EHR system called EPIC was in place at Cooper by 2010, long before the 2014 deadline mandated by the federal government for every American to have an EHR. The system allows for improved safety and quality in patient care, providing accurate and seamless access to the patient’s chart, regardless of where the patient is seen in the Cooper Health System.

Additionally, EPIC enhances collaboration between Cooper physicians Cooper’s Emergency Department staff get a glimpse of the new electronic health record system, EPIC, in 2010. and their patients by giving

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the patients secure and confidential online access to their electronic medical charts and allowing for two-way communication between physicians and their patients.

In addition to coordinating the hospital’s IT needs, Dr. Samaha and his team also worked with every department to review its diagnostic and clinical technology needs—including the region’s first laparoscopic robotic-assisted surgical system, state-of-the-art linear accelerators for radiation therapy at the Cooper Cancer Institute, and sophisticated diagnostic imaging equipment for Radiology.

The critical role that advanced technology played in Cooper’s recovery was especially apparent in the hospital’s radiology and diagnostic imaging program. Its residency training program was on probation, and three directors had come and gone in the two years before Dr. Raymond L. Baraldi was named Chief of Cooper’s Radiology Department in 2005. Dr. Baraldi, a well-known radiologist from Main Line Health, acknowledged Cooper’s “reputation for excellence in patient care” but admitted that Radiology had to “improve the quality of our services” through “modernizing and updating our technology.” His first task? To put the department back together, “do the right thing for the patients, the staff, and the organization,” said Gerald M. Mullen, the department’s Administrative Director at the time.

Cooper’s hybrid operating room blends surgical and imaging technology to treat complex aortic diseases.

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Toward that goal, Dr. Baraldi and Mullen moved quickly to rejuvenate the Radiology Department with advanced technology—including a new picture archive commu‑ nication system and radiology information system (both designed to provide superior and faster patient diagnostics), two new computer tomography (CT) imaging scans, and one new magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) device.

When it came to these critical technology upgrades, said Mullen, no one helped the department more than Dr. Samaha, who left Cooper in 2008 after also serving as Chief Medical Officer. “Simon A resident honing his clinical skills on a simulation mannequin, 2009. clearly understood the value of technology,” said Mullen.

Another physician credited with keeping Cooper ahead of the technology curve was Dr. Carolyn E. Bekes. Widely known for her expertise in critical care medicine since joining Cooper in 1977, Dr. Bekes, Cooper’s Senior Vice President of Academic Affairs and its future Chief Medical Officer, was also responsible for bringing simulation education to Cooper. Simulation mannequins are computer controlled and programmed to mimic real-life critical situations. Through simulation mannequins, the possible medical training scenarios—with different levels of illnesses as well as body parts designed to show different injuries—are endless.

Dr. Bekes first saw simulation mannequins demonstrated at a conference in 2002. She then drove the process to bring simulation education to Cooper. Dr. Bekes helped raise money to bring the first simulation mannequin (Sim Man) to Cooper in 2003, followed in 2004 by additional Board support for training and equipment so that she could prove that simulation worked as an educa‑ tional tool. Dr. Bekes’s insights proved entirely accurate: future studies showed that simulator-trained medical professionals are able to operate in less time and make fewer medical errors.

Through Dr. Bekes’s leadership, Cooper soon developed its own Simulation Laboratory, which included a full suite of patient rooms with simulated mannequins of both sexes and all ages. The Sim Lab would prove to be a unique and positive factor in the medical center’s quest for a four-year medical school, and simulation education played an important role in the medical school’s ability to provide four years of clinical training for its students.

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Cooper celebrates the opening of its new pavilion with a dazzling fireworks display, December 2008.

PA RT

S I X / C H A P T E R

1 8

A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn 2006–2010

F

rom 2006 to 2010, Cooper University Hospital successfully completed its

transformation to become a world-class medical center—committed to patient-centered care, medical education, academic research, and the citizens of Camden and South Jersey. Cooper’s rebirth involved the hospital’s most dramatic physical changes in the last three decades, changes that included a new patient pavilion, the first building blocks in the new $500 million Health Sciences Campus, and an unprecedented growth in medical programs and community outreach in a thirty-block area around Cooper known as the Cooper Plaza and Lanning Square neighborhoods.

Guided by what many considered the strongest leadership in Cooper’s long history, Cooper’s transformation took place in the exact same neigh‑ borhood where Cooper Hospital first opened in 1887, when its original slate-gray stone façade faced Sixth Street to provide an anchor for the growing city. But by 2010, the twenty-first-century hospital still known as Cooper was no longer just an anchor for a community. Cooper University Hospital, nearly everyone agreed, was recognized as Camden’s best hope for survival.

A New Vision Takes Hold Cooper started 2006 with remarkable news: the National Research Corporation had recog‑ nized Cooper as one of the top hospitals in the nation, awarding it the 2005–2006 Consumer

Choice Award. Cooper was the only hospital in the Delaware Valley to receive this distinction, which is based on consumer responses about quality of care, doctors, and nurses.

“This puts us in the company of such well-known institutions as Johns Hopkins University Hospital, the Mayo Clinic, and New York’s Columbia Presbyterian Hospital,” Chairman Norcross announced. “In the Delaware Valley, it was only Cooper that received this year’s award—not Jeff, not Penn, and not Hahnemann.

The message is clear: People are coming to Camden for their health care needs.”

The prestigious Consumer Choice Award highlighted a remarkable turnaround that Cooper began in 1999, a chance to step forward with confidence to realize its plans for the future. Just months after the award was announced, Norcross was absolutely beaming as he introduced a new promotional video called Our Vision, designed to present Cooper’s vision for a twenty-first-century Health Sciences Campus.

“Six years ago, Cooper was a hospital in crisis, unable to meet its obligations and mission,” Norcross said as he began the

“The message is clear: People are coming to Camden for their health care needs.”

—George E. Norcross III

Our Vision presentation. “Today, we are recog‑ nized in the region as the premier hospital, with more nationally renowned physicians than any other institution in South Jersey. The Cooper Health Sciences Campus will be the premier academic, research, and health care campus for

the Delaware Valley and all of South Jersey. And because the Cooper campus will be woven into the surrounding neighborhoods, it will also stimulate an economic revitalization of the Cooper Plaza and Lanning Square neighborhoods.”

For the next six years, Cooper embarked on a multiphase development plan to bring its vision for a Health Sciences Campus to life. The vision embraced thirty square blocks around the hospital and involved partnerships with city, county, and state agencies; private and nonprofit organizations; and a groundswell of community groups. The result was not only a dramatic physical expansion of the medical center and its programs but also the rehabilitation of local parks, the creation of pedestrian-friendlier streets, the development of rehabilitated and new housing, and improved services in surrounding neighborhoods that now included the promise of better schools.

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Drs. Maritza Cotto, Kathleen Heintz, Perry Weinstock, Frederic Ginsberg, and Prasanna Sugathan in the new Cardiac Care Unit.

The Roberts Pavilion: A Focus on Patient Experience The new patient pavilion was clearly designed to be the cornerstone of Cooper’s expansion program.

Officials broke ground for the $220 million project in August 2006 as excavation began between the Kelemen and Dorrance buildings and the Riebel parking garage next to Kelemen was torn down. First announced in 2004 as a six-story, $117 million project, that expanded to include a ten-story, 312,000-square-foot patient pavilion with a lobby that astounded everyone who entered it (see Sidebar, “Roberts Pavilion

Cooper’s pavilion features all private patient rooms.

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Highlights”). The patient and medical/surgical floors were designed to include sixty private patient rooms with features that provided not only the latest in medical technology but also a healing and family-centered environment in keeping with Cooper’s continuous quest to enhance the patient care experience. The twelve operating room suites would be more technologically advanced than any other facility in South Jersey, soon boasting the area’s first hybrid operating room designed to provide vascular and cardiothoracic surgeons with a futuristic state-ofthe-art facility to perform minimally invasive vascular and endovascular surgery. The pavilion would also include a thirty-private-bed Intensive Care Unit for the most critically ill patients at Cooper, named in honor of Edward D.Viner, the Cooper physician who served as Chief of Medicine from 1987 to 2006. It would double the size of the existing Emergency Department to include thirty-six advanced patient care rooms and create an entirely new twenty-bed Clinical Decision Unit for patients who came to Cooper primarily through the Emergency Department but who needed additional observation and assessment to determine if they should be admitted or discharged.

As dramatic as its new interior proved to be, the impact of the pavilion’s exterior would be just as great. With the entrance to Cooper now reoriented

Before long, signature “Cooper red” banners were hanging from lampposts throughout the area, designating Cooper’s growing Health Sciences Campus.

from Haddon Avenue to Martin Luther King Boulevard, the Cooper campus now faced downtown Camden and all but embraced the city—standing almost directly across from the Walter Rand Transportation Center and looking in the direction of RutgersCamden and Rowan Universities, Camden County College, the waterfront, and related businesses in the distance. “It set the stage

for the education and medicine sectors—the “Eds and Meds”—to cooperate, and it helped Cooper’s integration into downtown,” said Monica Lesmerises-Leibovitz, Cooper’s Director for Community Development in 2006. “It really marked the beginning of Cooper embracing the neighborhood.”

Before long, signature “Cooper red” banners were hanging from lampposts throughout the area, designating Cooper’s growing Health Sciences Campus. Within a few years, in addition to the new pavilion, this campus would include:

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Cooper banners are prominently displayed throughout the Cooper Health Sciences Campus.

• A $33 million, nine-story parking garage owned by the Camden County

block of Broadway between Benson and Washington streets.

Improvement Authority and used

by Cooper staff and visitors, neigh‑

• $12 million in streetscape improve‑

borhood residents, and nearby

ments and park development through

businesses when it opened adjacent

city, county, and hospital partnerships,

to the pavilion in 2007.

starting in July 2007.

• $60 million in renovations to the Kelemen and Dorrance buildings.

• A $4 million expansion at the Ronald McDonald House, and numerous public and private partnerships

• More than $139 million for the new,

to rehab and build new homes

four-year Cooper Medical School

in the Cooper Plaza and Lanning

of Rowan University, announced

Square areas.

by Governor Corzine’s Executive Order in 2009 after years of negotia‑

• The development of a new, $100

tions and scheduled to accept its first

million comprehensive cancer

students in the fall of 2012 on the 400

center that would soon be known

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as MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper, set in motion by Governor Corzine in July 2007 after an emotional appeal by New Jersey Assemblyman Louis D. Greenwald, and approved by the Camden City Planning Board in 2011.

• KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy School, a $45 million, 110,000-square-foot facility, designed to serve pre-K to eighth-grade students on Broadway.

With the critical components of Cooper’s Health Sciences Campus now outlined and destined to happen, Dr. Olivia resigned as CEO in early 2008 and accepted the position of President and CEO of the Penn Allegheny Health System in Pittsburgh.

Sheridan, who was appointed President of Cooper in September 2007, slipped seamlessly into the CEO’s corner office in February 2008, the first President and CEO at Cooper with a background in law and policy instead of health care and medicine.

Two Natural Leaders, Two Different Styles In some ways, Board Chairman Norcross and CEO Sheridan repre‑ sented a leadership style that harkened back to an earlier Cooper history— when Board leaders were extremely hands-on and George E. Norcross III, Chairman of Cooper’s Board of Trustees, during the Pavilion opening ceremony in 2008. worked jointly with hospital executives to run the hospital and chart its course. And though they worked together well, Norcross and Sheridan represented two very different personalities and styles. Sheridan’s

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intellectual management style and his ever-welcoming personality contrasted markedly with Norcross’s lasersharp intellect but sometimes cool, simmering persona.

Norcross readily admitted the difference in the two men’s styles. “John had a gift of likability that is important for leadership quality,” he said. “I am definitely a type-A personality, probably type-A on steroids. John was much more measured, more reserved, and he was one of the most respected persons I have ever come across.”

Together, the two men reflected the very best qualities in each other:

John P. Sheridan Jr., Cooper’s President and Chief Executive Officer, in the new Pavilion lobby, 2008.

skilled collaborators who used their individual drive and leadership abilities as a

and hospital buildings all in plain view.

As CEO, Sheridan oversaw the Pavilion

force for change. “We both have the same

project while John Schwarz, then Vice

goal in terms of what we are trying to do,”

President of facilities, managed the project

Sheridan said. “I very much bought into

from its beginning to completion in 2008.

George’s vision. Take a look at this place. It’s

When the pavilion celebrated its grand

his vision, it’s his determination. He doesn’t

opening in December 2008, dramatic

stop until it is done.”

exterior lighting displays filled the Camden

A lawyer with a background in state

nighttime skyline with red and white beams

government who also understood

of light. Local and state politicians, as well

historical properties, Sheridan was not only

as television star and hospital spokesperson

responsible for the operations of Cooper

Kelly Ripa and her father, Joe Ripa, crowded

University Hospital and its satellite offices,

onto a stage inside the hospital’s new lobby.

but he also took a special interest in the

Soon, Norcross stepped to the podium

changing landscape and programs in the

and announced what was pretty obvious

community around the hospital. One look

to everyone in Cooper on this milestone

outside Sheridan’s second-floor corner

occasion: Cooper, already known for its

window at Cooper soon told the story

superior care, now had a facility to match.

of his administration’s impact—with new housing, neighborhood parks, landscaping,

“This new pavilion marks a rebirth for the hospital and this great city we have

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

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called home for more than 120 years,” said Norcross, as applause filled the soaring, hotel-like lobby designed to cater to patients and their families and to enhance what Cooper referred to as “the patient experience.” “We have come so far to be able to provide this incredible building Joseph J. Roberts Jr. during the Roberts Pavilion naming ceremony in 2010.

to the patients of our region.

Our already existing superior

care is now matched by a facility that casts shadows on others in the region.”

For Sheridan and all of Cooper’s employees, the mid-December opening of the pavilion “feels like Christmas Day has arrived two weeks early,” Sheridan noted.

“This pavilion is the culmination of an eight-year project that has involved all levels of hospital employees. So many of our employees have worked tirelessly through this construction to ensure that this dream came to fruition.”

Two years after it opened, Cooper officials named the patient pavilion the Roberts Pavilion in honor of longtime Camden supporter and former Speaker of the New Jersey General Assembly Joseph J. Roberts Jr. And the Roberts Pavilion did more than attract new patients. Even while it was under construction, it helped attract more game-changing doctors, too.

For instance, Dr. Roland Schwarting, a noted pathologist formerly with Thomas Jefferson University, joined Cooper in 2006 to be Chairman of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Cooper. A future member of the Board of Trustees, Dr. Schwarting convinced many distinguished pathologists to join him at Cooper, where he brought together advanced technology and an internationally and nationally recognized faculty to provide comprehensive diagnostic and personalized service to physicians, community hospitals, independent laboratories, and other health care organizations. Dr. Schwarting was elected President of the South Jersey Pathology Society in 2008, and was President of Cooper’s medical staff in 2013.

As Pathology and Laboratory Medicine expanded, Dr. Parrillo had also begun to orchestrate a surgical evolution at Cooper. He pushed to include the most advanced cardiac surgical procedures in Cooper’s program, “in order to be

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Roberts Pavilion Highlights From its dramatic entrance to its sophisticated private patient rooms to its futuristic operating room suites, Cooper has never experienced any building project like the Roberts Pavilion. As Cooper officials like to say, “A new era for Cooper University Hospital began with the opening of the Roberts Pavilion in 2008.” Consider these highlights of the building that brought a new symbol of excellence to Camden and the entire South Jersey area: • Elaborate laboratory automation facility.

• Campus reorientation from Haddon Avenue to Martin Luther King Boulevard with a new front entrance and drop-off zone.

• Expanded, customer-friendly, public lobby space with new restaurant, health resource center, business center, gift shop, coffee shop, and chapel.

• DiFlorio Family Healing Garden, beautifully landscaped with water feature and private seating area for patients and visitors.

• Ten-story, 312,000-square-foot patient care pavilion; 12 operating room suites; 60 private medical/surgical rooms.

• Future expansion space for up to 120 additional beds and imaging/procedure suites.

Operating Room Features • Operating suites averaging 700 square feet.

• Two neurological operating rooms, with a “brain” room that contains dedicated, highresolution helical iCT scanner, and a “spine” room equipped with a robotically controlled image intensifier with intraoperative guidance.

• Two state-of-the-art cardiac surgical suites.

• Minimally invasive robotic suite.

• Operating rooms built to allow compartmentalization of equipment and, where possible, lifting equipment off the floor.

• Ceiling-mounted positions of delicate OR equipment to avoid moving it in and out of the rooms.

• Lights and booms allowing 360-degree rotation of the equipment.

The Dr. Edward D.Viner Intensive Care Unit • Thirty-private-bed unit, with five isolation rooms.

• 360-degree access to the patient; over 300 square feet per room; private, enclosed, glassdoor patient rooms; advanced remote monitoring capability.

• Family area within each patient room, including a couch and a caregiver section of the room providing more space for necessary equipment and monitoring.

• Bedside nurses’ station.

• New alarm management system.

• ICU satellite pharmacy.

• A station housing critical medications in each room.

• Family waiting area; private consultation rooms.

• Private nurses’ lounge and kitchenette; four on-call rooms with centralized lounge.

Cooper’s renowned cardiovascular surgeons (l–r): Drs. Frank Bowen III, Richard Y. Highbloom, and Michael Rosenbloom.

absolutely first-rate,” he said. “We wanted surgeons to do certain types of procedures and have the most advanced skills for our patients. We began actively recruiting one of the finest cardiothoracic surgery teams in the nation.” First among the team recruited was renowned cardiac valve repair and replacement expert Dr. Michael Rosenbloom to head the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery. Dr. Rosenbloom in turn recruited Dr. Frank W. Bowen III, a specialist in complete arterial revascularization; off-pump, beating-heart surgery; thoracic aortic surgery; and minimally invasive cardiac surgery; as well as Dr. Richard Y. Highbloom, specializing in robotic-assisted, minimally invasive coronary bypass surgery and complete arterial revascularization.

Dr. Jeffrey P. Carpenter, who became Cooper’s Chief of Surgery in September 2008, said he had “no intention of ever leaving the hospital of the University of Pennsylvania [HUP],” where he spent twenty-three years actively involved in research, teaching, and the practice of medicine. But immediately after visiting, Dr. Carpenter was attracted to the leadership and growth opportunities at Cooper, particularly with the promise of a new medical school on the horizon. “The Department of Surgery itself was poised to move; it had all the right pieces in place and a vision for real success. They had just completed a new pavilion, wonderful operating rooms, patient floors with private rooms, catering to the patient experience.”

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Within the next three years,

that Cooper couldn’t succeed as a world-

Dr. Carpenter was able to recruit more

class tertiary care center, that it couldn’t

outstanding surgeons to Cooper, including

reach higher and achieve more than being

Dr. Joseph V. Lombardi, a vascular and

a South Jersey teaching hospital with a

endovascular surgeon with expertise in

Level 1 Trauma Center. Indeed, the Roberts

complex aortic repair; surgical oncologist

Pavilion seemed to trigger the construction

Dr. Francis R. Spitz; and urologist Dr. Allen S.

of building after building and program after

Seftel, who specializes in male sexual health.

program as Cooper’s new Health Sciences

After a while, Dr. Carpenter had recruited

Campus became a reality.

so many new surgeons from his former

Many people observed that this transfor‑

employer that his former HUP colleagues

mation was vintage Norcross. “I think that

began to tease him by referring to Cooper

George believes very much the quote from

as “Little HUP.” Noted Dr. Carpenter, “I took

the poet Robert Browning: ‘Ah, but a man’s

that as a compliment.”

reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a

Dr. Carpenter pointed out that almost

heaven for?’” said former CEO Dr. Olivia.

all of Cooper’s surgery was now performed

“That is another way of saying that when

by Cooper University physicians—a fact that

George raises the bar, you jump over it, in a

reflected the medical center’s push since

very positive way. He saw that Cooper could

the mid-1980s for a predominantly hospital-

be a lot greater. And he took the necessary

based, full-time physician staff. And, he said,

steps to make sure that this happened.”

“the volume of surgery and the associated revenue have dramatically increased

Cooper Embraces the Community

since 2008.”

The reality of the Roberts Pavilion also

Milestones such as the new Roberts

challenged Cooper to finally lead the way

Pavilion, the arrival of countless new physi‑

and be the change it wanted to see in the

cians, and having a star like Kelly Ripa

surrounding streets of its Camden neigh‑

serve as the hospital’s spokesperson spoke

borhood. “You cannot just put a beautiful

volumes about Cooper’s resurgence. The

building in a certain spot and leave every‑

Roberts Pavilion was more than just a

thing around it in a dilapidated condition,”

visible, structural reminder of Cooper’s

said Joan S. Davis,Vice Chair of Cooper’s

transformation. The new pavilion—with

Board of Trustees. “The thing that I am

C-O-O-P-E-R spelled out in towering white

most proud of is a change in the culture

letters on the side of the rooftop facing

within the hospital and the way the

Camden and Philadelphia—also forever

hospital began to include the community

broke through the psychological barrier

and the city in its development—through

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Medical Advances, 2006–2010 With the recent development of an entire new patient pavilion, as well as a new medical school and a new cancer center scheduled to open, medical technology and innovations were seemingly announced on a daily basis at Cooper University Hospital.

Here, the use of simulation labs, hybrid operating rooms, and electronic patient records have become part of health care workers’ regular routines. Some highlights of Cooper’s medical advances follow.

Capsule Endoscopy (an Easy Pill to Swallow) and SpyGlass™ Cooper doctors now use the innovative technology of the video endoscopy or PillCAM to reveal intestinal abnormalities that cannot be seen with traditional diagnostic testing. PillCAM, or video capsule endoscopy, is a procedure that uses a tiny camera to take pictures of the insides of a patient’s digestive tract. The camera is housed in a vitaminsized capsule that patients swallow. As the capsule travels through the digestive system, the camera takes thousands of pictures that are transmitted to a recorder that patients wear on a belt around their waists. When traditional imaging studies fail to reveal the source of bleeding, PillCAM can provide detailed images of the small intestine—an area that’s difficult to reach with traditional endoscopy procedures.

In 2009 Cooper added another direct visualization innovation when the Cooper Digestive Health Institute began using SpyGlass, a fiber-optic camera, not much bigger than a pencil point, inserted through a catheter into the upper digestive track to help physicians examine areas previously difficult to access. Cooper became the only The PillCAM center in the region to utilize the technique.

Cool Therapy—Literally At Cooper, therapeutic hypothermia rapidly lowers the body temperature to ninetythree to ninety-four degrees Fahrenheit under monitored sedation for a twenty-four-hour period. This therapy has been shown to significantly reduce brain damage and improve survival after cardiac arrest; the earlier treatment is begun, the better the neurological outcome, and patients demonstrate better outcomes in centers with the most experience.

Time Is Muscle During a heart attack, the longer an artery in the heart is blocked, the more potential for irreversible damage to the heart muscle or even death. The Cooper Heart Institute has one of the best angioplasty records in the Delaware Valley for meeting and beating the national standard for keeping arteries open and blood flowing to the heart. Using advanced technology in the Cooper Cardiac Catheterization Lab, the physicians at the Cooper Heart Institute open the area of the arterial blockage using a catheter with a small, inflatable balloon at its tip. This relieves the recurrence of chest pain, increases a patient’s quality of

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life, and reduces other complications of heart disease—and Cooper cardiologists perform this procedure thirty-two minutes faster than the national average of ninety minutes, a statistical advantage highlighted in a recent public relations “Numbers” campaign designed to promote the advantages of medical care at South Jersey’s number-one medical center.

One more number: More than 90 percent of coronary artery bypass surgeries at Cooper were performed off-pump in 2010, which means that the patients’ hearts were not stopped or placed on a heart-lung machine, an approach that is much better for the patient. Nationally, only 21 percent of coronary bypass patients have off-pump surgery.

First in the Nation Cooper was the first hospital in the country to use an electronic medical system for transmission of real-time critical data on dialysis patients in the Intensive Care Unit.

The system allows the physician to monitor complex clinical data from any location in real time, an advancement that provides the physician access to vital signs and critical laboratory values to determine if the dialysis is being administered at an effective level.

This new tool, integrated through Cooper’s EPIC electronic health system, is the first of many real-time data collection and monitoring advances that will bring extensive benefits to critical care patients. Said Dr. Lawrence S. Weisberg, head of Cooper’s Division of Nephrology, “This remarkable advancement allows us to save critical time when treating some of our sickest patients.”

Experts in the Advanced Treatment of Atrial Fibrillation Treating heart rhythm disorders requires absolute precision. The Cooper Heart Institute provides its patients with access to the most advanced technology available. From 3-D mapping to radio-frequency catheter ablation technology to laser extraction of pacemaker leads, the state-of-the-art equipment and facilities at the Cooper Heart Institute are second to none. Moreover, Cooper’s electrophysiologists, like Dr. Andrea M. Russo (a cardiologist who specializes in heart rhythm disorders), perform thousands of complex procedures each year and are among the nation’s leading experts in catheter ablation therapy, a state-of-the-art treatment that can free many patients from the need for daily medication.

Existing and Future Technology for Cancer Treatment Cooper’s patients have access to some of the most innovative and advanced diagnostic imaging and treatment tools in the world, including high-resolution breast ultrasound, PET-CT scanners, MRI-guided biopsy, digital stereotactic and vacuum-assisted biopsy systems, brachy‑ therapy, intensity modulated radiation therapy, and the robotic daVinci Surgical System. In 2008, Cooper University Hospital became one of only a few hospitals nationwide and the only hospital in the Delaware Valley to offer patients both the GammaKnife and the CyberKnife System for noninvasive treatments. The GammaKnife and CyberKnife can be used both for intracranial and body tumors—including those identified in the liver, lung, prostate, and spine— helping patients achieve the best possible outcomes.

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housing, streetscaping, outdoor concerts, community programs, new construction, and rehabbed buildings and homes. That is something that I am proud of.”

To many at Cooper, the decision to embrace its neighborhood was long overdue. Before 2006, Cooper’s involvement with its surrounding neighborhoods was largely through community outreach and health services. Granted, these efforts were considerable, including substantial time and financial commitments from Cooper: community educational schol‑ arships; the Camden County Cancer

Well-known civic and business leader Joan S. Davis,Vice Chairman of Cooper’s Board of Trustees, 2008.

Screening Project; childhood vacci‑ nation programs; SAFE Kids Coalition for motor vehicle, bike, and swimming safety education; an early intervention program for people with HIV and AIDS; and dozens

“The thing that I am most proud of is a change in the culture within the hospital.”

—Joan S. Davis

of education and awareness campaigns covering a variety of health and safety topics for Camden’s citizens. In an effort that received nationwide attention, Cooper’s Dr. Jeffrey C. Brenner started the Camden Coalition of Health Providers, a citywide organization to improve the coordination

and tracking of certain patients who need chronic disease management.

But Cooper needed to do more.

“People in Camden looked at Cooper as the five-hundred-pound gorilla,” said Gary Young, Cooper’s Executive Vice President for government relations and public policy. They came here for medical care and so on, but Cooper was not engaged in its community. Cooper Plaza is our next-door neighbor, and we didn’t have a good relationship. I would credit John Sheridan with understanding that if you have an institution here like Cooper, you ought to be good neighbors.”

When Sheridan joined Cooper’s administration in 2005, he immediately began to connect the dots between the hospital and the community. “John Sheridan had

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a vision,” said Susan Bass Levin, President

for the residents to enjoy. The garden has

and Chief Executive Officer of the Cooper

become an important part of the fabric of

Foundation. “Cooper was not here just to

the community, and a beautiful willow tree is

provide medical care but to make a real

its centerpiece. A few years later the garden

difference in the community. There was a

would win the Plant One Million “Tree of the

strategic decision that Cooper was a part of

Year” award for its impact on the community.

this neighborhood, and the hospital needed

John Kromer, a member of the University

to be part of changing it to make it better.

of Pennsylvania Fels Institute of Government

John cares about every piece of it—the

who served as a consultant with the

streetscapes, the lights outside, and what he

Camden Redevelopment Agency, wrote

views as Cooper in the community.”

about Cooper’s visioning process in his book

Cooper definitely had the support of the

Fixing Broken Cities:

community. Though the city’s Department of Development and Planning had already

Senior administrators held a series of

approved the Cooper Plaza redevel‑

meetings with neighborhood residents.

opment plan—authorized by Camden’s

The hospital hired a consultant to

City Council in 2005—Cooper officials

manage a civic engagement process

began in March 2006 to conduct “visioning”

designed to present the plans and give

process meetings with nearby residents and

community members the opportunity

community leaders, including Sheila Roberts,

to learn about and influence

President of the Cooper Lanning Civic Association, and Sheila Davis, head of Lanning Square West Residents in Action.

Cooper, along with community residents, created the only community garden located in Cooper Plaza, on vacant land owned by the civic association. The garden was the dream of Sheila Roberts, and in the summer of 2011 Cooper and its partners completed the new garden

Children from a neighborhood day care center join in the grand opening celebration of Cooper Commons Park, 2009.

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them before they were finalized. At a well-attended meeting, residents reviewed and commented on building design options, expressed their views about current neighborhood conditions, and about their priorities for development, about what should be changed and what should remain.The community members wanted to see more green space in the area, which had been originally built up as a densely settled row house community. In response, Cooper made a commitment to finance the makeover of a centrally located small park that was in an extreme state of disrepair and to maintain the completed park for 20 years, after which this responsibility would be turned over to the City (and by which time, it was anticipated, the surrounding blocks would be populated by new residents who would look after the park).The Cooper expansion plan advanced without significant community opposition.

This approach reflected a relatively new but growing philosophy for attracting patients and revenue to medical centers in a competitive health care environment: you had to create a welcoming patient experience. “When you start thinking about that, it can’t just be a hospital,” said Sheridan. “Our Chairman, George Norcross, started a conversation about how to make Cooper a place that would be welcoming for patients to come into Camden. And that has to include everything around the hospital.”

Cooper’s top executives now recognized that there was more at stake than just attracting patients. As Kromer explained in Fixing Broken Cities, any institution situated in “disinvested neighborhoods characterized by declining housing values, rising crime rates and lower-quality public education” will eventually face a wealth of problems related to its workforce. As poverty and lack of education take hold, fewer remaining residents would be qualified for jobs at institutions like Cooper, and Seventh Street Linear Park replaced old train tracks in the street outside Cooper University Hospital, 2010.

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housing options would not

Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

be available to workers who are already

new housing development was under

employed. As Kromer wrote,

way within the census tracts where

The status of the Cooper Plaza /

Cooper is located.

Lanning Square neighborhood where Cooper University Hospital is located

In 2006 Sheridan hired Monica

is illustrative of this situation. In this

Lesmerises-Leibovitz to be Cooper’s

neighborhood, more than 40 percent

Director for Community Development,

of the population had incomes below

under the direction of Arthur Winkler,

poverty level in 2000, and more than

Executive Vice President of Corporate

half of the adults over twenty-five did

Support Services. “When I started at Cooper,

not have a high school diploma. At the

there was community service, but Cooper

same time, housing options were not

was not necessarily meeting and convening

available for workers who were already

and taking charge,” recalled Lesmerises-

employed at these institutions, despite

Leibovitz. “That was the evolution that

the fact that in some institutions,

started shortly before I arrived, when John

a significant number of employees

Sheridan arrived at Cooper and when

would likely be interested in moving

George Norcross became Chairman. The

into the city if housing were available.

two of them really had a vision.”

. . . In a 2006 survey of academic and

Lesmerises-Leibovitz never forgot how

health care institution staff, medical

Norcross and Sheridan explained their

professionals and graduate students

vision to her: together, they took out an

conducted by the Camden Higher

aerial map of Cooper and its surrounding

Education and Healthcare Task Force

neighborhoods and then used a red pen to

. . . most of the 837 respondents

literally draw an outline around the thirty

(679 of whom were associated with

blocks closest to the hospital. “And then

Cooper University Hospital) were living

they said, ‘This is our neighborhood. And it’s

in suburban areas not immediately

been our home for more than one hundred

adjacent to the city and were paying an

years and it’s a mess and we need to fix it,’”

average of $1,335 a month for housing.

Lesmerises-Leibovitz remembered. “And

Forty-four percent of the respondents

that’s when I knew: the directive for my job

answered “yes” to the question, “If

was a map with a red line and instructions to

new housing were built in the city of

‘start fixing.’”

Camden and cost was not a factor, would you consider living there?” At the

“Seeing Is Believing”: Revitalizing the Historic

time the survey was taken, no major

Neighborhood Adjoining Cooper

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327

Like the new buildings that would soon dominate the Health Sciences Campus, the visible pieces of community revitalization also began to appear. Starting in 2006— in an area roughly defined as north to south from Martin Luther King Boulevard to Pine Street and east to west from I-676 to Broadway—the Cooper Plaza neigh‑ borhood and adjoining Lanning Square witnessed an extended list of community improvements that Sheila Roberts, Cooper Lanning Civic Association President, once only dreamed about.

“We are part of the neighborhood,” Bass Levin proudly told community members who gathered in the Roberts Pavilion lobby at Cooper for the annual public meeting on December 7, 2010. Bass Levin then proceeded to take everyone on a virtual walk through the adjacent Cooper neighborhood, using a series of

On the south side of Cooper, just down the street from the entrance to the new Emergency Department, the St. Joseph’s Carpenter Society renovated and rehabbed seven historic row homes on Benson Street.

slides to trace the story of Cooper’s efforts to bring about dramatic changes to the neighborhoods and simulta‑ neously build a stronger, safer, more attractive community around Cooper.

And Cooper officials made one thing clear: they did not do this work alone.

Since 2006 Cooper has worked with civic and neighborhood groups, and community and housing partners,

to stabilize the neighborhood it calls home, improve housing conditions, reduce vacancies, and provide homeownership opportunities—block by block.

In 2008 Cooper led a community-based planning effort with the Cooper Plaza neighborhood and ten nonprofit and community groups to establish a plan for a shared vision for the neighborhoods’ future development. The shared vision is to create a vibrant mixed-use neighborhood that includes housing opportunities, a strong historic district, a revitalized commercial corridor, new parks and community space, and a Health Sciences Campus interwoven into the neighborhood. Cooper has been diligent in its efforts to work with its community partners to transform the Cooper Plaza neighborhood that it calls home.

On the south side of Cooper, just down the street from the entrance to the new Emergency Department, the St. Joseph’s Carpenter Society (in partnership with Cooper and the New Jersey Housing Mortgage Finance Agency) renovated and rehabbed seven historic row homes on Benson Street; these three-story,

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Ribbon cutting ceremony for The Cooper, a new market-rate condominium in the Cooper Plaza neighborhood.

red-brick homes with pocket-sized front

called The Cooper would soon be home to

yards are a part of the more than fifty area

twenty-five beautiful new condominiums

homes that St. Joseph’s rehabbed around

within walking distance of Cooper. The first

Cooper since 2006 and turned over to new

new condo development in Camden in over

owners in the community for homeown‑

twenty-five years, this M&M Development

ership. An additional one hundred occupied

was all but sold out when the building

homes on several blocks in the neigh‑

opened in the fall of 2011.

borhood will also benefit from St. Joseph’s

Granted, earlier neighborhood revival

ongoing residential façade improvement

plans had resulted in protests from displaced

program that started in 2011 and has been

residents and businesses in Camden. But the

completed in phases, where homes soon

redevelopment around Cooper in Cooper

featured fresh paint, new doors, and other

Plaza and Lanning Square did not involve any

exterior repairs to improve the conditions of

acquisition of occupied homes, and there was

occupied residential homes.

little if any neighborhood opposition; in fact,

Six newly constructed, two-story, owneroccupied homes on Sixth Street between Royden and Line streets, built through

the neighborhood roundly supported leveling a former methadone clinic on Broadway.

And to replace a trash-strewn

Camden County Habitat for Humanity, were

thoroughfare, a triangle of debris, and a park

finished in late 2011. And at the corner of

once derisively referred to as “Needle Park,”

Seventh and New streets, a new building

Cooper also spearheaded the construction

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

329

and rehabilitation of three new neigh‑ borhood parks: Seventh Street Linear Park—a welcoming. eightblock cobblestone promenade of trees, grass, beautiful park benches, and new lighting from John P. Sheridan Jr. (far left) and Dr. Edward Viner (second from left) enlist the help of PSE&G and other local businesses to help in the neighborhood revitalization.

Line to Benson streets; Triangle Park—a three-sided,

landscaped slip of a park that is now home to art panels celebrating the contri‑ butions of Dr. Bascom S. Waugh, the first African American doctor at Cooper, and Dr. Lewis Coriell, the founder of the Coriell Institute for Medical Research; and Cooper Commons Park, where a complete renovation turned a dangerous eyesore into a beautiful neighborhood park with a playground, benches, and open community space that is ringed with flowering crepe myrtles and plants to provide a safe urban haven for nearby residents. In the summer, local businesses partner with Cooper to sponsor concerts at Cooper Commons, where the sights and sounds of local jazz musicians, children dancing through giant bubble wands, and Cooper employees mingling with neighborhood residents help close the gap between the hospital and the community it serves.

“Seeing is believing,” said Roberts, a driving force behind the development of the 2008 neighborhood plan that Cooper used to create a shared vision of the community’s future. “More than two years ago, the community began designing this park, and now we are standing in it.” Restoring the neighborhood is “going to take time, no question,” Roberts told a newspaper reporter. “But now that we have so many partners in this fight, we will take charge block by block.” What Roberts called the “partners in the fight” to turn Cooper Plaza around now includes Cooper, St. Joseph’s Carpenter Society, Habitat for Humanity, nonprofit and private developers, and local civic associations. Through the state’s Neighborhood Revital‑ ization Tax Credit (NRTC) program—a state initiative that gives corporations

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tax credits for investing in urban areas­—

parking lot improvements for local nonprofit

Cooper secured a total of $4 million in grant

providers in the neighborhood, community

funding, starting in 2010, from corporate

safety improvements, and institutional

donors that included PSE&G, Campbell Soup

expansion that all supports further economic

Company, Horizon Blue Cross and Blue

growth and development in the Cooper

Shield, PNC, TD Bank, New Jersey Manufac‑

Plaza neighborhood.

turers Insurance, and Sun National Bank to help finance these neighborhood projects.

“The fabric of Cooper is becoming ever more woven into the fabric of the

In fact, six years later Cooper was approved for a fifth NRTC project that will provide nearly $1 million for further housing rehabilitation, improvements

community,”

Cooper and its nonprofit partners have utilized the Cooper Plaza NRTC funding to acquire nineteen vacant homes for rehabilitation, housing rehabilitations for eighteen homes, and construction of six new homes on once vacant lots.

for occupied

said LesmerisesLeibovitz, who left Cooper in 2010 after transferring the NRTC projects to the Cooper

homes, a workforce development training

Foundation. “There was a feeling before

program, and improvements for the Cooper

that Cooper had a physical back to the

Sprouts Community Garden. Cooper and

community. Now, with the Roberts Pavilion,

its nonprofit partners have utilized the

the new parks, the housing initiatives, and

Cooper Plaza NRTC funding to acquire

the beautiful Seventh Street promenade

nineteen vacant homes for rehabilitation,

where the trolley used to be, Cooper is

housing rehabilitations for eighteen homes,

embracing the community. And I think that is

and construction of six new homes on once

incredible.”

vacant lots.

In addition, Cooper stabilized existing

More Than Buildings, Houses, and Parks

occupied housing with residential improve‑

As Bass Levin pointed out in her annual

ments, providing for ongoing maintenance

public meeting presentation, Cooper’s

of parks and streetscapes in the neigh‑

community outreach wasn’t limited to new

borhood, lot stabilization and greening,

buildings and landscaping. In fact, in 2010

daily neighborhood maintenance services,

Cooper reported spending over $66 million

landscape improvements, health care clinics,

to support community initiatives every

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

331

year—initiatives that ranged from community development to vaccinations and health screenings to charity care and community health seminars to help make the greater Cooper Plaza neighborhood a safer, healthier place to live. The new Cooper Lanning Promise Neighborhood Initiative—where Cooper partners with Camden, Rowan University, the Center for Family Services, Cooper Lanning Civic Associ‑ ation, Lanning Square West Residents, and others—focuses on education and public safety to promote the success of neighborhood children and their families, with Cooper leading the way to secure a new elementary school for the area. Cooper was one of the original partners for this initiative and was active in the planning and implementation of programs to support children and families in the Cooper Plaza and Lanning Square neighborhoods. And through its community health outreach programs, Cooper delivered the medical resources necessary to build a healthier community. Just one example is Cooper’s Health Outreach Project (HOP) Clinic, an Urban Health Initiative in which third- and fourth-year medical students provided free health clinics for uninsured Camden residents. The HOP program was recog‑ nized nationally as a model to help improve the health of high-risk communities.

Last but not least, Cooper continued to provide employment in the city where it was founded. As the largest employer in Camden in 2010, Cooper employed

Camden resident Michelle Williamson has worked in Cooper’s Health Care Access Department since 2010.

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Cooper unfurls a banner announcing Cooper Medical School of Rowan University on the hospital parking garage, June 2009.

fifty-six hundred people, including six

campus centered around Cooper University

hundred Camden residents. As Bass Levin

Hospital, the city may finally be able to lay

noted, Cooper is committed to hiring and

claim to a neighborhood of some economic

retaining more Camden City employees

stability,” noted a Courier-Post editorial in

than ever before, through the help of

November 2010. “Where young profes‑

pre-employment and job readiness training

sionals live, where properties rising in value

programs, community college initiatives, and

are sought after, where the city can collect

youth summer internships for Camden City

taxes from most properties and draw more

High School students.

money to fund its budget and pay police

Newspaper headlines that once

officers, where drug dealers and thieves are

bemoaned the adverse conditions around

pushed out, where small stores and eateries

Cooper now regularly announced its

open and succeed, and, most importantly,

progress: Cooper Projects Are a Needed Catalyst

where there are good-paying jobs being

. . . Cooper Honors Camden Medical Pioneers

created. What’s happening in Cooper Plaza

with Permanent Display at Neighborhood

and Lanning Square may be the start of a

Park . . . Offering Hope to Camden . . . Leaders,

promising rebirth.”

Community Celebrate a “Clean and Safe Cooper Plaza.”

Joseph Chandler certainly thought so.

Chandler, a retired Camden City youth

“Thanks to the blooming medical

counselor, has lived for over thirty-five years

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

333

Local, national, and international press descend on Cooper following NJ Governor Jon Corzine’s auto accident, April 2007.

on Royden Street, just a few blocks from the hospital. “Seventh Street is absolutely beautiful,” he said. “I hope they keep building everywhere. I look forward to new neighbors.”

Taking Care of Patients About five blocks from Chandler’s home, and clearly visible over the rooftops and trees that surround Cooper Commons Park, the newest neighbor in the Lanning Square neighborhood would soon begin to take shape: a six-story, two-hundred-thousand-square-foot building on Broadway between Benson and Washington streets, the home of Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMSRU). It would be the first four-year MD-granting medical school in South Jersey, and only the 130th MD program in the entire country, when it opened for its first class of fifty medical students in August 2012 (see chapter 19 for the full story of CMSRU).

Then-Governor Jon S. Corzine joined Cooper and Rowan University repre‑ sentatives to celebrate the announcement of the new medical school in a special ceremony at Cooper on October 22, 2009. And as the governor made his way to the podium that day, there was a special note of recognition in the applause that greeted the man whom many recognized as their former patient. “I’m thrilled to be here,” Corzine began. “I know firsthand that people here are committed to excel‑ lence. I can’t walk through these doors without getting a little teary-eyed for the

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people here who let me live.”

cally intact, facing months of physical therapy

Just over two years before, on April 12,

and another operation or two before he

2007, Governor Corzine became a patient

could run and ski, but grateful for all that

at Cooper when his official car, driven by

Cooper had done for him. “I’m New Jersey

a state trooper, crashed on the Garden

Governor Jon Corzine,” the governor

State Parkway. The governor, who was not

said several weeks later in a public service

wearing his seatbelt, was critically injured,

announcement to advocate the use of

with broken bones and internal injuries from

seatbelts, “and I should be dead.”

head to toe—an open fracture of the left

There’s not a single Cooper physician or

femur, 11 broken ribs, a broken sternum,

nurse who will tell you that they have VIP

a crushed collarbone, a fractured lower

patients. “I consider all my patients VIPs,” said

vertebra, and facial cuts. He was immedi‑

Dr. Steven E. Ross, then head of Cooper’s

ately flown by helicopter to Cooper’s Level

Trauma Center;Vice Chief, Department

1 Trauma Center. For the next two weeks,

of Surgery; and the first physician to treat

Cooper’s staff did all they could do to save

Corzine the moment he arrived at Cooper.

Corzine’s life—to treat his severe injuries

“If we treat everyone well, you don’t have to

and to make him whole. On April 30 Corzine

change what you are doing.”

went home—medically stable and physi‑

And that’s exactly how Cooper

New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine thanks Cooper for providing lifesaving care as he is discharged from the hospital, eighteen days after his near-fatal car accident.

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

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Cooper President and CEO John P. Sheridan Jr. and Dr. Edward Viner share the stage at the press conference announcing the new medical school, June 2009.

approached the care of New Jersey’s governor—like he was any other patient who deserved all the expertise and skill the medical staff at Cooper had to give. But there’s no doubt that having the governor as a patient put a spotlight on Cooper that it had never experienced.

Dr. Robert F. Ostrum, an orthopaedic surgeon and Director of Cooper’s Orthopaedic Trauma program at the time, was watching a Phillies game when local networks broke in to announce Corzine’s accident. He turned to his wife and said, “If it’s serious, I’ll get a call.” Less than thirty minutes later, his phone rang. “I’m going in,” Dr. Ostrum said, “and it will be a late night.”

Lori Shaffer, then Director of Public Relations at Cooper, was in her car when her pager and cell phone “started going off like crazy.” She headed straight for the hospital. “After the first hour I went downstairs to check the back of the Emergency Department, where the media always gather, and I went to my normal spot and my mouth dropped open. Already, there were forty or more reporters from the media.”

Corzine stayed in the hospital for eighteen days, eleven of those in the Trauma Intensive Care Unit. Cooper made special accommodations not only for the massive national and local press coverage the event received but also turned over

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several executive offices and the Board

ferred out of here, he is your patient,’” said

Room to Corzine’s family and government

Dr. Olivia, then Cooper’s CEO.

officials. At one point, a medical team from

There’s no question that Corzine

New York University came to visit Cooper

received excellent care at Cooper. “I’ve been

to see, basically, if Corzine was getting good

doing this for twenty-five years, and you see

care. Understandably, the news did not go

someone with the extent of injuries that

over well at Cooper. “I remember looking

he had—and they were very impressive—

around at everyone, and they were tense and

and you always wonder if they are going

angry and tired, and I said, ‘Look. He is your

to survive,” said Dr. Ostrum. “Once he got

patient, they don’t have privileges here and

past ten days, two weeks, then you worry

we do more trauma care than they will ever

about latent infection. And then past that,

do, and until the governor asks to be trans‑

you wonder if he will walk. Will he limp?

Cooper Medical School of Rowan University

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

337

He wants to ski and he wants to run, but will he be able to do that? I can only line everything up, and Governor Corzine was a great patient. He was the nicest man, always very grateful, and everything we asked him to do, he did.”

According to Shaffer, the care Corzine received at Cooper had a ripple effect.

“Our reputation grew as a respected medical center. And it still is true today.

People remember us as the hospital that saved the governor of New Jersey.” Even the world-renowned New York Times noted Cooper’s expertise in an article just two days after the accident, stating, “Governor Corzine . . . [is] under the care of doctors in a nationally respected trauma center.”

Two years after Corzine’s accident, when he signed into law the legislation that created Cooper’s long-desired medical school, people couldn’t help but put the two together, with the predictable “What ifs?” punctuating every discussion. Dr. Tama, for one, describes the connection like this: “Cooper was on its ascendancy before Corzine got hurt and came here. But having him here focused on how far we had come. And if we hadn’t come to that point, we couldn’t have saved him.”

Most of Cooper’s patients will never make newspaper headlines, and their care will never be played out in the national press. But as every Cooper physician and nurse will tell you, these patients still receive the same expert care as the patients

Dr. Anthony Mazzarelli unpacks a shipment of crutches in Haiti, where he led a medical mission from Cooper following a catastrophic earthquake in January 2010.

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whose visits prompt news coverage.

At Cooper, patient care often extends beyond the patient census count—even beyond state and national boundaries.

In January 2010,

Cooper’s Air Two provides emergency air services for the South Jersey region, 2011.

when a catastrophic

critical air transportation for Cooper’s team

earthquake hit Haiti, Cooper sent an entire

through the Norcross Foundation. “Today,

medical team to the devastated country,

more than a century later, that mission

where the team worked tirelessly for two

continues through the medical professionals

weeks to provide emergency surgery and

who care for patients every day at Cooper

critical care for thousands of injured Haitians.

and beyond our borders. This mission is an

The team, led by Dr. Anthony J. Mazzarelli,

example of true dedication to the profession

then Director of Emergency Medicine at

of medicine.”

Cooper, was instrumental in bringing organi‑ zation to the chaos around them, working

A Soaring Lobby—and Future

to develop separate care areas for triage,

Every day, hundreds of physicians, nurses,

surgery, wound care, medical and postsur‑

patients, visitors, and staff walk through

gical care, and intensive care. The staff of

the lobby of Cooper’s Roberts Pavilion, a

Cooper followed their overseas colleagues

beautiful, light-filled space that very purpose‑

through daily blogs and Internet postings, and

fully provides a touchstone for Cooper’s

welcomed them back with a standing-room-

past, present, and future.

only celebration in the Roberts Pavilion that

The past is richly represented by the

was a unique mixture of pride, relief, and

historical panels that line the lobby entrances

exhaustion. During the celebration, everyone

and the interior lobby walls. Here, stories

was reminded of what Cooper was really

from Cooper’s past reveal its history—with

all about.

narrative nuggets about the Cooper family;

“Cooper Hospital opened its doors in

the hospital’s first intern and its history of

1887 as a charity hospital, and its mission

medical education; nursing when nurses’ caps

was clear: to provide medical care to those

were important, and the nurses’ evolution

most in need,” said Norcross, who provided

from taking doctors’ orders to being full

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

339

The Pavilion Lobby is richly represented by the historical panels that line the lobby entrances and interior lobby walls.

partners in patient care; nurse Ruby Gross and the 61st Hospital established by Cooper overseas during World War II; the pen used by a governor to launch a medical school; the contributions of a family named Ripa and the Ripa Center for Women’s Health and Wellness at Cooper; the famous cinnamon buns that Lewis Saunders made in the hospital cafeteria; generations of doctors named Mecray, Gamon, Kain, and Sherk; and the formidable long-term chairmen of the Board of Trustees named Voorhees, Archer, Driscoll, Walker, Kelemen, and Norcross.

Occasionally, the past collides with the present, like the day Dr. Paul Mecray Jr., Cooper’s former Chief of Surgery, toured the new patient pavilion in April 2010, just months before he passed away at age 102. “The visit was fantastic,” said his son, Paul Mecray III. “My father was deeply touched by everyone’s kindness and particu‑ larly impressed by the new facilities.”

And there was the afternoon that Dr. Paul Katz, just tapped to be the founding Dean of the new medical school, happened to stop in the lobby and say hello to Board Secretary Mary Gamon, who just happened to be standing beside former Cooper surgeon Dr. Rudolph C. Camishion, who first joined Cooper in 1968 with the goal to convince the medical staff to support a medical school. “You two should meet,” said Gamon, clearly delighted as the two men exchanged a handshake that connected the long-ago dream with the reality of Cooper’s medical school.

Throughout the lobby of the Roberts Pavilion, there is no question that the

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greatest reminder of Cooper and its mission

Cooper’s future, there is certainly no longer

today are the faces of patients’ families—

any reason to worry that this institution

waiting anxiously in a quiet seating area

would ever leave Camden. “I would say that

for word from a doctor; researching a new

spending a billion dollars on real estate that

diagnosis in the Patient and Family Education

you can’t pick up and move would cement

Center; grabbing a cup of coffee in the coffee

Cooper as a Camden resident in perpe‑

shop; or stopping, finally, for a moment of

tuity,” said Norcross, reflecting on the

quiet in the nearby chapel. Just past the

various building blocks of Cooper’s Health

coffee shop, the sparkling mosaic panels

Sciences Campus, anchored by the Roberts

hanging on the wall remind each and every

Pavilion and its signature lobby—soaring,

patient and family member that Cooper

arching, reaching for the sky, looking out over

and its entire medical and nursing staff are

Camden and the wider vistas just beyond.

devoted to patient-centered, family-focused

The glass and steel pavilion is arguably

care. Cooper brings to life every day the

perfect as a metaphor for the 130-year-old

themes illustrated in these mosaic panels—

institution. For the first time in its long

comfort, wellness, healing, and kindness for

history, the future of Cooper—the hospital

every patient who walks through its doors.

that refused to leave a city and community

When these patients wonder about

behind—seems limitless.

Mosaic panels, created by family members and staff, are displayed throughout Cooper, symbolizing Cooper’s patientcentered care philosophy.

Chapter 18 / A Hospital Transformed, and an Academic Medical Center Is Reborn

341

At the Cancer Institute groundbreaking event in April 2012 (l–r): Camden Mayor Dana Redd; U.S. Congressman Rob Andrews; NJ Senate President Stephen Sweeney; Cooper Board Chairman George E. Norcross III; NJ Governor Chris Christie; Cooper President and CEO John P. Sheridan Jr.; Cooper Cancer Institute Director Generosa Grana, MD; and NJ Senator Donald Norcross.

PA RT

S I X / C H A P T E R

1 9

Celebrating 125 Years, a New Medical School, and MD Anderson at Cooper 2011–2013

A

s Cooper University Hospital prepared to celebrate its 125th anniversary in 2012,

the medical center founded by a family named Cooper was entirely focused on the future.

The towering new Roberts Pavilion continued to represent an exciting momentum throughout the entire Cooper community, as equally visible programs and new buildings began to appear on the Health Sciences Campus.The new Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMSRU), the first four-year, allopathic medical school in South Jersey, opened in 2012, almost 125 years to the day that Cooper first opened its doors. And just steps away from the hospital and the new medical school, construction was under way for the $100 million, freestanding MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper, designed to provide comprehensive cancer care for the residents of southern New Jersey and the entire Delaware Valley.

From 2011 through 2013 the future—not the past—clearly defined developments at Cooper University Hospital. And that future, all agreed, included making Camden the premier health care destination in the region.

The Story of Cooper Medical School After a groundbreaking ceremony in 2010, over 160 workers—ironworkers, masons, carpenters, plumbers, sheet metal workers, electricians,

and others—began to construct the $139 million building at the corner of Broadway and Benson Street, a building designed to offer “the next generation of medical education.”

For CMSRU, that meant embracing an innovative curriculum that provides a solid foundation in the science of medicine while offering an early and continuous clinical experience—as soon as the third week of classes for first-year students, which is a full two years ahead of clinical experiences at most U.S. medical schools.

The curriculum emphasizes small-group and self-directed learning, with early patient contact, a student-directed ambulatory clinic, and workshops designed to expose students to the many facets of providing medical care in the rapidly changing world of health care.

In a move that reflected Cooper’s early commitment to simulation training, the new medical school offers a complete Clinical Simulation Center on the second floor where students can learn and practice patient interviewing and clinical skills.

Twelve clinical simulation rooms are designed to look like outpatient exam rooms in physicians’ offices—but they are actually sophisticated teaching modules.

An aerial view of the Cooper Health Sciences Campus looking east, 2011.

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The new entrance to the Emergency Department, now located in the Kelemen Pavilion, 2011.

Each room has equipment that records

the attending students and manipulate the

students and their patient interactions, and

mannequins’ breathing, pulse, heart sounds,

then students can review the recordings.

breath sounds, pupil size, responses, and

CMSRU routinely hires professional

other electronically monitored information.

actors—frequently referred to as “SPs” or

The medical school’s innovative

“simulated patients”—to portray patients in

curriculum and its advanced technology,

these rooms, presenting a variety of real-life

said Dr. Paul Katz, the founding Dean of the

medical and social scenarios that challenge

medical school, might just be the answer to

and test students’ communication, profes‑

creating what Cooper has called the “next

sional, and decision-making skills.

generation” of physicians. “The educational

Four additional clinical simulation rooms

process has in the past been oppressive

are set up like hospital patient rooms and

because we haven’t focused on the personal

feature life-sized, simulator mannequins

side of medicine,” said Dr. Katz, board

that can replicate human functions and be

certified in internal medicine and rheuma‑

programmed to simulate a broad variety

tology, and the founding Vice Dean for Faculty

of clinical situations and patient diagnoses:

and Clinical Affairs at the Commonwealth

fevers, cardiac arrest, childbirth, stroke,

Medical College in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

pulmonary distress, airway obstruction, and

“What separates great physicians from

many more. From two adjacent control

anyone else is not their technical skills but

rooms with two-way mirrors, a host of physi‑

their communication skills, their ability to

cians, technicians, and students can observe

show empathy. I know that all of our students

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will graduate and know what they need to know about diabetes, heart failure, and how to take out an appendix.

But we want to graduate physicians who are wonderful communicators and able to show empathy for their patients, a sense of caring that goes above and beyond technical skills.”

Dr. Katz led a faculty that originally included more than 450 clinical and basic scientists in sixteen depart‑ ments. From the start he promised to embrace the surrounding neighborhood, providing an academic and work environment where diversity is celebrated and where the medical school is a resource of economic growth and health care for the community. Indeed, Dr. Annette Reboli, head of the Division of Infectious Diseases, becomes Vice Dean of the Cooper Medical School, 2012.

the medical school slogan, “Camden is our Classroom.

Camden is our Home”—originally coined by Dr. Annette Reboli, CMSRU’s founding Vice Dean, for the self-study document that led to the school’s preliminary accredi‑

tation—embraces Camden as both patient and partner (see Sidebar, “Camden Benefits from New Medical School”).

It’s a bit of an understatement to say that a four-year medical school was a dream come true for Cooper. After all, the hospital has been involved in medical education since first opening its doors in 1887. Cooper’s first interns lived at the hospital for free and were not allowed to accept fees from patients.The hospital’s own Training School for Nurses opened in 1888, and the hospital developed its first surgical residency program in 1935 for a young doctor named Edwin Ristine. In the 1950s Cooper joined with Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia to provide

While confronting the challenge of increased competition for patients, Cooper also continues to face financial challenges, too.

clinical training in medicine to Jefferson’s junior medical students as well as clinical training in obstetrics to its senior students.

Dr. Mark J. Pello, a surgeon and then head of Cooper’s Division of Colorectal Surgery, recalled that in the mid-1970s, Cooper was the most popular general

surgery rotation of all the hospitals associated with Jefferson, his alma mater.

“Cooper’s attendings were great,” said Dr. Pello. “Every day was different.They gave

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us a lot of responsibility as residents and let

clinical teaching facility for third- and fourth-

us take a very active role in a wide variety

year medical students for what was then

of complex cases.” Dr. Eugene R. Principato

the University of Medicine and Dentistry

supervised Dr. Pello’s first major trauma

of New Jersey (UMDNJ), with its inaugural

case—a gunshot wound to the abdomen. “I

class of students arriving at Cooper in 1983.

removed the patient’s spleen, repaired his

Gradually, the hospital increased its residency

stomach and colon, and much to my relief,

program to include eleven residency and

the patient did fine.” After completing his

sixteen fellowship programs. And while

general surgery residency at Cooper, Dr. Pello

the hospital no longer operates its own

accepted a fellowship to study colorectal

nursing school, Cooper serves as the clinical

surgery at William Beaumont Hospital in

education site for eight schools of nursing

Michigan, and returned to Cooper in 1977.

with more students on-site each year.

“I am amazed at how far Cooper has come,” he said.

Cooper’s association with Jefferson continued until Cooper was named the core

The hospital’s thirty-year quest to become a four-year allopathic medical school intensified in the early 2000s as Cooper led the charge to justify a third allopathic

Dr. Mark J. Pello (right), division head for Colorectal Surgery and CSMRU faculty member, with fellow surgeons Dr. Benjamin Phillips and Dr. Michitaka Kawata.

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Camden Benefits from New Medical School Cooper Medical School of Rowan University, a six-story, $139 million project at the corner of Broadway and Benson Street, has been called an “economic engine for the neigh‑ borhood, Camden, and South Jersey.”

Why? According to Cooper officials, medical schools create at least three dollars in economic activity for every one dollar spent. The process of building the medical school created three hundred to four hundred construction jobs, including a preapprentice construction trades training program from the Union Organization for Social Service. When the school opened for students in August 2012, the medical school created nearly one hundred permanent jobs and officially expanded Cooper’s Health Sciences Campus into Lanning Square. With the influx of faculty, staff, and students, the medical school would soon attract new businesses to the neighborhood, including retail, health Charter class of Cooper Medical School of Rowan University in 2012. care, biomedicine, and technology firms—not to mention the need for new restaurants and housing. The medical school faculty also attracted more grant funding for research, which positively impacts the community through the medical school, Cooper Research Institute, and the Coriell Institute for Medical Research. And when Cooper Medical School of Rowan University opened, officials predicted that it would help reverse the trend of medical dollars leaving the state; South Jersey loses approximately $2 billion in economic activity to Philadelphia medical centers each year, and innovative programs like the medical school may very well help stop that exodus.

In addition to its financial impact, the first four-year allopathic medical school in southern New Jersey creates a wealth of important health care advantages for the surrounding Camden community—and supports those that already exist. First and foremost, the medical

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school graduates will address physician shortages in New Jersey, which ranks thirty-third nationally in the number of medical school graduates per capita. “These graduates make a difference in caring for you, your parents, your children, your friends,” Dr. Katz wrote in a Courier-Post editorial in August 2011. Shadowing the footsteps of Cooper Hospital’s original mission, the new medical school curriculum includes service to the community, which enhances and builds on Cooper’s existing Urban Health Initiatives program.

Not only has the medical school promised to bring increased numbers of physicians to the area, it exposes medical students to urban health care with the hope that more doctors will go into this underserved field of medicine. Plus, Cooper looks forward to creating future physicians from its own backyard. According to Dr. Annette Reboli, founding Vice Dean and then Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs, the admissions committee favors New Jersey students and “helps offer scholarships to students who stay in the area. In fact, they could go on to become residents and fellows and faculty, like Dr. Mazzarelli.”

Dr. Anthony J. Mazzarelli is a true Cooper success story. He first came to Cooper as a third-year medical student in 1999, and went on to graduate from what was then the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School. He also graduated from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Penn’s Center for Bioethics, and came back to Cooper to complete his residency in Cooper’s Emergency Medicine program, serving as chief resident his last year.

In the fall of 2000, just as he was starting law school, Mazzarelli and his fellow medical school classmates started the Health Outreach Project (HOP) clinics to serve Camden’s uninsured residents. “I came back to Cooper because of the clinic, and because of Cooper’s residency in emergency medicine and Dr. Chansky. As an emergency medicine doctor, there is not a place I would rather be than in Camden. We are providing care for those who are under‑ served, and that is important to me. This is where I want to practice.”

Paul Katz, MD, founding Dean of Cooper Medical School of Rowan As Vice President of Strategic Planning and Implemen‑ University. tation, Dr. Mazzarelli worked alongside Dr.Viner and Dr. Reboli to help develop the medical school concept after it was first announced. When the medical school opened, Dr. Mazzarelli noted that he “couldn’t be happier. This is where I learned medicine. And that is a debt I can never repay.” Dr. Mazzarelli is now Co-President of Cooper University Health Care.

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The medical team working together to provide care in Cooper’s Intensive Care Unit. (l–r): cardiothoracic surgeon Michael Rosenbloom, MD; Brian Roberts, PA; critical care specialist Stephen W. Trzeciak, MD; and Leanne Mader, RN.

medical school within the UMDNJ medical school system.When UMDNJ seemed reluctant to push the idea, Cooper hired outside consultants to review its campus and programs; they concluded that the Cooper campus was ready to evolve to a four-year school. In 2009 UMDNJ and Cooper mutually hired consultants from the Association of Academic Health Centers (AAHC).

The AAHC consultants told various physicians—including Dr. Edward D.Viner, long a champion of bringing a four-year medical school to Cooper—that they were totally impressed by Cooper’s program, and that “no one is more ready than you are” to launch a medical school.When their official report came out on June 11, 2009, the AAHC consultants said that Cooper appears “remarkably well prepared to expand its medical clinical training into a full four-year medical school.”

Dr.Viner took an incredible personal gamble on the day the AAHC consultants visited Cooper, a story that he and others often recalled when reviewing the history of Cooper’s medical school.Though he told no one at the meeting that morning, Dr.Viner experienced severe chest pains the day of the AAHC visit. Dr.Viner later explained the situation as follows:

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“The meeting started at 7:30 in the

from their visit. I had worked so hard to get

morning, and I started to have chest pains.

this together, I had to hear what they said. So

Well, I had written the whole first hour of

we sat around the table for another hour, and

the presentation, and I had basically waited

that’s when they said that no one was more

thirty years for this, so I didn’t even think

prepared than we were to have a medical

about missing it. I got out of my car and left it

school. It was really positive.They said they

with the valet and tried to make the 250-foot

were blown away. And then I went upstairs

walk to the front door. I had to stop about

to the cath lab at 4 p.m. I badly needed a

ten times. I realized, well, that I couldn’t go

new stent.”

in like this, and then I also realized that I had

Dr.Viner survived the procedure just fine,

a nitroglycerin pill—which I didn’t usually

and he is often referred to as “the first dean”

have—and I took one and the pain subsided.

of the medical school to honor his sustained

So I went in and made my presentation.Then

efforts to bring the institution to Cooper.

I went up to the cath lab and asked them to

For years, he positively glowed whenever he

put me on the cath schedule. Dr. Janah Aji,

talked about why a medical school was the

the Director of the Cardiac Catheterization

“culmination, the natural inclination, the inevi‑

Lab, is a wonderful magician with a catheter.

table forward progress motion of building

But I didn’t let them take me right away. I told

a strong clinical campus.This is our logical

them I would come back later, that I had to

expression of it—to evolve to our own

be present when the consultants came back

four-year medical school. It brings credibility,

Jeffrey P. Carpenter, MD, Professor and Chairman of the Department of Surgery and Vice President of Perioperative Services.

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Cancer specialists Dr. Alexandre Hageboutros, Dr. Robert A. Somer, and Dr. Kumar Rajagoplan display the Clinical Trials Participation Award from Conquer Cancer Foundation of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, 2011.

it brings excitement. Almost all doctors love teaching, and it is natural for us. It’s an important, gratifying experience.”

There was one last hiccup in the process.

Despite the overwhelmingly positive reports from two consulting groups, UMDNJ decided that it could not create a third allopathic four-year school.With Norcross and Sheridan leading the way, Cooper considered several options and quickly zeroed in on Rowan University as an academic partner. Rowan’s Board of Trustees and its President, Dr. Donald Farish, immediately saw the benefits to being one of only 113 universities in the country to have a medical school. Rowan quickly agreed to partner with Cooper to build a medical school. “This is a significant expansion of our graduate programs, and we are proud to be aligned with Cooper on this exciting endeavor,” said Farish in a news release announcing the partnership.

“Our existing programs will dovetail with a medical school curriculum and provide for future expansion of our science, technology, and allied health degree programs.”

On June 25, 2009, Governor Jon S. Corzine officially ended Cooper’s relationship with UMDNJ and recognized the partnership between Cooper and Rowan “to establish, operate, and maintain a four-year allopathic medical school in Camden, New Jersey.” The excitement over finally realizing Cooper’s long-awaited dream

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brought out a sense of wonderment, almost

in 1975 to sign the first legislation designed

giddiness, to those who now watched the

to create a medical school in South Jersey;

medical school take shape.

over thirty-five years later, the son, deter‑

Board Vice Chairman Joan S. Davis said

mined to make the dream a reality, played a

she was “on top of the world—on top of

pivotal role in making it happen. “Together we

the world!” George Weinroth, then COO of

will attract the best and brightest students

Cooper University Physicians, admitted that

and produce generations of well-trained,

Cooper’s doctors “were more shocked that

dedicated, and compassionate physicians,”

it really was going to happen than anything

Norcross promised.

else.” Outgoing Camden Mayor Gwendolyn

In June 2011—as steel beams were

Faison said she was “so proud I could leap

positioned to support the walls of the

tall buildings in a single bound.” Board

medical school’s 250-seat theater, as both

Chairman Norcross recalled that former

stair towers opened, and as internal framing

Governor Brendan Byrne gave his father,

continued—the Liaison Committee on

George E. Norcross Jr., the pen Byrne used

Medical Education gave CMSRU preliminary

Former Cooper physician Dr. Paul Mecray Jr. (seated), age 102, visits the new Cooper in 2010. With him are (l–r): Dr. Carolyn Bekes, Dr. Rudolph Camishion, Justine (Sally) Mecray Opel, Paul Mecray III, Dr. Eugene Principato, Dr. Albert Tama, and Dr. Edward Viner.

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accreditation, confirming that the new medical school met or exceeded more than 130 rigorous standards for structure, function, and performance. Now CMSRU executives could recruit prospective students. By the end of the year, CMSRU had received over twenty-eight hundred admission applications; from this pool, CMSRU selected approximately three hundred applicants to be interviewed for one of the fifty spots in CMRSU’s charter class. According to John F. McGeehan, MD, Associate Dean for Student Affairs and Admissions at CMSRU, the field of prospective students was spectacular. “They have stellar MCAT scores, distinguished under‑ graduate careers, and well-rounded extracurricular activities that demonstrate a true commitment to community service,” he said.

In August 2012 CMSRU celebrated the arrival of the charter class of the first four-year medical school in South Jersey. Here’s the breakdown of the charter class of fifty students: • Seventy-four percent of the students in the charter class were residents of New Jersey, an important factor to a medical school with a goal to increase the physician workforce in the state. Nearly half the students chose to live in Camden, which CMSRU officials believed would benefit both the students and the Camden neighborhoods. Nearly one-quarter of CMSRU’s charter class were underrepresented in medicine (URM), which means they belong to racial and ethnic populations that have been traditionally underrepre‑ sented in the medical profession relative to their numbers in the general population: African American, Hispanic/Latino, and Native American.

• The students were athletes, scholars, and musicians. Some were recent college graduates and others had spent years as working professionals or volunteering in the United States and around the world. Many spoke languages in addition to English, including American Sign Language. And some were juggling the responsibilities of being a parent while attending medical school full time.

Said Kathy Williams, one of the school’s first fifty charter students: “I picked CMSRU after I read the school’s mission—it really just resonated with me. I really liked the fact that it was clearly within the mission that this was a school that wanted to give

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A Leader Who Saw Beyond a Community Hospital Kevin G. Halpern, Cooper’s President and Chief Executive Officer from 1981 to 1999, died suddenly on September 17, 2012.

Mr. Halpern was instrumental in Cooper’s transformation from a community hospital into South Jersey’s premiere academic medical center. With his strong vision, compelling personality, and unrelenting perseverance, he helped bring together employees, physicians, legislators, and business and community leaders, encouraging them to work together toward the common goal of improving health care in South Jersey.

Mr. Halpern’s accomplishments at Cooper are numerous and significant. Under his tenure, Cooper established new medical programs and services, including its nationally renowned Trauma Center. He made it a priority for Cooper to always be on the cutting edge of surgical, medical, and technological advancements in the health care industry, and Cooper’s expertise and reputation grew. He was also the first Cooper CEO to recognize that the hospital’s future is inexorably linked with Camden’s future, and he worked diligently to build relationships within the community. Mr. Halpern was committed to the city of Camden and to South Jersey, paving the way for the Cooper Health Sciences Campus of today. In recognition of his contributions, the Board Room on the tenth floor of the Roberts Pavilion was named in his honor. Mr. Halpern’s imprint on the health care landscape in South Jersey will be a lasting one.

Kevin G. Halpern

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back to the community and that working within the community was important.”

In August 2013 the charter class started its second year of medical school, and CMSRU welcomed sixty-four members into its second class, the Class of 2017.This class claimed these descriptions: • Nearly four thousand students—a 72 percent increase over the previous year—submitted applications to CMSRU and underwent the same rigorous application process that was applied to the charter class of 2016.

• Over 50 percent of the Class of 2017 were residents of New Jersey, and the rest had lived in eleven other states.

• The students represented a wealth of diverse life experiences and backgrounds in fields such as academia, research, military, the performing arts, and missionary work. All shared the drive to become successful physicians and the passion to effect change in their communities.

Said Jefferson Benites, CMSRU Class of 2017, “When I started to research medical schools, I read about the vision of CMSRU.When I saw the word ‘diversity,’ I thought this was the school for me. On the application, other medical schools wanted to know about me, my background, what I did in college. On this application, they wanted to know, ‘What was my vision?’ Right away, I thought the school was special.”

On September 21, 2013, in a lecture hall filled with proud families, friends, medical school faculty, and staff, Benites and the other sixty-three members of the second class of Cooper Medical School at Rowan University received their tradi‑ tional white coats, a rite of passage for medical students for more than a century.

“Today is the day you formally enter the medical profession,” said medical school Dean Katz, introducing the cloaking ceremony.

Looking out over those assembled, Dr. McGeehan, Associate Dean for Student Affairs and Admissions, joked that “fifty-one of the sixty-four are extroverts and I will have no hair by the time they graduate.” Then, pausing to check his emotions, he continued, “They are dedicated to service, dedicated to the profession, and ready to wear this coat.”

The soon-to-be new doctors were a reflection of the world they one day hoped to serve. From her seat in the auditorium that day, Hae Min Lee, a Cooper

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critical care nurse for nearly thirteen years,

University Health Care and The University

glanced proudly toward her daughter, Andrea

of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Creamer, a member of the Class of 2017.

in Houston,Texas.Widely recognized as

When the white coat was placed around

one of the nation’s leading cancer centers,

Caroline Kaigh’s shoulders, few in the room

MD Anderson Cancer Center’s partnership

that day knew that this young medical

with Cooper brought together the world-

student’s grandfather had also practiced

renowned cancer center and the region’s

in Camden, a legacy worth celebrating.

leading cancer program to establish a fully

Catherine Young, a former Cooper medical-

integrated, comprehensive center to treat

surgical nurse during Kevin Halpern’s

cancer patients in the Northeast.

administration, watched as her son Nicholas

Norcross, who credited Sheridan

Young received his white coat. And Daisy

with constantly lobbying since 2002

Obiora, from Sicklerville by way of Nigeria,

to create a cancer center in Camden,

soon celebrated this milestone day with

believed that the confluence of “being

family and friends.

lucky and being good” ultimately brought

The opportunity to help develop South

MD Anderson Cancer Center and

Jersey’s first medical school was cherished

Cooper together. After an introduction

and embraced by all those associated with

from Dr. Francis R. Spitz—Vice Chief

the experience. “It truly is amazing,” said Dr.

of Cooper’s Department of Surgery,

Reboli, then Vice Dean of CMSRU. “Even

who had trained in surgical oncology at

though I have worked hard on initiatives

MD Anderson Cancer Center—the two

before, I’ve never worked harder in my life

institutions agreed to talk. By December

to develop this. I don’t feel tired or stressed

2012 the Cooper cancer team had taken

by it—everyone is energized. One day I said

preliminary discussions to the next level

to John Sheridan, ‘This is the biggest project I

and met with MD Anderson Cancer Center

have ever been involved with.’ And he turned

officials. By now, Norcross definitely wanted

around and said, ‘You know, me, too.’ This is a

this to happen, viewing it as the partnership

once-in-a lifetime opportunity for all of us.”

that would put Cooper’s cancer program on the proverbial map. “It was apparent

The Story of MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper

to me that MD Anderson Cancer Center

A second “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunity

advantage,” said Norcross. And the impending

soon unfolded for Cooper: the estab‑

announcement, he noted, created “more buzz

lishment of MD Anderson Cancer Center

for Cooper than anything we have ever done

at Cooper, a partnership between Cooper

in my twenty-five-year tenure on the Board.”

would give our cancer center an enormous

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MD Anderson Cancer Center officials spent nearly a year assessing Cooper’s cancer services, physicians, and protocols. After extensive negotiations, and just weeks before the cancer center was scheduled to open, Cooper announced in September 2013 that the partnership with MD Anderson Cancer Center was official. Immediately, officials described it as “game changing.” Essentially, the oncology program and oncologists at Cooper would adhere to the philosophy, process, and guidelines set by MD Anderson Cancer Center staff in Houston, and patients would receive the same proven practice standards and treatment protocols provided at MD Anderson Cancer Center. Disease-site-specific, multidisciplinary teams consisting of physicians, nurses, and other clinical specialists would work together to provide cancer patients with advanced diagnostic and treatment technologies, access to clinical trials, and dynamic patient-physician relationships. A range of supportive care services would soon provide complete, compassionate care from treatment to recovery and through survivorship—services that benefit patients and families.

“It is going to tremendously enhance Cooper as a whole and the cancer program in particular.The impact will have a halo effect for the rest of the insti‑ tution,” said Dr. Generosa Grana, Director of the new center, speaking of the MD Anderson Cancer Center affiliation. “And it’s truly program integration.We are not just taking their name and putting it on our building—it’s integration.

We already had an incredibly strong team, a breadth of faculty experience, an impressive infrastructure for cancer treatment, and MD Anderson Cancer Center was struck by that.This partnership gives us access to so much more. Each physician at Cooper will spend time there to learn pathways and approaches that MD Anderson Cancer Center has in place. It will give our patients access to clinical trials, and will assure input from MD Anderson Cancer Center as we discuss patients and protocols.

“I think it really portends a very bright future, and not just for cancer patients,” Dr. Grana concluded. “This building is another piece of the academic expansion in our Health Science Campus for the benefit of Camden as well.”

HOPE: A Promise Realized When the last steel beam was hoisted into place during the 2012 construction phase of Cooper’s new cancer center, that beam carried a two-word message that doubled as a sky-high promise and a sun-kissed prayer for the city of Camden and cancer patients throughout the region: “BUILDING HOPE.”

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In 2012, the Cancer Institute in Camden was fitted for its final steel beam during the topping-off ceremony. The beam, which displayed the words “BUILDING HOPE,” was signed by the construction trades and its cancer clinical and executive team, symbolizing the sentiment behind the new cancer center.

On October 7, 2013, when

signature, multidisciplinary approach to

the $100 million, four-story

care in a state-of-the-art setting close to

MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper

home,” concurred Dr.Thomas Burke, MD

opened on the Cooper Health Sciences

Anderson Cancer Center’s former Executive

Campus, the beam bearing those four letters

Vice President and Physician-in-Chief. “This

was long enclosed and covered over. But the

facility shows our commitment to providing

promise of “HOPE” was just beginning to be

compassionate care to every patient who

realized.

walks through our doors.”

“This building is the corner‑

The new center features an outdoor

stone of our new partnership with

Tranquility Garden—a scenic, rooftop oasis

MD Anderson Cancer Center, and together

designed to allow nature to enhance the

we bring renewed hope to cancer patients

healing process.The garden provides patients

across the region,” said Norcross, addressing

and families with a space for relaxation

the standing-room-only crowd of physicians,

and quiet contemplation and complements

administrators, politicians, media, patients, and

the DiFlorio Family Healing Garden at the

staff during the grand opening ceremony in

hospital and the Healing Garden at the MD

the natural light–filled lobby, with its illumi‑

Anderson at Cooper Voorhees campus.

nated floor-to-ceiling Tree of Life centerpiece.

“Patients across the region will experience MD Anderson Cancer Center’s

In addition, the state-of-the-art facility exhibits more than 125 carefully selected works by New Jersey artists. Diverse in style

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and content, the art shares a powerful message of healing and hope, intended to bring emotional comfort and spiritual well-being to patients and families.

One week after the grand opening, a fifty-eight-year-old Quakertown, Pennsyl‑ vania, resident named Annette Sholette walked through those glass doors and became the first patient seen by Dr. Grana in MD Anderson at Cooper. A seventeenyear breast cancer survivor at the time, this tall, beautiful woman wearing a coat that reflected the color of her striking green eyes talked about her history at Cooper since her first diagnosis, a multiyear journey of care that had taken her to Dr. Grana’s offices in 3 Cooper Plaza to Brace Road to Voorhees and now back to Camden and the new cancer center. A recent, highly sophisticated PET-CT had revealed what appeared as a tiny pink-reddish hot spot on Sholette’s scan, a lesion

At the announcement of Cooper’s partnership with AmeriHealth are (l–r): Daniel Hilferty, President and CEO, Independence Blue Cross; Judith Roman, President and CEO, Amerihealth; George E. Norcross III, Chairman, Cooper Board of Trustees.

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in her left lung that indicated her cancer had

whatever Dr. Grana said is best. Nearly two

returned.

decades ago, when a physician in Pennsylvania

“Your cancer went dormant for

had told her not to worry about that lump

seventeen years,” Dr. Grana told her, with

in her breast, Sholette came to Cooper for

compassion and clarity, “and now it’s come

a second opinion. After surgery at Cooper

back.We are going to treat it again.” Using

to remove the cancerous tissue, the surgeon

all of the considerable resources she has

gave Sholette Dr. Grana’s contact information

available in the new center—advanced cancer

with these encouraging words: “She is the

diagnostic and treatment technologies, a

best and she is the one who is going to save

thorough review of new laboratory reports

your life.”

and recent scans, and a quick consult with a

“I’ll never forget those words,” Sholette

pulmonologist on the benefits and wisdom of

recalled, speaking emphatically and without

another biopsy—Dr. Grana had developed a

hesitation. “I’ve been with Dr. Grana ever

treatment approach and was now delivering

since. Sure, it’s a haul from my home, given

the news to Sholette, who listened with her

the distance, but it is well worth it. And now

husband in one of the beautiful new exami‑

with the new building—it is just beautiful

nation rooms on the second floor.The trust

and I love the way they have everything set

and connection between the two women—

up. It’s a blessing to have all of these services

one patient, one physician—was evident the

in one place, especially when people are so

moment Dr. Grana walked into the room.

sick. And over the years, I’ve had so many

“You look great, you’re feeling great, the

people follow me to Cooper. ‘Tell me again,’

tumor is not growing, and I’m not sure I

they say, ‘what’s the name of your doctor?’ I

want to make any changes based on what I’m

am never giving up coming to MD Anderson

seeing today,” Dr. Grana said.

at Cooper.”

“Oh, that’s great, that’s really good news,” said Sholette. “I’ve really been feeling so good that I forgot what I’m going through!”

“But I want you to have another biopsy

Innovative Initiatives and Changes Continue In addition to Cooper Medical School of

just in case we need to change any additional

Rowan University and MD Anderson at

treatment down the road, and that way we’ll

Cooper initiatives, Cooper also pursued what

have all the information we need,” Dr. Grana

many called another innovative and unprece‑

continued.

dented move in New Jersey. Cooper acquired

No one welcomes the thought of going

an interest in a health insurer, AmeriHealth

into the hospital for another biopsy, but

New Jersey—an example of a provider

Sholette made it clear that she would do

investing in the payer of health care services.

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Beginning in October 2013—the new partners officially introduced new, cobranded insurance products designed for individuals and small businesses.The products are available through an insurance broker by contacting AmeriHealth New Jersey and through the state’s federally run health exchanges under the Affordable Care Act. One feature of these new products is the ability to partic‑ ipate in the Cooper Advantage Network—an option offered under several different insurance levels that provides access In January 2012 Adrienne Kirby, Ph.D., FACHE, joined Cooper as Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. She was promoted to President and CEO of Cooper University Health Care in 2013.

to Cooper’s more than five hundred employed physicians in South Jersey and a network of over one hundred outpatient offices.The investment is an obvious win-win for all involved: Cooper knows that it will drive more patients to its outpa‑ tient practices; the insurance company banks on people wanting to buy the insurance in order to have more access

to Cooper; and the consumers have access to affordable, exceptional care.The move also reflected the goals of the Affordable Care Act, where providers are being pushed to be more like insurance companies and provide health care coverage for a set fee each year.

The innovative changes that seemed to happen routinely in and around Cooper during 2013 were guided by a restructured organization with a new leadership team.

John Sheridan, President and CEO of the Cooper Health System since 2008, would now focus on the expansion of the Health Sciences Campus and Camden redevel‑ opment, while overseeing all governmental matters that impacted Cooper and health care in New Jersey. Adrienne Kirby, who had joined Cooper in January 2012 as the Chief Operating Officer, was named President and CEO of Cooper University Health Care, responsible for managing all hospital and ambulatory operations and overseeing the physician group, the advancement of strategic health care partner‑ ships, and the implementation of new models of care delivery to improve quality and service while decreasing cost.

Citing her thirty years of health care management experience, much of it at hospitals in the Delaware Valley, both Sheridan and Norcross agreed that Kirby had exactly the skills that Cooper needed to move it forward.

“Dr. Kirby’s proven track record of implementing processes that drive organi‑ zation performance, productivity, and growth will make her a valuable member of

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Cooper’s leadership team,” said Sheridan

motivated and inspired to help grow our

in 2012 when Kirby’s appointment was

business, decrease our operating costs, and

announced. “Her ability to build strong

improve our clinical quality and service.

relationships with both academic and

Cooper has an amazing legacy, and I am privi‑

community-based physician partners and

leged to be in a position to help build upon

professional colleagues will be extremely

that legacy. I was born at Cooper, and my

important as Cooper continues its expansion

family has received care here over the years.

of programs and services throughout the

I am now in the position to help steer the

region.”

organization into the future and to connect

As the new President and CEO, Kirby

our entire workforce to our mission. Our

recognized the challenges before her. “One

people are what have made us a great organi‑

of my main contributions to the organi‑

zation, and our people will make us successful

zation must be to assure that we are better

in the future.

tomorrow than we are today,” she said. “This means that the entire organization must be

“I also believe in focusing efforts on making the right alliances so that we are

Cooper’s first Urgent Care Center, in Cherry Hill on Route 70.

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Dr. Brenner—A Hero to Camden A well-known Cooper University family medicine physician, Dr. Jeffrey C. Brenner has been the subject of a PBS Frontline show, was profiled by prestigious national newspapers and magazines like The New Yorker, received the Innovation Hero Award from NJBIZ for his work as founder and executive director of the Camden Coalition of Health Care Providers, and was named a prestigious MacArthur Foundation Fellow in 2013.

The cause for Dr. Brenner’s largely unsought celebrity status? At first glance, it’s absolutely daunting: The Camden Coalition is trying to do nothing less than change the culture of primary care.

Its target patients are the most vulnerable populations in the city of Camden, what one magazine writer once called “the worst of the worst.”

Since meeting with other primary care providers in 2002, Dr. Brenner has worked to not only understand the health care needs of Camden’s poorest citizens but also to change the city’s health care delivery system and to improve patient outcomes. Using discrete patient-level claims data, it was found that, in one year, nearly half of the city’s residents visited a city emergency department or hospital; a single patient visited every city ED/hospital a total of 113 times; and the most common diagnoses for visits were head colds, viral infections, ear infections, and sore throats. In Camden, 80 percent of the costs were spent on 13 percent of the patients, and 90 percent of the costs were spent on 20 percent of the patients. The total cost for hospital and ED care in Camden over five years was $650 million, mostly public funds.

Dr. Brenner called these patients the “super utilizers.” Together, he and the members of the Camden Coalition decided that if they could find these people, they could help them by giving them better care and bringing down health care costs in the process. With grants from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Geraldine Dodge Foundation, and the Merck Foundation, along with office space at Cooper, the Camden Coalition officially began in 2003.

Using measurements from the first thirty-six super utilizers, the Coalition reported some staggering results in 2011: Before joining the program, these thirty-six patients averaged sixty-two hospital and emergency room visits per month for a monthly cost of $1.2 million; after joining the program, the hospital visits dropped by 40 percent and the costs dropped by 56 percent. “Highutilizer work is about building relationships with people who are in crisis,” Dr. Brenner explained to New Yorker writer Atul Gawande. “The ones you build a relationship with, you can change behavior.

The fun thing about this work is that you can be there when the light switch goes on for a patient. It doesn’t happen at the pace we want, but you can see it happen.”

Over a decade after it started, the initiative continued to earn accolades and supporters and effect changes that may one day radically alter health care delivery. In September 2011 the New Jersey legislature approved the development of Medicaid accountable care organizations (ACOs), which encourage urban health care pilot programs by allowing them to share in the Medicaid cost

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savings they create. The legislation allowed Dr. Brenner to expand on the work of the Camden Coalition. Toward that goal, the coalition received $3.45 million from the Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation in November 2011 to help support the coalition’s work to reduce diabetes in Camden and lower the cost of diabetes care by providing more individualized care at patient-centered health care centers.

“Through this program,” Dr. Brenner said, “Camden primary care practices will undergo a journey of practice transportation and continuous improvement. “We are changing the culture of primary care and expect that this intensive approach to diabetes will evolve into a more compre‑ hensive chronic disease care model.”

Dr. Brenner’s work is a source of pride for Cooper. “Dr. Brenner plays a vital role in linking Camden residents with essential health and medical services especially in the areas of preventive care and chronic disease management,” said Adrienne Kirby, Ph.D., FACHE, President and CEO of Cooper. “We congratulate him on the recognition he’s earned for his progressive health programs in the city of Camden.”

Dr. Jeff Brenner (far left) supervising medical students in a Camden clinic.

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well positioned to succeed under health care reform.We will continue to serve the community, other health care organizations, and our patients as the only tertiary, academic provider in southern New Jersey. No one should ever cross the bridge for care when they have the high-caliber doctors, nurses, and other health care profes‑ sionals right here at Cooper.”

In an effort to meet these goals, Kirby created a multiyear pathway to what she called “Cooper’s Transformational Journey.” In 2012, for instance, Kirby zeroed in on improving Cooper’s organizational effectiveness through steps that included establishing strategic planning and nurturing a focus on operational excel‑ lence, establishing a Performance Improvement Office to promote and monitor organizational changes, redefining organizational metrics, creating the Leadership Development Institute, and working with employees to select a new tagline that reflects how the work of the organization gets done: “One Team. One Purpose.”

Kirby’s initiatives represented nothing less than what Norcross expected from the new President and CEO.When she joined Cooper in 2012, Norcross had praised Kirby as “a leader who has the proven ability to develop comprehensive programs and strategies to achieve improved efficiencies.” And, he predicted, “she has a thorough understanding of the complexities of health care and will bring new insight to Cooper.”

In 2013 Kirby continued her focus on leadership when she implemented a strategic plan that highlighted leadership alignment and the development of an operations work plan. In a move that was strikingly different to leadership perfor‑ mance evaluations at Cooper in the past, Kirby implemented a performance review system that emphasized accountability at every level of the organization.

Patient-Centered, Innovative Care In 2013 Kirby also revised the mission and vision statements to reflect Cooper’s commitment to deliver a world-class patient experience. Every employee is “mission critical,” and every aspect of Cooper’s daily interaction with patients—from the registration to color-coded scrubs that identifies a caregiver’s responsibility— revolves around the patient.

This patient-centered approach dovetailed with new programs that focus on employee growth, health, and wellness. For instance, through its Population Health Institute, Cooper established an Employee Centered Medical Home to create a comprehensive, hands-on approach for its ten thousand covered employees

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and their dependents.This program provides close medical management of those employees who have chronic conditions and often have difficulty managing their care. It offers more costefficient, coordinated care with the goal of keeping Cooper employees healthier over time and reducing long-term medical costs.

The Employee Centered Medical Home, soon renamed Cooper Collaborative Care, was originally located in the same

Dr. Jeffrey Brenner, Medical Director of Cooper Advanced Care Center, with Cooper in the background.

office as the Urgent Care Center

Runnemede in 2017.The entire concept

in Cherry Hill. In addition to being a home

“fits in very neatly” to Cooper’s strategy

base for Cooper employees, this freestanding

to be sensitive to the needs of patients

center is open to the community on a

and give them greater access to care while

walk-in basis seven days a week, every day of

avoiding unnecessary ER admissions, said

the year for medical care that ranges from

Louis S. Bezich, Senior Vice President of

minor illness to injuries that need urgent

Strategic Alliances.

attention but not necessarily a trip to the

“It’s about keeping people out of the

hospital or the ER.Think earaches, strep

hospital for things that aren’t necessary, and

throat, stitches for a minor cut, colds and flu

it’s also a critical business strategy that helps

symptoms, immunizations, breaks and sprains;

drive patients to Cooper if they need tertiary

emergency medicine physicians are available

care,” said Bezich. “Unfortunately, you will

to treat all of these and more without an

have people who need tertiary care, and

appointment for insured patients.

people will have the chance to get familiar

Since it opened, volume has drastically

with Cooper through our Urgent Care

exceeded expectations, indicating a change

Centers. One of the things that we talk about

in the way patients seek urgent medical care.

at Cooper is that for the consumer—with

A second Urgent Care Center opened in

banking, shopping—it’s all about convenience.

Audubon in 2013, and Cooper soon opened

And health care needs to be as convenient as

two additional centers in Cinnaminson and

other consumer services.”

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A Long Partnership with Cooper—and the Community “I always believed in serving the community, and my service on the Cooper Board of Trustees is an extension of that belief. Cooper has undergone a significant transformation over the past several years, with the opening of the new medical school and the construction of the new cancer institute, and the future looks bright. I am proud to have the opportunity to be a part of it.”

Joan S. Davis spoke these words on June 6, 2013, the last public speech she ever gave. Wearing a suit that matched the colorful bouquet of flowers she held in her arms, Mrs. Davis was the guest of honor that day, surrounded by more than fifty community leaders who had gathered to dedicate Camden’s Seventh Street Park to her in honor of her longtime civic and community leadership. Nearly three weeks later, after a courageous three-year battle with lung cancer, she passed away on June 29 at the age of seventy-five.

A former educator and financial analyst, Mrs. Davis created a lasting legacy as a tireless community advocate and leader in Camden, a lifetime of service described on a beautiful plaque in the park that now bears her name. She held leadership positions at the Camden Public Library, CAMcare Health Corporation, Delaware River Port Authority, Home Port Alliance for the USS New Jersey, Cooper’s Ferry Development Corporation, and the Camden Redevelopment Agency. She served on Cooper’s Board of Trustees since 1994 and was the first woman to become Vice Chair, serving in that position from 2006 until she passed away.

“Joan was my partner throughout my leadership tenure at Cooper,” said Norcross. “She believed passionately in the mission of Cooper, and she lived in the city until her passing. She was an anchor—not only for Cooper and our Board of Trustees but for an entire city.”

At Mrs. Davis’s memorial service, Norcross read the statements that Mrs. Davis had prepared to deliver on June 10, 2013, the day Cooper and MD Anderson Cancer Center publicly announced their partnership for a new cancer center. Her declining health, just three days after she attended the park dedication, prevented her from speaking at that press conference, but her poignant, inspiring, and selfless words will forever remain a powerful reminder of why MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper is so important.

“In July 2010, I was diagnosed with lung cancer. I am the eighth person in my family diagnosed with cancer,” she wrote. “Other members of my family did not have the opportunity to live as long as I have. I have received the best care at Cooper, and it’s the same care they provide the man or woman battling their own cancer in the chemo chair beside me. To me and to cancer patients throughout the region, this new partnership brings promise. I believe that this partnership will give families, like mine, more time, more memories, and more hope.”

Joan S. Davis

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Such forward-looking, innovative

Brenner—A Hero to Camden”).

care was fast becoming a touchstone for

One of the unique offerings of this

Cooper. In October 2013 Cooper’s new

program is the group visits. Patients with

Urban Health Institute launched a unique

similar diagnoses, such as diabetes, meet

approach to primary care medicine called

together to learn best practices of care. Each

the Cooper Advanced Care Center. Located

patient then has individual time with physi‑

in 3 Cooper Plaza, this innovative service

cians and clinicians. Studies have shown that

provides Camden’s underserved population

group visits can be an effective tool in helping

with unprecedented access to a collaborative

patients manage their chronic illnesses.

practice of primary care, along with twenty

Dr. Brenner has worked with other

medical and surgical specialties under one

communities across the country (including

roof.The center incorporates traditional

Allentown, Pennsylvania; Aurora, Colorado;

provider-patient visits with group visits, open-

Kansas City, Missouri; and San Diego,

access scheduling, and enhanced access to

California) to develop sustainable and

support services.

accountable care systems based on the

“Coordinated care simply makes sense

Camden model, a step that PBS Frontline

as we draw upon the basics of medicine we

journalist and physician Dr. Atul Gawande

started with centuries ago,” said Dr. Jeffrey

predicted in a 2011 feature on Dr. Brenner.

Brenner, Medical Director of the center.

As the urban laboratory for Dr. Brenner’s

Widely recognized as a national expert in

Cooper initiatives, he reported, “Camden

reducing hospital readmissions and providing

may also be the city to help solve one of

better, personalized care to patients at

America’s most intractable problems—

reduced costs, Dr. Brenner was named one

lowering the cost of health care.”

of only twenty-four MacArthur Fellows in

Cooper’s message of progress does not

2013, a prestigious fellowship often referred

always trump historical images of Camden

to as the “genius award” that is presented

and translate to a wider national audience

once a year by the MacArthur Foundation

like the Frontline story. But when critical

to celebrate creative individuals. Cooper’s

stories about the Camden area appear

new Advanced Care Center, Dr. Brenner said,

and garner attention, Cooper’s response

“can eliminate some of the confusion among

has become swift and emphatic. Consider

the patients’ care and provide a better, more

Cooper’s response to a national television

coordinated effort that will help patients get

report in March 2013 that focused on the

a better grasp of their own health conditions

negative aspects of Camden:

and be able to identify problems sooner with fewer emergency care visits” (see Sidebar, “Dr.

At Cooper University Hospital, we

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New Jersey Governor Chris Christie announces Cooper’s partnership with MD Anderson Cancer Center during a special event in Trenton. With him are Dr. Ronald DePinho (far left), former President, MD Anderson Cancer Center, and Cooper Board Chairman George E. Norcross III (far right). understand firsthand the challenges Camden faces and the complicated dynamics that affect the people we serve in our hospital every day. For 125 years, our hospital has called this city home, and our commitment to serving the Camden community has not and will not waver.

Positive things happen every day on our campus.Three newly restored neighborhood parks have opened in the past three years; Cooper Medical School of Rowan University opened in 2012; a new, freestanding cancer center will open this fall; and walkways and homes have been rehabilitated in our neighborhood. Our campus is safe for the thousands of employees, patients, and visitors who come here every day. Children play outside, parents are engaging in activities, and the hope for our community remains steadfast.

We believe in Camden and the good work of our community partners. One block at a time, we are making it happen.

Facing Challenges and Competition From 2010 through 2013, as Cooper continued its block-by-block march to make Camden a health care destination, challenges definitely remained. Cooper lost one of its

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staunchest advocates on June 29, 2013, when

I see the Roberts Pavilion. I see what has

Joan S. Davis, a member of Cooper’s Board

been done with Kelemen and Dorrance, the

of Trustees for twenty years and the first

Emergency Department, the cath labs, the

woman to become Vice Chair in 2006, passed

medical school—that whole campus area

away. Her death came just a few weeks

is close to wonderful. And with the cancer

after the city of Camden dedicated Seventh

center across the street and the landscaping

Street Park in her honor, a lasting tribute to

that the Chairman insists on, it will be like

her devotion to Cooper and Camden (see

a city within a city. And perception, as we

Sidebar: “A Long Partnership with Cooper—and

all know, is reality.The medical school will

the Community”).

totally reinforce the perception and reality

Without Davis, Cooper continued to face

of Cooper being the place to go if you are

an issue that this longtime Board member

sick. If you are sick and scared, you will want

was keenly aware of before her death: with

to come to Cooper. Because we are tertiary

thirteen hospitals within fifteen miles of

care, which no one on this side of the bridge

Cooper’s front door, competition was a

can say but Cooper.”

given. Philadelphia’s medical metropolis—

Part of Cooper’s newer advertising

with such medical giants as the Hospital

campaigns focused on what differentiates

of the University of Pennsylvania, Jefferson,

Cooper from other hospitals. After the

Pennsylvania Hospital, Hahnemann, Drexel,

success of the ongoing Kelly Ripa campaign,

and Temple—is a constant reminder that

Cooper launched what Marketing Vice

South Jersey medical dollars can and do

President Jill Sayre Lawlor calls a “data-

cross the Delaware River. One of Cooper’s

driven, research-based, marketing focus on

biggest challenges is to stop that exodus and

raising the level of awareness about Cooper’s

capture those patients. Cooper’s expanding

signature programs and its pillars of excel‑

Health Sciences Campus—with the hospi‑

lence.” For instance, in 2013, Cooper’s

tal’s Centers of Excellence, a medical school,

“Numbers” campaign—where each

and the new cancer center—should “help us

commercial focused on a number to describe

slow the outflow of patients into Philly,” said

what’s special about one of Cooper’s medical

Sheridan. “They will more and more come

advantages—was designed to educate not

to recognize that they can get exceptional-

only consumers but area physicians, too.

quality, cost-effective, advanced medical care

According to Sayre Lawlor, “Nearly 66

right here in New Jersey.”

percent of our patients come here based on

Former Cooper Board Chairman Raymond Meillier put it another way: “When I go to Cooper now, it’s literally amazing.

the recommendation of physicians. Clearly, physician referral is a powerful thing.”

While confronting the challenge of

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The 2013 Annual Jim Fifis Lung Cancer Research Fund Dinner at Ponzio’s in Cherry Hill (l–r): John Fifis; Frank W. Bowen III, MD; George E. Norcross III; Susan Bass Levin;Violetta Fifis; Nick C. Fifis; Joan Davis; and Chris Fifis.

increased competition for patients, Cooper also continued to face financial challenges.Would Cooper’s payer mix improve to include more fully insured and private-paying patients? “We have a challenging payer mix here—always have,” said Sheridan in early 2014, noting that Cooper was trying to capture more paying patients and commercial business from the suburbs. “And all hospitals are entering a world of uncertainty due to health care reform and accountable care organizations.

But we seem to be positioned well for that because of our large physician group, our safety-net status, and our strong tertiary care services.”

With the recent surge of building projects, Sheridan pointed out that Cooper is “at or near our debt capacity.” However, Cooper earned an “investment grade” for its bond rating and had eighty days cash on hand in early 2014, compared to one day or less of cash that Cooper had when Sheridan first joined the hospital back in 1999. “The New Jersey Hospital Association put us in the top tier of hospitals in that category.That’s probably the best indicator of our financial improvement over time.”

A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats There’s no doubting the impact that an institution like Cooper has on Camden. In his book Fixing Broken Cities, John Kromer wrote that “the places with the greatest potential to contribute to the growth of civic leadership in Camden are the city’s academic and health care institutions.These institutions are the city’s largest workplaces, employing many Camden residents at all income levels.They are located

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at strategically important downtown and

boats,” she said. “I really believe that the best

neighborhood sites, and they are the city’s

revitalization efforts start small and work

largest service providers.They know how

out.Tearing down entire parts of a city and

to collaborate with businesses in the city

thinking you will build other areas doesn’t

and the region, and their well-being is less

work.You start in a neighborhood and you

dependent on municipal government than

build out to core institutions. And when I

is the case with most other businesses

think about Cooper as an institution, I think

in Camden.”

of it as a place that is not willing to accept

Susan Bass Levin, President and CEO

the status quo. Really, we are playing against

of the Cooper Foundation, keeps a copy of

type. As this national debate raged over the

Kromer’s book on her office shelf. A lawyer

last twenty years about access to health care

and former longtime mayor of Cherry Hill

for everyone, Cooper was living it. Cooper

who also served in the cabinets of three

never turned anyone away.”

New Jersey governors, Bass Levin has helped

Since taking over the Cooper Foundation,

revitalize the Cooper Foundation and worked

Bass Levin has also worked to grow the

to help connect Cooper to community

foundation and increase its impact in

redevelopment efforts throughout the city

supporting the Cooper mission. In 2011

and primarily within the Cooper Plaza and

the Cooper Foundation held its first ever

Lanning Square neighborhoods. For that

Cooper Red Hot Gala, now one of the

reason, Bass Levin likes to remind everyone

largest philanthropic events in the region.

that “progress in Camden is more than just

The Red Hot Gala is an annual foundation

a new building; it’s about making the connec‑

event that celebrates Cooper’s role in the

tions between institutions, businesses, and

community and raises money for critical

residents in the neighborhood that Kromer

health care, education, and training.The

writes about.” According to Bass Levin, it’s

gala has raised $8 million since the first

about “bringing a needed service to the

event in 2011.

people of the region and working with our

The Foundation held its inaugural Pink

community to develop programs that will

Roses Teal Magnolias Brunch (Pink and Teal)

meet their specific needs.”

in September 2010 to support the breast

With a lifetime in public service to

and gynecological research and clinical

her credit, Bass Levin brought passion and

programs. Another new signature event for

intensity to her new position at Cooper. And

the foundation, the Jim Fifis Lung Cancer

she frequently uses a time-honored mantra

Research Fund, a partnership with the Fifis

to explain what her work and her passion

family who own Ponzio’s Diner, was estab‑

are basically all about. “A rising tide lifts all

lished in September 2011.

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Pink and Teal is a unique community event, with more than forty women who serve on the host committee, more than twenty community partners, and close to one thousand cancer survivors, family, and friends. Since 2010, this annual event has raised more than $4 million to support cancer research, new technology, and programs for patients, including the Patient In Need Fund, Survivorship Program, and the Dr. Diane Barton Complementary Medicine program.

The annual Jim Fifis Lung Cancer event has raised more than $650,000 since 2011 to support early lung cancer detection, the development of innovative diagnostic and treatment technologies, and critical patient support programs.

Cooper Research Institute With the arrival of CMSRU, Cooper’s association with the Coriell Institute, and the success of the Cooper Research Institute, established in 2003, research is more critical than ever before.The Coriell Institute’s pioneering techniques related to cell cultures in liquid nitrogen “constitute one of the greatest contributions to modern human genetics,” said Michael F. Christman, Ph.D., President and CEO of the Coriell Institute. He noted that the Coriell Biobank is regarded “as one of the world’s largest and most diverse collections” and today plays “a principal role in adult stem cell research to unlock the code of human diseases like Parkinson’s and heart disease.Together, we are educating the next generation of physicians and researchers and contributing to the health and economy of this city.”

In 2011 Cooper received nearly $3.7 million through the Cooper Research Institute for medical research, and just under $6 million for program service grants, according to Harry Mazurek, Ph.D., Administrative Director of the Research Institute. In his new role as Associate Dean for Research at the medical school, Mazurek hopes to continue to “create an environment where all faculty are involved in scholarly activity” and “medical students, graduate students, residents, and fellows can participate in research projects.”

Considered a regional leader in providing patients with access to clinical trials, Cooper faculty members conducted approximately 440 National Institutes of Health– and industry-sponsored clinical trials in 2011 alone. For instance, Cooper received a Clinical Trials Participation Award for providing nearly 20 percent of its cancer patients with cancer clinical trial participation; Cooper’s Division of Hematology/Oncology had fifty cancer research studies open across all disease sites; and Cooper’s Department of Medicine, Division of Critical Care Medicine—already

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internationally recognized for septic shock treatment and research—was selected in

more powerful.

“I love the idea of bringing high-quality

2012 as the national coordinating center and

medical care to a disadvantaged community,

flagship investigative center for an innovative

to serve those who have no other options,”

clinical trial featuring a novel approach to

he said. “This ties into the medical school

treat sepsis.

mission, which is why we see our location in

Throughout Cooper, research to advance

Camden as an advantage. If you are thinking

patient care continued every day—a tradition

about how to optimize the care of popula‑

founded by doctors from Cooper’s past

tions—and you are working in Camden

named Benjamin, Coriell, Finch, and Sherk.

where the resources are so dismal and

From 2010 through 2013, Drs. Brigitte

the medical literacy of the population is so

Baumann and Kathryn McCans studied

low—if you can make it work here, you

the use of pediatric bladder ultrasound to

can make it work anywhere.The tools we

reduce painful invasive procedures for young

develop here are translatable—anywhere.

children; Dr. Lori Feldman-Winter researched

And that, in essence, is why we say, ‘Camden

childhood obesity and the benefits of breast‑

is our classroom.’”

feeding through grants from the Centers for

While Dr.Weisberg sees this as a clear

Disease Control and Prevention; Dr. Zoltan

advantage for Cooper’s medical students and

Turi continued to advance novel technologies

Camden’s population, former CEO Dr. Chris‑

to fix structural defects of the heart; and

topher Olivia took the concept a few steps

under Mazurek, the Salem Cardiovascular

further in late 2013 when he was asked to

Health and Wellness Grant, an initiative of the

consider what Cooper has ultimately done

Division of Cardiovascular Disease, screened

for the city of Camden.

a record-number 7,714 Salem residents in

“Looking back,” said Dr. Olivia, who

2010, and screening continued in order to

left Cooper at the end of 2007, “I am most

help stop the spread of heart disease.

proud of the fact that the institution today

The concept of community outreach and

is a ray of shining hope in that city.The

providing critical medical connections long

people of Camden can look to Cooper for

ago appealed to Dr. Lawrence S.Weisberg,

employment, for the best medical care on the

who joined the Cooper faculty in 1987

planet, and for the finest in medical education

because he believed in Cooper’s mission

around. And in revitalizing Cooper, we helped

and he wanted to work in Camden.Through

save the city.”

the new medical school, Dr.Weisberg, the Assistant Dean for Curriculum– Phase I, considers those connections even

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Cooper’s Future without Limits: Advancing Medicine, Changing Lives 2014–2017

T

he twenty-three members of Cooper’s Board of Trustees

meet regularly in the beautiful, expansive Halpern Board Room on the tenth floor of the Roberts Pavilion. A portrait of founder William Cooper, circa mid-1800s, is centered on one wall. An original hospital deed from 1875 is framed and hangs nearby, surrounded by a collage of vintage photo‑ graphs that show members of the Cooper family and scenes from the hospital just after it opened in 1887. An antique, eight-day tall case clock—so named because it needs to be wound every eight days—stands against one wall, not far from the Board Room table.

For just a moment, the room seems dominated by the past, framed by the swirl of objects and photographs from genera‑ tions ago. But all that changes in an instant with a glance toward the long bank of glass windows on the far side of the Board Room, windows that provide a panoramic view of Cooper and its Health Sciences Campus. One by one, the building blocks of this campus transcend the past and provide concrete proof of Cooper’s unquestionable progress and its promise of a remarkable future.

At the center is the Roberts Pavilion, a structurally impressive guarantee that

Roberts Pavilion at dusk

Cooper is deeply committed to providing world-class patient care to the citizens of Camden and the region. To the far left stands Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMSRU) at Benson and Broadway, which graduated its first class of medical students in May 2016. Just down the street on South Broadway is the site of the future Joint Health Sciences Center. This partnership of Rowan and Rutgers-Camden under the 2013 New Jersey Medical and Health Sciences Education Restructuring Act promises to create $300 million in new construction projects for Rowan and Rutgers and provide new programs in nursing, pharma‑ ceutical sciences, public health, and allied health.

At the corner of Martin Luther King Boulevard and Haddon Avenue, just steps away from the hospital and CMSRU, stands MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper. The medical center’s unique partnership with the leading cancer center in the nation offers every cancer patient the most advanced treatments available anywhere in the country.

And throughout the neighborhoods that border Cooper, there are examples of not only progress but also commitment—ranging from newly constructed townhouses and landscaped parks to the first Renaissance school, and the KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy that will educate the children of Camden for genera‑ tions to come.

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In just a few years after Cooper’s 125th anniversary, each of these new programs and

area and created 2,300 new jobs from 2011 to 2014.

According to the Economic Impact Report

buildings became integral parts of Cooper’s

released in 2015 by the Camden Higher

landscape, helping to fuel the medical center’s

Education and Healthcare Task Force, Cooper’s

unprecedented growth in key volume areas in

slice of this impact played out in capital

inpatient admissions, outpatient visits, and new

investments that included the $100 million

patient visits. And, as Cooper continued to advance

MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper, the $139

medicine and change lives from 2014 to 2017,

million CMSRU, the $41 million KIPP Cooper

Cooper and its entire medical community embraced

Norcross Academy, and more than $75 million spent

the reality of a future without limits.

on new facilities within the hospital. These new facilities now include a 30-bed surgical patient care

A Future without Limits Unfolds

unit on the eighth floor of the Roberts Pavilion; a

In 2014, nine educational and medical institutions

30-bed surgical patient care unit dedicated to the

in Camden—commonly referred to as the region’s

Cooper Heart Institute on the Pavilion’s ninth floor;

“Eds and Meds”—generated $2 billion in total

a 30-bed inpatient MD Anderson at Cooper cancer

economic impact to the Camden and South Jersey

unit on the Pavilion’s fifth floor; expanded operating

Grand opening, MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper, October 2013.

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379

Dr. Michael Rosenbloom, Codirector, Cooper Heart Institute and Head of the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery.

room suites with additional robotics and trauma surgical facilities; a new fullservice pharmacy called Direct Meds Inc., the region’s first hospital-based retail pharmacy; and offices on the Camden Waterfront for over six-hundred Cooper business employees who had previously worked outside the city.

Cooper had clearly expanded in every direction, a reality realized by other 2015 statistics, too. According to Stephanie D. Conners, Senior Executive Vice President, Hospital Chief Operating Officer, and System Chief Nursing Officer, Cooper now treats more patients than at any time in its history, with record patient volumes filling its 635 licensed beds. The hospital’s daily census had, in fact, climbed dramatically while other regional hospitals reported declining or stagnant numbers, increasing from the mid-300s in 2013 to more than 500 patients daily. By the end of 2015, more than 500,000 patients were cared for by Cooper’s excep‑ tional staff. Conners said this dramatic increase required the hospital to hire more nurses. “We have hired hundreds of additional nurses and support staff since 2013,” she said. “We cannot onboard staff fast enough. And what drives this is our commitment to patients who need our services: we don’t say no. “Without our extraordinary nursing staff, the organization could not experience this growth.”

Gary J. Lesneski, Esq., Senior Executive Vice President and General Counsel, calls Cooper’s growing inpatient census “a phenomenon. We are the only health system in the region with a growing inpatient census.” While inpatient volumes have declined at other regional health systems, volumes have risen at Cooper by

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John P. Sheridan Jr. On a weekday morning in the spring of 2014, the sounds of construction drew attention to the new three- and four-bedroom townhouses directly across from the newly named Sheila Roberts Park, formerly known as Cooper Commons Park. John Sheridan, a Cooper executive since 2005 and President and CEO since 2008, was delighted.

“The townhouses are popping up in the neighborhood like asparagus in the spring,” he said, standing on the sidewalk and pointing to the new buildings. “It is something I always wanted to see. If you could just picture how bleak that park was six years ago, and look at the vibrancy of the neighborhood now.

They just sold one of the rehabbed units on Washington Street for $219,000, with a fully approved bank mortgage. The market is set.”

Less than six months later, John P. Sheridan Jr. was gone. His death, on September 28, 2014, left behind a deeply saddened Cooper family. But one thing was clear: Sheridan had created a legacy that forever changed the course of Cooper.

Remembered for his quiet strength and passionate commitment to Cooper and to Camden, Sheridan was a pivotal figure in the history of the health care center and the neighborhoods that surround it. In his decade at Cooper, Sheridan helped lead a transformation of the entire health care system, from the construction and expansion of the Roberts Pavilion of Cooper University Hospital, to creating the first new medical school in New Jersey in three decades, to building a partnership with MD Anderson Cancer Center to bring their world-renowned care to Cooper.

And as the hospital’s reach and reputation grew, Sheridan refused to leave the neighborhood behind. He served as co-chair of Cooper’s Ferry Partnership, an organization committed to the revitalization of Camden. Perhaps his greatest contribution to the larger Cooper community was his commitment to help rejuvenate Camden.

Every day he was focused on what Cooper could do to help reinvigorate the city he had grown to love. His enthusiasm and vision for change helped spark decades of neighborhood improvements that included housing, parks, schools, lighting, and employment opportunities. His impact will continue to be realized for generations to come.

In 2017, John Sheridan and his wife, Joyce, were honored with the renaming of 3 Cooper Plaza to the Sheridan Pavilion at 3 Cooper Plaza. The current and five former New Jersey governors were in attendance, along with the John and Joyce Sheridan entire Sheridan family.

4.1 percent annually since 2012. In 2015, Cooper was among the top five acute care hospital systems in New Jersey, with the highest growth percentage when it reported more than 1.5 million patient visits, a 10 percent increase in one year (see Sidebar: “2013–2016: Unprecedented Growth”).

Lesneski points to several reasons to explain this patient uptick. More services and regional hospital affiliations now drive acute care patients to Cooper, and the system is better prepared to accept more patients. He credits Drs. Kirby and Mazzarelli for the hospital’s focus on improved processes and performance systems such as Lean Six Sigma, efforts that ultimately lead to greater access to Cooper’s services for patients and physicians alike. “There had been a pent-up demand for Cooper that had been unfulfilled because we had process issues that have now been addressed aggressively,” he said. “We have increased our profile as the place for tertiary care, and that is a reflection of many efforts to reach out to other health systems. A lot of creative planning has been done to manage our increased inpatient load. It’s unprecedented.”

Moving Forward, but with Heavy Hearts As Cooper experienced continued unprecedented growth, it moved forward without an individual who played a key role in taking it to this moment. The Cooper family suffered a stunning and incalculable loss on September 28, 2014, when the Cooper CEO, John P. Sheridan Jr. and his wife, Joyce, suddenly died at their home in central New Jersey. The sadness at Cooper was palpable.

“It is hard to overstate how great a loss John’s death was to his family, friends, coworkers, and Cooper,” said Board Chairman George E. Norcross III. “He was a friend, a mentor, and a role model. There was no one else who had as big an impact on me as John did, except my father. I miss him very much.”

Kirby agreed. “Working closely with John, I was able to see firsthand his quiet strength, his decisiveness, and his passionate belief that Cooper not only could make a difference in people’s lives, it had an obligation to do so,” she said. “His leadership made Cooper a better place.”

Following months of newspaper headlines, investigative reports, and endless speculations, the Cooper family realized that the circumstances surrounding the Sheridans’ deaths might never be completely resolved or understood. Only one thing was clear: Cooper had to move forward without a man who had cared passionately about Cooper and Camden, who had helped put so many of the

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Anthony J. Mazzarelli, MD, George E. Norcross III, Chairman, and Kevin M. O’Dowd, JD, at the Cooper Gala. Mazzarelli and O’Dowd were named Co-Presidents in 2018.

building blocks for its future in place (see

seeking to clearly define and brand Cooper

Sidebar: “John P. Sheridan Jr.”).

as focused on the patient experience, patient services, and employee and physician

New Executive Leadership

engagement. In December 2014, Kevin

Cooper University Health Care was already

M. O’Dowd, JD, joined Cooper as Senior

in a succession process at the time of Sheri‑

Executive Vice President and Chief Admin‑

dan’s death, and Kirby had earlier taken over

istrative Officer. O’Dowd left New Jersey

the day-to-day operations. “To the organi‑

Governor Chris Christie’s cabinet to join

zation’s and Dr. Kirby’s credit, we had no

the Cooper team. O’Dowd had previ‑

missteps after John died,” said Lesneski.

ously served as the lead health care fraud

“Even though it would be hard for me to

prosecutor for the U.S. Department of

even articulate the impact his death had

Justice in New Jersey, as well as a deputy

on all of us, I can honestly say that the

attorney general who provided legal advice

operation of the hospital continued, the

to the New Jersey Department of Health.

care of our patients continued, and we did a

O’Dowd’s background in health care

remarkable job in the face of a very difficult

law and policy, as well as his experience

time.”

managing large organizations, was a perfect

Since joining Cooper, one of Kirby’s top

fit for his role as a senior executive for

priorities was to build a leadership team

business and organizational development

and an effective organizational structure,

at Cooper.

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Cooper’s commitment to Camden is one of the main reasons O’Dowd chose to work at Cooper over other health care systems when he left a career in government after 18 years. “The Camden nexus, the hospital’s 130-year history here, never leaving the city when times weren’t as good, and to be able to contribute to the work that so many others had undertaken to revitalize the city of Camden was the deciding factor for me,” said O’Dowd. “This organi‑ zation thinks about its mission beyond the four walls of its hospital, with seamless integration into the city. There are no boundaries that separate Cooper from the community it serves. This is very unique, and I am proud to be a part of it.”

In addition to Kirby, the executive team includes O’Dowd, Lesneski, and Mazzarelli.

The Transformational Journey Kirby’s focus on building a leadership team extended much further than the executive team. Under her new Leadership Development Institute, Kirby has required and extended leadership training three to four times a year for

2014–2015 Advancements Cooper continued to expand its reach and services with these advances in 2014 and 2015: • AmeriHealth New Jersey expanded its cobranded product offering in late 2014 to include Shore Medical Center and Cape Regional Medical Center, a move that demonstrated the organizational commitment to expand access to highquality health services to a broader South Jersey market.

• The Janet Knowles Breast Cancer Center opened in May 2015 on the second floor of MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper, reflecting the dramatic 26 percent growth in new patients seeking specialized cancer services at Cooper since MD Anderson at Cooper opened.

• In the spring of 2015, Cooper was part of a coalition that launched the South Jersey Behavioral Health Innovation Collaborative to work to improve access to behavioral health services.

• Cooper was certified as a Level II Pediatric Trauma Center, making Cooper the only hospital in the Delaware Valley that provides trauma care for adults and children—serving nearly 3,000 patients every year.

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MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper’s Breast Surgery Team (l–r): Catherine Loveland-Jones, MD; Katherine Hansen, DO;Vivian Bea, MD; and Kristin L. Brill, MD.

hundreds of Cooper managers. In full-day

team treats patients and, just as importantly,

sessions, managers focus on how to build

one another. To enhance this Cooper

patient-centered leadership practices that

Experience, the senior leadership team took

emphasize patient care and how to make it

steps in 2014 and 2015 to implement new

better. Their goal? To continue to promote

productivity tools throughout the health

and be a part of what Kirby described as

care system; develop leaders and leadership

“Cooper’s Transformational Journey,” a

evaluation systems to embed accountability;

process she began in 2012 to improve

strive to improve and leverage physician

Cooper’s efficiencies and practices with a

and employee engagement; and continue

focus on the quality of care and service.

to leverage growth through MD Anderson

By 2014 Cooper was in the third phase of the transformational journey, with a focus on defining and branding the “Cooper

at Cooper, surgery, urgent care, and relationships with community providers.

Throughout 2016, the senior leadership

Experience,” one of Kirby’s signature

team embarked on the fourth phase of

leadership hallmarks. Described as an

Cooper’s leadership journey—focused

emphasis on service and an institution-wide

on organizational excellence. The team

culture of service, the Cooper Experience

continued its quest to drive organizational

is defined by the patient’s perception of

metrics and leverage partnerships to

care and services and how the entire care

improve quality and service and facilitate

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

385

growth. The efforts paid off, as evidenced

by Cooper achieving its best financial performance ever in 2016, driven by significant growth in cancer, surgical specialties, and tertiary transfers from across southern New Jersey. In essence, partnerships have made Cooper stronger.

According to O’Dowd, these organiza‑ tional underpinnings that had been driven into every corner of the Cooper Experience would now help guarantee that every patient “has a better quality of care, a better experience at Cooper. That’s what it means to have the patient experience as the focus of our goals and objectives.”

A Community on the Move In May 2014, President Barack Obama President Barack Obama visits Camden in 2014.

visited Camden to tour the Camden County Police Department Intelligence Center, to

meet with city youth, and to deliver a speech on community investment at a local community center. The President proclaimed Camden as “a symbol of promise for the nation,” praising community engagement and partnerships, reduced crime, improved education, and economic investment. “If it’s working here, it can work anywhere,” he said.

By the fall of 2015, the faculty at CMSRU had witnessed four White Coat ceremonies and expanded its curriculum to include all four years of a medical school education, all the while pursuing its official accreditation. The CMSRU Class of 2018 included the first two Camden residents accepted into the program (see Sidebar: “Doubling Down: Camden Twins Reach Medical School”).

In December 2015, New Jersey lawmakers gave final approval for $50 million in bonds to help fund the construction of the joint Health Sciences Center slated for the fall of 2016 in downtown Camden, another anchor in the “Eds and Meds” corridor that integrates Rutgers and Rowan Universities.

And in staggered stages from 2014 through 2015, the KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy at Lanning Square opened, the state’s first Renaissance school to offer

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Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

guaranteed enrollment to children in the Lanning Square and Cooper Plaza neigh‑ borhoods. The school opened in August 2014 with one hundred kindergarten students at a temporary neighborhood site while construction of the new facility was under way. One year later, in August 2015, approximately seven hundred students in pre-K, kindergarten, and first grades, and in fifth through eighth grades, began the school year in the new 110,000-squarefoot school building behind CMSRU, on the former site of the Lanning Square School at South Broadway and Clinton Street.

The new school offers modern classrooms with state-of-the-art technology, art and music rooms, science labs, a cafeteria and auditorium space, as well as a gym. The campus features extensive recreational amenities, including playing fields, outdoor

basketball courts, and play areas for younger students. The Camden School District also used the building to serve children in second, third, and fourth grades during the 2015–2016 school year. The Lanning Square school building actually includes three schools: a pre-K program; KIPP’s first elementary school, serving students from kindergarten to fourth grade; and the first middle school, serving students in fifth to eighth grades. The school will ultimately grow to serve more than eleven hundred students, from pre-K to eighth grade, with a rigorous college preparatory curriculum beginning in the earliest grades, with the ultimate goal to increase the number of Camden students going to college and obtaining four-year degrees. KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy offers an educational program that includes longer school days, an

KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

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extended school year, and whole student learning that incorporates sports, visual and performing arts, community projects, and field trips to further foster student learning.

The new school offers guaranteed enrollment for children from the Lanning Square and Cooper Plaza neighborhoods and is the first KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy to open in the city. The Camden network will include three to five additional schools: an elementary school, middle school, and a high school, eventually serving more than twenty-three hundred Camden students from pre-K to twelfth grade. Expansion of the KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy started in August 2016 when it opened its second middle school with one hundred fifthgraders in temporary space at the Lanning Square site while the rehabilitation of the KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy at the former John Greenleaf Whittier School was under way. The Whittier School, which opened in 2017, will grow to serve more than four hundred students in fifth through eighth grades.

Established under the Urban Hope Act, legislation sponsored by then–New Jersey State Senator Donald Norcross and Assemblymen Angel Fuentes and Gilbert “Whip” Wilson provides students in three struggling school districts— Camden, Newark, and Trenton—access to new, quality public schools in their communities. The legislation establishing the Renaissance schools as public schools provided three distinct differences from charter schools: Renaissance schools do not We are providing quality have a lottery system for selecting students, housing to Camden families, as every child in the neighborhood where and the neighbors are happy. the school is located is guaranteed a seat ­—Susan Bass Levin at the school; Renaissance school facilities must be new construction or substantially renovated construction of an existing facility; and approval of the Renaissance schools is provided by the local school board—not the state.

The KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy was created in partnership with KIPP NJ, a leading national network of free, open-enrollment, college-preparatory public charter schools; the Cooper Foundation, the charitable arm of Cooper University Health Care; and the Norcross Foundation. According to the Cooper Foundation’s President and CEO, Susan Bass Levin, the new school was the state’s first privately run and financed Renaissance school, defined as a public school that is built, operated, and managed by an approved nonprofit organization committed to improving educational outcomes in struggling districts.

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Each year, students at the KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy receive backpacks filled with school supplies compliments of Cooper employees.

“One of the unique aspects of the

for Humanity, along with M&M Devel‑

school is the partnership with Cooper,”

opment and other collaborators, resulting

she said. “Our employees volunteer at the

in the construction and renovation of over

school and to introduce them to medicine

125 housing units in the neighborhood.

and the business world. And it’s structured

In addition, Cooper and its partners are

so that every child in the area automatically

moving forward on plans to rehabilitate an

gets to choose this school. It’s not based on

additional 15 vacant and abandoned units

academic requirements but is a true neigh‑

in the neighborhood for new homeown‑

borhood school. Cooper and the Cooper

ership opportunities. In 2016, St. Joseph’s

Medical School of Rowan University will

also completed rehabilitation of six

continue to build partnerships to support

additional vacant and distressed homes on

the children and families from the schools

key blocks in the neighborhood of New

to meet their needs.”

Street and Trenton Avenue. Bass Levin

Along with the KIPP Cooper Norcross

makes clear that the notion of gentrifi‑

Academy, the Cooper Foundation partners

cation and pushing long-term residents out

with a number of other nonprofits, including

of the neighborhood is not the goal of these

St. Joseph’s Carpenter Society and Habitat

housing opportunities.

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

389

Cooper opened five new operating rooms in 2016, increasing Cooper’s total number of operating rooms to twentythree. Two of the operating rooms are specifically designed for robotic surgery, with fully integrated computers built into the architecture and design.

“That’s why we have partnered with nonprofit groups,” Bass Levin said.

“They work with Camden residents so that they are ready-to-buy homes, they learn about home ownership, and then they move into these properties. We are providing quality housing to Camden families, and the neighbors are happy.

They don’t like to see abandoned properties on their blocks, and it’s exciting and rewarding when you feel as though you are making a difference and you are doing it with the neighbors right by your side.You are creating a new sense of what the future can look like.”

Cooper’s Growth Continues in 2016 Within the vast array of statistics that Kirby keeps at her fingertips, Cooper’s success as the region’s leading tertiary care provider can be expressed in myriad impressive, black-and-white numbers: • In 2016 Cooper reported operating revenues of $1.1 billion for 2015, compared with operating revenues of $821 million in 2012, a dramatic increase of 33 percent in only four years.

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2013–2016: Unprecedented Growth To meet increased demand for patient services, Cooper added new outpatient locations, a new inpatient cancer unit with thirty private rooms, and five state-of-the-art operating rooms. In recent years, Cooper has been the only health system in the region to see growth in both inpatient and outpatient volume. In 2016 Cooper became the market share leader in cancer treatment and remains the region’s market leader in trauma care as the only Level 1 Trauma Center in South Jersey.

Patient Volume Has Steadily Increased

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

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• In 2016 Cooper reported an equally impressive jump in operating margins, reporting an increase of 300 percent over 2011. This unprecedented fiscal strength points to improved efficiencies at every level of hospital opera‑ tions, with the majority of the money being reinvested in programs and services for patients and the community.

• At a time when overall hospital admissions are down in the region by 2 percent, Cooper’s admissions were up 4.2 percent. And from 2012 to 2015, Cooper increased its overall market share by 6.6 percent, a statistic that is expected to trend higher in the next few years. Cooper has enjoyed the greatest rate of annual increases in market share and patient volumes among all providers servicing southern New Jersey during the past four years.

Kirby is passionate when discussing operational goals and financial objectives.

“We have focused on the fundamentals, organized around our medical institutes for quality patient services, worked on creating an identity as the true tertiaryacademic institution in the area, and repurposed our mission and vision to include education and research as one of our pillars,” she said. “When you do all this, you don’t see the local hospital as your competition; they become your customers.

Our competition is across the river. Our goal is to stop the migration of acute-

Cooper Ambulance EMS Squad

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Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

care and surgical patients to Philadelphia, and we are seeing that happen with our growing tertiary care volume. We will always honor our mission and be the hospital for Camden. But now we are the tertiary partner for the entire South Jersey region.”

The past few years of strategic planning have clearly paid off. “We have improved our market share by one point per year, with compound annual growth from 2011 to 2015.That is significant,” said O’Dowd.

“We experienced our best three years financially in 2014, 2015, and 2016” (see “2013–2016: Unprecedented Growth”).

Much of the growth can be attributed to Cooper’s enormous expansion in surgery and the partnership with

MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper’s light-filled lobby with the “Tree of Life” in the background.

MD Anderson Cancer Center. Cooper’s surgical patient volume has increased over

• In 2016 Cooper was designated

15 percent in 2013 through 2016, while

by the New Jersey Legislature to

patient visits related to MD Anderson

provide paramedical services for

at Cooper have grown during the same

Camden. This new, fully integrated

period by over 17 percent. “Plus, combine

system of prehospital care resulted

that with the medical school, and we

in faster response times and

have been able to elevate the profile

better coordinated care for the

of Cooper as a whole,” said O’Dowd.

city’s residents.

“We are a true academic medical center providing tertiary care, and we are able to compete against anyone.”

• In June 2016 MD Anderson at Cooper expanded its services by opening a new inpatient oncology

Serving the Community

unit at Cooper University Hospital.

Major headlines in 2016 foreshadowed a

The thirty-bed, all-private room units

continuing bright future through a number

on the fifth floor of the Roberts

of initiatives benefitting patients and the

Pavilion replaced Cooper’s existing

local community.

oncology inpatient unit, making

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

393

Cooper the only hospital in South Jersey with a dedicated inpatient oncology unit. “This unit is an important part of our comprehensive cancer services,” said Kirby, noting that Cooper had witnessed a 20 percent increase in cancer patients since 2013 when it partnered with MD Anderson Cancer Center to bring world-class cancer care to South Jersey.

“Thousands of residents have chosen to stay right here in the Garden State to receive first-rate cancer care.” As a result of this growth, the infusion unit at the Camden Cancer Center expanded to thirty-six chairs and four private rooms in October 2016.

• In February 2016 the Cooper Foundation announced a $2 million grant from the William G. Rohrer Charitable Foundation to help fund the expansion of the cancer genetics program at MD Anderson at Cooper.

The grant is the largest given to MD Anderson at Cooper since it opened in 2013. With the partnership, the cancer genetics program will officially be named the William G. Rohrer Cancer Genetics Program. The program provides genetic counseling, testing, and long-term cancer risk reduction strategies for people at increased risk for cancer due to hereditary mutations. The program also focuses on the evolving use of molecular profiling to define cancer treatment.

• On March 18, 2016, CMSRU’s charter class celebrated its first-ever Match Day, the day forty-three members of the class of 2016 received their residency placements at the same time as their medical school counterparts throughout the country. At exactly 12 p.m. EST, tears of joy, applause, huge smiles, and countless hugs filled the CMSRU building as medical students matched at a wide range of nationally esteemed programs—including, of course, Cooper University Hospital. “Match Day is the culmination of many years of hard work,” a visibly proud Dean Katz explained. “As a new medical school, we are especially pleased to see the caliber of the institutions where our graduates will begin the next phase of their education. Given the intense competition for residency spots nationally, their results are extraordinary!”

• In April 2016 Summit Medical Group and MD Anderson at Cooper announced a unique partnership, the Cancer Center’s first with a physician394

Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

owned multispecialty group. Patients

What’s more, newspapers throughout the

in northern New Jersey will now

region reported during the spring and early

have access to the nation’s leading

summer on new efforts to bring manufac‑

cancer center.

turing facilities and jobs to Camden, while also providing opportunities for Camden’s

• The year 2016 culminated with an

youth. Names like Holtec International

announcement by Congressman

joined a growing list of companies, including

Donald Norcross at the KIPP

Subaru of America and NJ American Water,

Cooper Norcross Academy that the

that are part of over $2 billion in redevel‑

Promise Neigh‑ borhood Initiative received a $30 million grant ($6 million per year over five years) from the

Another milestone in the expansion of higher education occurred on May 9, 2016, as the inaugural class of medical students in the history of CMSRU prepared to graduate and start their careers as physicians.

opment projects announced in Camden.

Headlines now proclaimed what was once unimagi‑ nable: Imagine 10,000 New Jobs in Camden. . . . Camden’s Comeback. And

U.S. Department of Education. The

steps have been taken to make sure

grant provides for a collaborative

Camden residents were not left out of

to provide high-quality, safe, and

these employment opportunities.

stable opportunities for students to

In September 2016 the Cooper

succeed in school, along with support

Foundation and Camden Mayor Dana Redd

services for their families. The funding

announced the Camden Construction

will make it possible to strengthen

Career Initiative, which trains Camden

early childhood services, improve

residents for construction jobs and

opportunities for children to be

connects construction work-ready city

successful in school, develop college

residents with employment opportu‑

and career pathways for young

nities. The initiative will train more than

adults, and transform neighborhoods

100 Camden residents through the Union

through services that promote family

Organization for Social Service (UOSS)

stability. Cooper is proud to be part

preapprenticeship training program, which

of the partnership.

George E. Norcross Jr., the father of the current Cooper Board Chairman, had

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395

Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper during the 2016 presidential campaign.

envisioned. The comprehensive ten-week program will train residents with skills in construction trades (carpentry, bricklaying, and more), while simultaneously teaching residents the necessary soft skills, including life skills education and career development strategies to succeed in the workplace. Cooper successfully utilized the UOSS preapprentice training program to train Camden residents for a career in construction, enroll in a local building trade union, and work on specific construction projects, such as the CMSRU, MD Anderson at Cooper, and the KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy.

Camden’s progress and Cooper’s own health care advances caught the attention of more than newspaper reporters in May 2016 when Hillary Clinton, then running for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination, stopped at MD Anderson at Cooper during a campaign swing through South Jersey. In a short, off-the-record visit, Secretary Clinton asked questions about Cooper’s health care challenges and successes. Before she left, she lined up for a picture with registered nurses Jacqueline Bockarie, Kathrina Chapman, Devyn Berry, and Sean Deiter; Nettie Trotman, Cooper’s Nurse of the Year; and several Cooper executives.

Long before and long after her visit, Secretary Clinton’s own “it takes a village” approach to strong communities and families has resonated throughout Cooper, Cooper’s extended neighborhood community, and Camden. With a 396

Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

Doubling Down: Camden Twins Reach Medical School In 2014, identical twin sisters Samantha and Susana Collazo became the first lifelong Camden residents admitted into Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMSRU).The story of these young students and their path to medical school reflects years of hard work, motivation, and the importance of good mentors.

As young girls, the Collazo twins were bright, eager students who were determined to earn high school diplomas during a time when Camden’s graduation rate hovered around 50 percent.The youngest of six children from a close-knit Hispanic family, they attended H. C. Sharp Elementary School and Veterans Memorial Middle School, where they excelled.Their hard work earned them spots in the Dr. Charles E. Brimm Medical Arts High School, a prestigious Camden magnet school for students interested in health careers. At Brimm, achievement was valued, and teachers, guidance counselors, and family members quickly recognized that the Collazo twins were gifted in math and science.

“In high school, our teachers encouraged us to go to college, something no one in our family had ever completed,” said Susana. “They made us believe that it was possible and helped us every step of the way.”

The Collazo twins attended Rutgers University–New Brunswick, majoring in exercise science and sport studies. As college juniors, they learned that a new medical school had opened in their hometown, and that it offered a summer biomedical science, clinical, and service learning experience for college students called the Premedical Urban Leaders Summer Enrichment (PULSE) program.They were accepted into the highly selective, six-week PULSE I program, where they not only gained an understanding of what medical school would be like but also developed strong bonds with CMSRU faculty members. “The faculty at CMSRU are so committed to helping students,” explained Samantha. “After our first summer as PULSE students, they continued to stay in touch and offer us encouragement and guidance. It was clear they wanted us to succeed.”

The Collazo twins graduated from Rutgers in 2013 and continued preparing for medical school by participating in PULSE II during the summer of 2013. PULSE II offered an even more advanced science experience.They applied for early accep‑ tance into CMSRU, and joined CMSRU in the fall of 2014. “Having the Collazo twins as CMSRU medical students is significant for us and for the city of Camden,” explained CMSRU’s Dean Katz.

“These hardworking, diligent young women were steadfast in their commitment to achieving academic success. It shows that hard work, good choices, the support of a loving family, and the Twin sisters Susana (shown on the left) and Samantha guidance of mentors can truly make a difference. (shown on the right) Collazo entered Cooper Medical We are so proud of them and hope they serve as School of Rowan University in 2014. Both matched in their first choice at Morristown Memorial Hospital an inspiration for Camden’s youth and children in the departments of Pediatrics and ObstetricsGynecology, respectively. all over the country who are being raised in distressed urban environments.”

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goal to strengthen the community and keep young people healthy and active, a coalition made up of the Cooper Foundation, the Norcross Foundation, and AmeriHealth New Jersey established the Camden Health and Athletic Associ‑ ation (CHAA) in 2016 to provide wellness and youth athletic programs for boys and girls in Camden. By working with existing recreation organizations in Camden and identifying new opportunities, CHAA serves as an umbrella organi‑ zation to help establish new athletic programs, develop new sports fields and facilities, and create centralized purchasing methods for equipment and uniforms.

Cooper physicians and nurses volunteer their time to offer free sports physicals to every child who plays youth sports through CHAA. Camden County police and sheriff’s officers volunteer as coaches, umpires, referees, and mentors. And in addition to providing youth athletic programs, CHAA also focuses on devel‑ oping and supporting community health-related programs and coordinates its

Cooper physicians and nurses volunteer their time to offer free sports physicals to every child who plays youth sports through CHAA.

efforts with the Get Healthy Camden Initiative of Cooper’s Ferry Development Corpo‑ ration, which was funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Another milestone in the expansion of higher education occurred on May 9, 2016, as the inaugural class of CMSRU medical students prepared to graduate and start their careers as physicians.

The forty-three medical student pioneers, wearing their graduation caps and gowns, met in the towering lobby of the Roberts Pavilion for one last class photo.

Cheering crowds of employees, patients, and visitors lined up along hospital corridors and outdoors along the sidewalks as the beaming medical students joined leaders and faculty from Cooper and Rowan in a processional down Stevens Street, turning left on Broadway, and proceeding past CMSRU. When they arrived on the Green at the KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy, they were greeted by more than 650 family and friends gathered to help them celebrate this remarkable milestone.

“Today is an opportunity to recognize the tremendous individuals who contributed in countless ways to help make the more than forty-year dream of a medical school in Camden a reality—a promise kept,” said Dr. Katz, then Dean of CMSRU, turning to acknowledge the deans, faculty, university and health care

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executives, and business and legislative

Center Designation

leaders from the city, county, and state who had played a role in making this day possible.

• US News & World Report—recognized

“In addition, it is a time to celebrate our

as a High Performer in Colon Cancer

amazing charter class for having the courage

Surgery

to take a chance on a new medical school that had only a vision, a mission, and a

• Consumer Choice Award­­s—National

dream to become truly unique.You each

Research Corporation

took a risk—an enormous, high-stakes risk.

* Best Overall Quality

Thank you for being our standard-bearers.”

* Best Doctors

Dr. Annette Reboli played a pivotal role in turning the dream of a four-year medical

* Best Image and Reputation * Best Nurses

school in Camden into a reality and was named Interim Dean after Dr. Katz left to take a position at the University of the

• American Orthopaedic Association * Star Performer Recognition

Sciences in Philadelphia. Dr. Reboli was

Award for Own the Bone

later appointed Dean of the Medical School

Cooper Bone and Joint Institute

in 2017.

• Urgent Care Association of America

Our Mission: To Serve, to Heal, to Educate

* Urgent Care Designation

Cooper’s mission was highlighted in 2017

• American College of Surgeons

with numerous awards and recognitions,

* Level I Trauma Verification

including:

* Level II Pediatrics Trauma Verifi‑ cation

• Healthgrades

* National Surgical Quality

* Recognized as a 5-Star organi‑

Improvement Program for

zation for GYN Surgery

Achieving Meritorious Outcomes

(Hysterectomy)

for Surgical Patient Care

* National Quality Award for Excel‑ lence in Cranial Neurosurgery

• New Jersey Hospital Association * HeroCare Connect – Community

• Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

Outreach Award (Cooper and Deborah)

* Advanced Comprehensive Stroke

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399

Philanthropic Gifts Benefiting Pediatric Patients Children’s Regional Hospital at Cooper provides care to the region’s littlest patients, and the Cooper Foundation has received philanthropic gifts from donors to make sure these patients have access to the best pediatric doctors, nurses, and specialists in a patient-centered, family-focused environment designed especially for children.

The Cooper Foundation, in partnership with the Johnny M Foundation, celebrated the opening of the new Johnny M Playroom at Children’s Regional Hospital on November 2, 2015. Replacing an outdated playroom on the sixth floor of the Kelemen Building, the playroom is designed as an outdoor space within the hospital. The focal point of the playroom is a custom “tree” with a built-in flat-screen TV. The space also features a customized outdoor barbecue play set, a toadstool table and chair set, and butterflies suspended in the air. An adjacent family lounge is designed to give a feel of being on an outdoor deck and provides a relaxing environment for parents and families while their little one is in the hospital.

In May 2015 a newly created Teen Lounge at Children’s Regional Hospital opened on the seventh floor of the Kelemen Building in partnership with the Alicia Rose Victorious Foundation and the Ravitz Family Foundation. The lounge provides adolescent patients with a much-needed space where they can relax, watch movies, play video games, access computers, and socialize with others their own age, helping them escape the rigors of their hospital stay.

And in partnership between the Holman Automotive Group and the Cooper Foundation, more than twenty employees painted a new “Under the Sea” mural in October 2015 to greet pediatric patients and families at the Children’s Regional Hospital. The large, brightly colored mural on the sixth floor of the Kelemen Building, complete with friendly sea creatures, helps reduce anxiety for children and their families during their hospital stay.

In May 2016 a new child-friendly playroom opened in the Surgical Access Center on the second floor of the hospital to provide children with a place of their own to relax and play while waiting for a loved one to come out of same-day surgery. The newly renovated playroom offers a tree-shaped bookshelf and a leaf-shaped table, a floor-to-ceiling glass wall that also serves as a marker board for creative play, a wall-mounted television, colorful ottomans, new carpet, cheerful light-blue paint, and a butterfly mural.

Construction of the John E. Kostic Pediatric Infusion Center was completed in 2017. The center started seeing patients in 2018, providing family-centered care to children requiring short- or long-term infusion therapy, therapeutic injections, or provocative stimulation testing. Infusion therapy is admin‑ istered to infants, children, and adolescents who require either one-time or ongoing IV therapy for a variety of acute and chronic illnesses including juvenile diabetes and other endocrine disorders, as well as blood, genetic, and gastrointestinal disorders.

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• Studer Group

nated and comprehensive cardiac services.

* Excellence in Patient Care Award for Physician Engagement

“This collaboration will expand access to the most advanced cardiac care for more South Jersey residents,” said Dr. Kirby.

• Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of

“Cardiac Partners will increase efficiencies,

New Jersey

reduce clinical variation, and allow us to

* Blue Distinction Centers for

provide the highest-quality care to patients

Bariatric Surgery

with better coordination through a full range of cardiac services from diagnosis to

• National Committee for Quality

advanced cardiac surgery to rehabilitation.”

Assurance * Patient-Centered Medical Home Recognized Practice, Level III • HIMSS Analytics

Expansion of Military, Diplomatic, and Veteran Programs Services In 2017 Cooper furthered its strong

* Most Wired Award Health & Hospital Networks • NJ Sharing Network * Gold Award for Organ Donation and Transplant Awareness

commitment to serve those who have served our country. Fulfilling this mission takes the talents of many and occurs quietly and without fanfare, every day, through a number of innovative, personalized initia‑ tives.

• Cooper Health Care Careers

Cooper delivers needed health care

Initiative with Camden County and

services to servicemen and -women

HopeWorks

through numerous programs, giving them

* Launched a free training program

priority access that had been eluding

for medical coding for Camden

them. One such program is through a joint

residents with the promise of a

venture with Deborah Heart and Lung

job at Cooper upon successful

Center in Browns Mills, New Jersey, in the

completion of the program

shadow of the vast Joint Base McGuire-DixLakehurst military base. Through HeroCare

Cooper and Inspira Health Network

Connect, Cooper and Deborah connect

announced a joint venture to integrate

active-duty and retired members of the

cardiac services. Cardiac Partners at

military, veterans, and their families with

Cooper and Inspira provides patients in

quality and timely health care services. This

South Jersey with access to more coordi‑

program adds another important layer to

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

401

Special Operations Combat Medics Team

Cooper’s VETS VIP priority program that provides same-day access for primary care appointments for veterans.

Understanding the health care needs of First Responders, Cooper works side by side with firefighters, police officers, and emergency service technicians by bringing health care to their work places. Potential health issues of this highstress, high-risk population can be detected with routine screenings and a visit from a primary care physician.

Cooper is the only trauma center in the country that provides real-time physician-to-physician clinical consultation; hands-on training; research and education; plus real-time, worldwide, situational, video and phone support, as well as supervision to select members of our nation’s diplomatic divisions and elite military units. Through the program, the Department of Defense and the U.S. Department of State send their elite military personnel to Cooper—prior to deployment—for hands-on training. When critical medical emergencies arise around the world, Cooper’s trauma team jumps into action and provides medical teams with real-time guidance via its telemedicine capabilities. As a regional leader in trauma care and preparedness, Cooper has unique expertise in understanding how to handle complex medical emergencies resulting from car accidents, explo‑ sions, gunshot wounds, and other serious accidents. Cooper is often called upon by state and local law enforcement, fire personnel, emergency medical technicians, the military, and government agencies to provide training in handling extreme blood loss in these trauma situations.

In addition to military patient care and training, Cooper’s research initia‑

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tives strive to develop advanced technologies that will improve the standard of care among the U.S. Armed Forces as well as civilians. A common thread runs through all these programs— a sense of honor, duty, and service—and most impor‑ tantly, a unified desire to give back to those whom have given so selflessly of themselves to help their communities and their country.

Sheridan Pavilion In May 2017, Governor Chris Christie, five former governors, numerous elected officials, and nearly thirty members of the Sheridan family joined Cooper

Steven E. Ross, MD,Vice Chairman of the Department of Surgery, and John M. Porter, MD, Head of the Division of Trauma Surgery, at the January 2017 dedication of the Ross Trauma Admitting Area. Dr. Porter succeeded Dr. Ross as the Head of Trauma in 2017. Dr. Ross joined Cooper in 1984 and served as the Head of the Division of Trauma from 1988 through 2015. During that time, Cooper’s Trauma Center achieved national recognition for clinical care, education, and clinical research.

leaders for the unveiling of the

the campus.”

Sheridan Pavilion at 3 Cooper Plaza in honor of John and Joyce Sheridan.

“John Sheridan left a lasting legacy at

The Future Looks Like This The architect behind the dramatic

Cooper University Health Care and in

advances and expansion at Cooper is

Camden, a city he worked tirelessly to

undisputedly George Norcross. During

improve,” said Chairman Norcross at the

an interview, he discussed the years

unveiling. “Now and forever, in celebration

of dreaming and planning that had

of the lives of John and Joyce Sheridan,

preceded CMSRU, the KIPP Cooper

and in tribute to all they did for Cooper

Norcross Academy, the partnership with

University Health Care and the City of

MD Anderson Cancer Center, and other

Camden, this building will be known as the

game-changing accomplishments at Cooper.

Sheridan Pavilion by the tens of thousands

“The first ten years of my tenure

of patients, employees, and visitors who

at Cooper were not quite so exciting,”

come here annually or drive through

recalled Norcross, sitting behind a sign on

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

403

Six New Jersey governors honored John and Joyce Sheridan at the dedication of the Sheridan Pavilion (photographed l to r): Board Chairman George E. Norcross III, Governor Chris Christie, Sheridan’s son Mark Sheridan, Esq., Governor Jim Florio, Governor Tom Kean, Governor Jim McGreevey, Governor Don DiFrancesco, Governor Jon Corzine, and President and CEO Adrienne Kirby.

his desk that reads, “CAN DO CLUB—Members Only.” “But the past ten years have been some of the most exciting and rewarding moments in my life—to see what has happened, to see what we have been able to do and the team we have been able to assemble, and to see some things come to fruition that someone said could never happen. If someone tells me it can’t be done, that is the most motivating thing in my life.”

Norcross specifically recalled a video created by Cooper in 2005, a video that Norcross said he recently watched for the first time in over ten years. In a reflective moment, he recalled highlights from the film that included everything from introducing Kelly Ripa as Cooper’s spokesperson to dreams for a worldclass cancer center, a four-year medical school, expanded hospital facilities, and a safer, better future for Camden. Watching that video, Norcross was genuinely amazed: Every goal had been realized.

“What’s remarkable is looking back at the film, and hearing and seeing what we talked about doing,” said Norcross. “And I would say, without a doubt, that we exceeded our expectations.”

In 2017, in the city where it began, the future of Cooper University Health

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Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

Care is now as clearly defined as its past.

new townhouses and new parks; and a

With a network of over one hundred

Camden waterfront teeming with growth

outpatient office locations and its flagship

and economic development, Cooper still

Cooper University Hospital; MD Anderson

reflects the goals of the Quaker family that

at Cooper; Cooper Medical School of

first opened the hospital in 1887. It has, of

Rowan University; an institute-based

course, expanded dramatically beyond the

structure that aligns care and services

Cooper family’s initial hopes. But as the four

with patients’ health care needs; the KIPP

founders once dreamed possible, Cooper

Cooper Norcross Academy; the burgeoning

continues to provide medical care to the

Health Sciences Campus bordered by

citizens of Camden and beyond.

The Sheridan Pavilion at 3 Cooper Plaza was dedicated May 24, 2017.

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

405

Premier Institutes • MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper, through a partnership with one of the nation’s leading cancer centers, offers advanced, multidisciplinary cancer treatment, innovative technologies, cutting-edge clinical trials, and comprehensive supportive care services.

• The Surgical Services Institute offers advanced surgical options in twelve specialty areas including ear, nose, and throat, pain management, colorectal, general, plastic and reconstructive, oral and maxillofacial, thoracic, urology, and vascular. It is also home to the Cooper Aortic Center, the Bariatric and Metabolic Surgery Center, the Level I Trauma Center, and the Level II Pediatric Trauma Center.

• The Adult Health Institute provides coordinated care via Cooper’s extensive network of primary and specialty care services, including dermatology and dermato‑ logic surgery, endocrinology, family medicine, geriatric medicine, infectious diseases, internal medicine, nephrology, palliative care, and pulmonary medicine. It is also home to the Cooper Digestive Health Institute, South Jersey’s largest free-standing endoscopic center, providing a full range of gastrointestinal services with satellite offices throughout the region.

• The Cooper Heart Institute, one of the most comprehensive cardiovascular programs in the region. This institute provides a full range of heart care from prevention and diagnosis to the most innovative nonsurgical techniques and surgical treatments, including stenting procedures, heart surgery, and minimally invasive procedures.

• The Cooper Bone and Joint Institute offers the latest surgical and nonsurgical treat‑ ments in orthopaedics, rheumatology, podiatry, and rehabilitation.

• The Cooper Neurological Institute (CNI) is fully dedicated to the diagnosis and treatment of neurological and neurosurgical issues, including epilepsy, movement disorders, headache, trauma, and brain, spine, and pituitary cancer. The CNI is recog‑ nized as a Comprehensive Stroke Center by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations.

• The Women’s and Children’s Institute is home to the Children’s Regional Hospital at Cooper, South Jersey’s only state-designated hospital for children, and the Ripa Center for Women’s Health and Wellness at Cooper, which provides primary and multispecialty care, radiology services, and wellness education.

• The Urban Health Institute is redesigning health care to meet the needs of an underserved population. The founding principle is to ensure that community

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Part Six: Transformative Years—1999 to 2017

In November 2015 the new Cooper 1, air medical transport helicopter, became an integral part of the Cooper air and ground transport program.

residents have access to quality preventive care and the tools to manage complex medical conditions when needed. This includes the Cooper Advanced Care Center, with primary care and medical and surgical specialties, and the Camden Coalition of Healthcare Providers, whose key role is knowledge dissemination and communi‑ cation among organizations in the City of Camden.

Centers of Excellence • The Center for Population Health helps Cooper implement new patient care strat‑ egies to improve the patient experience and to reduce costs.

• The Center for Critical Care Services provides the highest level of lifesaving inpatient care for the seriously ill and injured. The center is staffed by physician experts in sepsis, cardiogenic shock, and respiratory failure, among others, and serves as a major referral source for area hospitals.

• The Center for Urgent and Emergent Services provides 24/7 access to immediate care, whether through the Emergency Department, 911 Emergency Medical Services, Toxicology, Disaster Medicine, Air Medical Services, or the Transfer Center. Cooper’s Urgent Care Centers take ED staffing out to the community and offer extended day, evening, and weekend hours for patients of all ages.

• The Center for Trauma Services is a Level I Trauma Center and Level II Pediatric Trauma Center that cares for severely injured patients involved in motor vehicle crashes, falls, industrial accidents, and acts of violence. It has an active community education program in trauma prevention and safety. Cooper is the only hospital in the Delaware Valley that provides trauma care for adults and children.

Chapter 20 / Cooper’s Future without Limits

407

Mission Our mission is to serve, to heal, to educate.

We accomplish our mission through innovative and effective systems of care and by bringing people and resources together, creating value for our patients and the community.

Vision Cooper University Health Care will be the premier health care provider in the region, driven by our exceptional people delivering a world-class patient experience, one patient at a time, and through our commitment to educating the providers of the future.

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1928 Medical Staff (shown on pages 102–103) 1. Alexander S. Ross 2. Joseph S. Roberts 3. A. Haines Lippincott 4. Thomas B. Lee 5. Levi B. Hirst 6. Dowling Benjamin 7. Joseph L. Nicholson 8. Paul M. Mecray 9. Alfred Cramer Jr. 10. Albert B. Davis 11. Vincent Del Duca 12. Reed Hirst 13. J. Halbert Connelly 14. Gordon F. West 15. Thomas K. Lewis 16. George Meyers 17. Ernest G. Hummell 18. Alfred M. Elwell 19. Anthony Gorham, DDS 20. David Bentley Jr. 21. Irvin Deibert 22. Howard C. Curtis 23. Franklin Busby 24. S. Emlen Stokes 25. Ralph K. Hollinshed

26. David L. Farley 27. J. Lynn Mahaffey 28. Thomas M. Kain 29. Mervin Hummel 30. Walton Clark 31. Winborne Evans 32. Garnett Summerill 33. Lacy Newton Connelly 34. Walter Cameron 35. Hammill Shipps 36. George German 37. Albert Shafer 38. Cecil B.VanSciver 39. Oswald Carlander 40. Cedric E. Filkins 41. Robert H. Lyman 42. Lee Hummel 43. Robert S. Gamon 44. Carlton C. Fooks 45. Robert Imhoff 46. Lester Wilson 47. Edward N. Smith 48. James D. Smith 49. J. Harris Underwood

Appendix

409

BOARD OF MANAGERS/TRUSTEES Tenure 1875 Rudolphus Bingham Alexander Cooper Joseph B. Cooper Thomas F. Cullen, MD Albert W. Markley Augustus Reeve Charles B. Stratton Peter L.Voorhees John W.Wright 1876 William B. Cooper 1878 John V. Schenck 1885 Richard H. Reeve 1886 David M. Chambers 1890 Peter V.Voorhees Alexander C.Wood 1893 Richard M. Cooper 1894 H. Genet Taylor, MD 1896 William F. Reeve 1906 Joseph W. Cooper Edward L. Farr 1911 Ephraim Tomlinson 1914 Robert H. Comey 1917 F. Morse Archer Sr. Ralph L. Freeman Paul M. Mecray, MD

410

1904 1893 1889 1876 1876 1918 1885 1895 1890 1888 1885 1917 1904 1906 1919 1927 1916 1949 1909 1924 1948 1924 1950 1927 1957

1919 Edward S.Wood 1924 J. Carl De La Cour Warren Webster 1927 David Baird Jr. Albert Middleton 1938 F. Morse Archer Jr. 1939 William T. Read 1943 Benjamin S. Mechling 1948 Thomas M. Farr Robert Y. Garrett Jr. Sydney E. Longmaid 1949 Samuel E. Fulton Joseph S. Riebel 1952 J.William Markeim 1954 Lewis W. Barton Harry F. Jones 1955 Willis S. De La Cour 1956 Harry W. Pierce 1958 John S. Carter 1963 Joseph Holman 1969 Lewis L. Coriell, MD 1970 Henry D. Bean Sr. Rodney Leeds Jr.

Appendix

1943 1948 1938 1955 1939 1982 1954 1948 1969 1954 1949 1971 1973 1956 1969 1963 1977 1971 1970 1975 1984 1985 1974

BOARD OF MANAGERS/TRUSTEES Tenure (continued) 1971 Frank K. Kelemen Stephen G. Lax 1973 Doris C. Cox 1976 William H. Bell Rudolph C. Camishion, MD Maryann Cox, RN Riletta Cream Theodore Z. Davis Robert L. Evans, MD Edith Graulich Frank J. Hughes, MD Irving K. Kessler Stanley Leonberg Jr., MD Horace G. Moeller George E. Norcross Edward B. Patterson Jr. W. Eric Scott, MD William H.Taylor Robert G.Williams 1977 Doris Carr Sal DeVivo Roberto L. Figueroa William R. Martin Henry H. Sherk, MD 1978 Donald E. Baker Dolores T. Errichetti James C.Walker 1979 Yolanda Aguilar de Neely Thomas A. Cucinotta N. S. Hayden Emily Johnson Eugene H. Kain, MD William Tomar

1983 1976 1984 1978 1977 1983 1985 1981 1980 1977 1981 1985 1983 1979 1983 1978 1981 1981 1978 1979 1979 1979 1979 1979 1984 1981 1987 1983 1988 1981 1980 1980 1986

1980 Mary Morgan 1983 Louis Pierucci, MD 1982 1981 Marion Andrews, RN 1990 Stuart Blum, MD 1990 Kevin G. Halpern 2000 Lindsay L. Pratt, MD 1985 Richard C. Reynolds, MD 1987 Sidney J. Sussman, MD 1985 Arnold W.Webster, Ph.D. 1989 1982 John L. Bantivoglio 1984 Zoe Coulson 1991 G.William Fox 1991 George T. Hare, MD 1984 James R. Laessle 1991 Ernest L. Previte 1989 1983 James B. Carson 1992 Joseph P. DiRenzo 1992 James R. Foran 1992 Michael C. Proper, MD 1991 Paula Stebbins 1987 The Right Reverend Albert VanDuzer 1992 1984 David T. Carey 1990 Rabbi Fred J. Neulander 1993 Reverend Dennis Thomas 1987 1985 Herbert Baum 1993 Peter E. Driscoll 1999 Raymond Schiffman, MD 1989 Ardelia Stewart 1992 Harvey Strassman, MD 1989 Robert G.Williams 1994 1986 George T. Hare, MD 1990

Appendix

411

BOARD OF MANAGERS/TRUSTEES Tenure (continued) William H.Taylor 1987 1987 John B. Canuso 1990 Ronald V. Donato 1989 Mary Ann Driscoll 1991 William Tomar 1996 1989 Norman H. Edelman, MD 1995 Paul Gazzerro Jr. 1991 Gary W. Lamson 1991 Edward D.Viner, MD 1998 Thomas B.Whitesell 1998 1990 Stephen M. Levine, MD 1996 George E. Norcross III Current Member Barbara Schraeder, Ph.D., RN 1996 Lynn Bradeen 1992 Michael Cresci 2002 Harold Rushton, MD 1992 1991 Gerald G. Abelow, MD 1994 Elaine Fanjul 1995 Joseph Tarquini 1997 The Honorable Warren Douglas 1997 1992 Thomas A. Bracken 1998 Jeannine LaRue 1997 Henry H. Lee 1994 George D. Pugh 1995 Andrew Weber 2001 Robert G.Williams 1997 William F.Youse 1995 1993 Patrick Abiuso, MD 2002 1994 James B. Carson 1998 Joan S. Davis 2013 Rabbi Fred J. Neulander 1995

412

Harvey A. Snyder, MD Current Member George J.Weinroth 2009 Arthur Winkler 1997 1995 Carolyn C. Brann 1998 Reverend James E. Fitten 2005 Gary Lamson 1998 Harold L. Paz, MD 2006 Charles E. Sessa Jr. 2005 1996 Thomas C. Ober 1998 Mark J. Pello, MD 2000 1997 Samuel L. Allen III 2002 Raymond A. Meillier 2000 1998 James A. Archibald 2000 James H. Jacoby, MD 2001 1999 Judith Heuisler 2000 Leslie D. Hirsch 2002 William A. Schwartz Jr. Current Member John W. Shimrak 2013 Albert R.Tama, MD 2011 2000 Anthony J. DelRossi, MD 2006 Robert A. Saporito, DDS Current Member Scott R. Schaffer, MD 2002 2001 Karen Harbeson 2003 William G. Sharrar, MD 2011 2002 Ronald M. Jaffe, MD 2005 Thomas S. Newmark, MD 2007 Christopher T. Olivia, MD 2008 2003 Patricia Mervine 2005 2004 Linda M. Kassekert 2012

Appendix

BOARD OF MANAGERS/TRUSTEES Tenure (continued) 2006 Peter S. Amenta, MD Current Member Denise V. Rodgers, MD 2008 John P. Sheridan Jr. 2014 Ann D.Thomas 2007 Edward D.Viner, MD 2011 Arthur Winkler 2007 2007 Leon D. Dembo Current Member Lynda C. McCollum-Hall 2011 Raymond A. Meillier 2011 Duane D. Myers Current Member Robin L. Perry, MD 2011 Vincent P. Sarubbi 2011 M. Allan Vogelson, J.S.C.(Ret.) 2018 2008 Dennis M. DiFlorio Current Member 2010 Joel B. Rosen 2011 John M.Tedeschi, MD 2011 Donald J. Farish, Ph.D. 2011 Paul Katz, MD Current Member

2011 Annette Reboli, MD Ali A. Houshmand, Ph.D. Michael E. Chansky, MD Generosa Grana, MD Wendell E. Pritchett, Ph.D. Roland Schwarting, MD Kris Singh, Ph.D. 2012 Adrienne Kirby, Ph.D. 2013 Joseph C. Spagnoletti 2014 Sidney R. Brown 2015 Phoebe A. Haddon, JD, LLM Philip A. Norcross, Esq. Steven E. Ross, MD Susan Weiner

Current Member Current Member Current Member Current Member 2014 Current Member Current Member Current Member Current Member Current Member Current Member Current Member Current Member Current Member

PRESIDENTS/CHAIRMEN—Cooper Hospital 1875–2013 1875–1893 1893–1918 1918–1924 1924–1948 1948–1958 1958–1966 1966–1972 1972–1975

Alexander Cooper Augustus Reeve Edward L. Farr Ephraim Tomlinson Thomas M. Farr F. Morse Archer Jr. Joseph S. Riebel Henry D. Bean Sr.

President President President President President President President President

1975–1983 1983–1984 1984–1986 1986–1999 1999–2000 2000–2002 2002–2006 2006–

Appendix

Frank K. Kelemen Chairman Donald E. Baker Chairman James C. Walker Chairman Peter E. Driscoll, Esq. Chairman Raymond A. Meillier Chairman Samuel L. Allen III Chairman Charles E. Sessa Jr. Chairman George E. Norcross III Chairman

413

Chronological History of Cooper University Hospital —1875 The Camden Hospital is incorporated.

—1877 State legislators change name to the Cooper Hospital.

—1887 Hospital officially opened August 11, 1887. Charity cases only.

—1889 The Camden Training School for Nurses opened at Cooper Hospital.

—1903 Nurses Home opened.

—1911 Outpatient Building opened.

—1919 Women’s Auxiliary of the Cooper Hospital organized to support Social Services Department.

—1920 Hospital starts charging patients who could afford to pay.

—1921 The first Charity Ball is held.

—1923 Women’s Auxiliaries organized in Camden and suburbs.

—1927 Ann Canning Building opened.

—1929 New Nurses Building opened (named for Sarah Cooper in 1969).

—1941 Dorrance building, a six-story facility, opened. It featured additional private rooms, operating rooms, and offices.

—1942 World War II 61st Station Hospital departs for Africa.

—1951 X-Ray Administration Building opened.

—1960 Women’s Auxiliary formally recognized as the Women’s Board to the Cooper Hospital.

—1961 North and South wings of Dorrance building opened.

—1966 Broadway Stevens Building purchased, renamed Medical Arts Building.

—1969 First Methodist Episcopal Church building purchased.

—1973 Parkade opened.

—1975 Cooper Board of Managers expanded from nine to twenty-four members.

—1977 UMDNJ signs affiliation agreement with Cooper.

—1978 Cooper Foundation established.

—1979 Kelemen Pavilion, a ten-story building, opened.

—1982 Southern New Jersey Regional Trauma Center at Cooper opened. Cooper is the only Level I Trauma Center in southern New Jersey.

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Appendix

Chronological History of Cooper University Hospital (continued) —1983 Ronald McDonald House opened.

—1986 3 Cooper Plaza Building opened.

—1987 Centennial Celebration at Cooper.

—1988 Cooper celebrates a two-year effort that designated Cooper as the southern New Jersey children’s regional hospital. Bill signed on November 4, 1987.

—1989 Coronary Intermediate Care Unit opens in the hospital; the Eye Institute and the Cardiac Diagnostic Center opened at 3 Cooper Plaza; the Coriell Institute for Medical Research relocates to the Cooper Campus.

The Neonatal Intensive Care Unit offers high-frequency jet ventilation to help premature infants and babies with respiratory disease, making Cooper the first hospital in southern New Jersey to offer this procedure.

—1990 Cooper becomes a smoke-free environment.

The New Jersey Regional Birth Defects Program starts at Cooper for children and adults with birth defects and gene disorders; Cooper also begins a Colorectal Care Center, a Sleep Disorders Laboratory, and a Bone Marrow Transplant program.

—1991 Cooper staff is involved in the Persian Gulf War; bright yellow ribbons appear throughout the hospital to show support.

Neurosurgical operating suite is renovated.

Cooper begins preparations for Y2K, focusing on technology and infrastructure to avoid any disruptions to services.

The Cooper Campus changes as the Medical Arts Building is demolished and neighboring townhouses are purchased and renovated.

—1992 The New Jersey State Aquarium opens on the Camden waterfront. Kevin G. Halpern, Cooper President and CEO, is Chairman of the Cooper’s Ferry Development Corporation, which developed the aquarium.

Newly renovated Pediatric Intensive Care Unit opens.

Hillary Rodham Clinton, wife of then-presidential candidate Bill Clinton, tours Cooper.

Cooper establishes a Division of Community Services to work in the community and run the Camden Partnership for Substance Abuse Prevention, the Allied Health Career Training Program, and the Residential and Outpatient Drug Treatment Program (Cooper House). Community problems surface, and area clergy and Camden officials meet with Cooper to solve issues, with Rev. Larron Jackson playing a crucial role.

—1993 Cooper Hospital/Center City opened at the former Franklin Square Hospital in Philadelphia. Franklin’s inherited financial problems, however, eventually force Cooper to end this management association.

The southern New Jersey Cancer Center is dedicated. The Cancer Center at Cooper

Appendix

415

Chronological History of Cooper University Hospital (continued) later agrees to test the ability of a drug called tamoxifan to prevent breast cancer in healthy women with high risk of developing the disease, and to test the use of finasteride to prevent prostate cancer.

Cooper Trauma Unit staff begin “Youth Violence Awareness” program in Camden; floorby-floor refurbishment begins in Kelemen Building.

—1994 Cooper’s remodeled cafeteria opens, ready to serve more than 600,000 meals a year.

Cooper CARES begins as an employee-sponsored grants program.

Embezzlement at Cooper by two top finance officials stuns Cooper community.

—1995 Cooper shifts from hospital-based system to patient-centered delivery system and is renamed the Cooper Health System.

Department of Pediatrics opens the Children’s Regional Center at Main Street in Voorhees. The Departments of Cardiology, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Urology, and Medicine open offices on North Kings Highway.

—1996 The Children’s Regional Hospital at Cooper opened, a “hospital within a hospital,” on the sixth floor of the Kelemen Building. Designated by the state as the regional pediatric specialty hospital for the eight southern New Jersey counties, the hospital includes a Level I Pediatric Intensive Care Unit.

Division of Trauma receives continued verification as Level I Trauma Center, which includes special recognition in the area of Pediatric Trauma; a residency program begins in Emergency Medicine.

—1997 Cooper enters a period of severe financial instability.

Cardiology Department nearly wiped out as thirteen cardiologists abruptly leave the organization.

—1998 The Cooper Health System at Voorhees opens. This 70,000-square-foot complex features the Surgery Center, Medical Specialties, and Cooper Imaging Center.

Internal report detailing the hospital’s losses from fraud in 1994 is publicly released.

—1999 Cooper enters its phase of financial turnaround.

Cooper nurses vote to unionize.

—2002 Cooper officially changes name to Cooper University Hospital, and its physician group becomes Cooper University Physicians.

416

Cooper Trauma celebrates twentieth anniversary as the only Level 1 Trauma Center in South Jersey.

Cooper Heart Institute established under the direction of Joseph E. Parrillo, MD; Cooper Critical Care Unit established under the direction of R. Phillip Dellinger, MD; Cooper Stroke Unit opened under the direction of neurologist Thomas Mirsen, MD.

Appendix

Chronological History of Cooper University Hospital (continued) —2003 Cooper Bone and Joint Institute opened under the direction of Philadelphia-based orthopaedist Lawrence S. Miller, MD, as Director, Cooper Bone and Joint Institute, and Director, Sports Medicine Program.

The Cancer Institute of New Jersey at Cooper is established as an affiliate of the Cancer Institute of New Jersey.

—2004 Cooper dedicated new helipad for Level I Trauma and Critical Care atop the Kelemen Building.

Cooper purchased the DaVinci Robotic Surgery technology, making Cooper the first in the region to perform robotic prostatectomies.

Cooper began a four-year project to bring the latest technological advances to the Health Sciences Campus.

—2005 George E. Norcross III named Chairman of the Board.

—2006 Cooper becomes a Planetree affiliate, enhancing care delivery by focusing on patient- and family-centered care.

—2007 New Camden County Improvement Authority parking garage opened on Benson and Broadway.

Cooper for Women opens in Voorhees. Program later renamed the Ripa Center for Women’s Health and Wellness.

Cooper establishes radiosurgery programs with the CyberKnife and GammaKnife.

Digestive Health Institute opens in Mount Laurel, New Jersey.

—2008 John P. Sheridan Jr. named President and CEO of the Cooper Health System.

$220 million, ten-story Roberts Pavilion opened—largest expansion to Cooper’s Health Sciences Campus in more than thirty years.

—2009 Implementation of the new Electronic Health Record (EPIC).

Three revitalized community parks open within the Health Sciences Campus.

Cooper and Rowan University announce a partnership to form Cooper Medical School of Rowan University, the first four-year allopathic medical school in South Jersey.

—2010 Cooper dedicates the new pavilion in honor of Joseph Roberts in recognition of his longtime support of the organization. The new building is officially named the Roberts Pavilion.

Expanded Emergency Department opens, tripling capacity size.

Cooper expanded in Willingboro–Sunset Road offices.

Cooper and Rowan break ground for the new Cooper Medical School of Rowan University medical education building on Broadway.

Appendix

417

Chronological History of Cooper University Hospital (continued) —2011 Preliminary accreditation received for Cooper Medical School of Rowan University; recruitment of charter class begins.

Cooper launches Transport Program, purchasing first Cooper helicopter in partnership with Atlantic Care.

Cooper breaks ground for Cooper Cancer Institute, a free-standing building on the corner of Haddon and MLK, opposite the hospital. The new Cooper Cancer Institute will offer all medical and supportive care for cancer patients all under one roof.

—2012 Cooper Medical School of Rowan University opens medical education building.

CMSRU fifty-member charter class begins.

Cooper opens its first Urgent Care Center in Cherry Hill, with extended office hours and service 365 days a year.

Cooper rebrands the Health System to Cooper University Health Care to reflect its expanding urban footprint.

Cooper celebrates 125th anniversary.

The Cooper Foundation, together with KIPP Academy and the Norcross Foundation, is granted approval to build Camden’s first renaissance school—the Kipp Cooper Norcross Academy—on property adjacent to Cooper Medical School of Rowan University.

Cooper and AmeriHealth New Jersey introduce new cobranded health insurance products designed for individuals and small businesses.

—2013 Adrienne Kirby, FACHE, Ph.D., named President and CEO of Cooper University Health Care.

Cooper launches the Employee Centered Medical Home and the Urban Health Institute, two programs designed to improve access to care and decrease hospital admissions.

Jeffrey Brenner, MD, was named a MacArthur Fellow by the James D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation for his work in creating a comprehensive health care delivery model that addresses the medical and social service needs of high-risk patients in poor communities.

Cooper partners with MD Anderson Cancer Center, one of the nation’s leading cancer centers, to establish a fully integrated, comprehensive center to treat all types of cancers for patients in the Northeast.

MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper opens in Camden in October 2013.

­—2014 Groundbreaking ceremony for Kipp Cooper Norcross Academy at Lanning Square, school opens for pre-kindergarten and kindergarten students in temporary location.

418

Cooper opens two new patient floors in the Roberts Pavilion.

AmeriHealth New Jersey expands cobranded product offering to include Shore Medical Center and Cape Regional Medical Center.

Cooper opens its third Urgent Care Center in Sicklerville, Winslow Township.

Appendix

Chronological History of Cooper University Hospital (continued) —2015 Cooper launches collaborative to improve access to Behavioral Health Services.

The Janet Knowles Breast Cancer Centers opens at MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper.

Cooper is verified as a Level II Pediatric Trauma Center, making Cooper the only hospital in the Delaware Valley that provides trauma care for adults and children.

Cooper announces a multiphased Operating Room Expansion in the Kelemen Building.

Kipp Cooper Norcross Academy opens for over seven hundred students in new building.

Lawmakers back $50 million for Camden Health Sciences project.

—2016 Cooper is the first hospital in New Jersey to earn premier certification for geriatric fracture care.

MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper–Cyberknife team treats one thousandth patient.

Cooper announces $2 million grant to support cancer genetics program.

MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper opens Egg Harbor Township Office.

CMSRU receives full accreditation and graduates its first class of medical students.

­—2017 In May, Cooper unveiled the Sheridan Pavilion at 3 Cooper Plaza in honor of John and Joyce Sheridan.

In June, Cooper joined the elite ranks of U.S. hospitals to earn the Joint Commission’s Gold Seal of Approval and the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s Heart-Check mark for Advanced Certification for Comprehensive Stroke Centers.

Cooper made a strong commitment to serve those who have served our country, including members of the military and first responders. The effort includes, in part, giving priority access to those who serve.

Cooper and Deborah Heart and Lung Center, launched HeroCare Connect, a personalized concierge program that links military families, active-duty, veterans, and their dependents with health care services close to home. HeroCare Connect’s concierge service connects patients with a specialist within 24 to 48 hours and manages each case with personalized attention.

Healthgrades, the leading online resource for information about physicians and hospitals, recognized Cooper as a 5-Star organization for GYN Surgery (Hysterectomy), and Heart Failure Mortality. Healthgrades also bestowed Cooper with the National Quality Award for Excellence in Cranial Neurosurgery.

US News & World Report recognized Cooper as a High Performer in Colon Cancer Surgery.

The Urgent Care Association of America granted Cooper’s Urgent Care Centers an Urgent Care Designation, signifying that Cooper met both certification criteria for scope of services and accreditation standards of quality and safety..

Appendix

419

Numbers in italics indicate photographs.

A AAHC (Association of Academic Health Centers), 350 academic medical center, birth of a, 310–341 acceptance of the hospital, 67–69 accident ward, 78, 81, 85, 121, 144, 159 Action News, 305 Administrative Council, 290 administrator, new hospital, 191–198 Adult Health Institute, 406 advancements at Cooper, 384 advances, medical, 64–67, 187–190, 245–246, 245, 269, 322–323. see also technology at Cooper advertising, medical, 239 aerial view of Cooper, 120–121, 150– 151, 200, 210, 256–257, 276–277 Affordable Care Act, 361–362 AFL-CIO, 207 Africa, the 61st Station Hospital in, 134–136, 144 Air Force School of Medicine, 161 Air Medical Services, 407 Air Two, 339 Aji, Janah, 299, 351 Alewitz, Sam, 19 Alexander, F. O., 153 Alfred P. Sloan School of Management, 215 Algeria, the 61st Station Hospital in, 130–134 Alicia Rose Victorious Foundation, 400 Allegheny Health Education, 270–271 Allen, Laura, 82 Allen III, Samuel L., 286, 290–291, 291 Allied Armed Forces, 129, 131 ambulance, car, 90, 100 ambulance, horse, 21, 88 Ambulatory Diagnostic and Treatment Center, 265 American College of Physicians, 155 American College of Surgeons, 399 American Dredging, 78 American Heart Association, 188, 399 American Hospital Association, 155, 162 American Medical Association, 21, 155, 174 American Medicorp, 185, 206, 222 American Orthopaedic Association, 399 American Red Cross, 65, 113, 134, 136, 139, 141 American Society of Clinical Oncol‑ ogy, 352 American Stroke Association, 399 AmeriHealth New Jersey, 360–361, 384, 398 analysis, service, 168

420

Andrews, Marion, 163–164, 177, 216, 223, 225, 237 Andrews, Rob, 342 Anesthesiology Department, 246, 267 Ann Canning Building decade of development, 159 expansion and end of free care, 87–89, 91 and the home front, 123, 125–126 photos, 88, 89, 102–103, 125 answers to change, looking for, 259 Archer Jr., Franklin Morse and a collision of changes, 146 decade of development, 159 and the home front, 124–125 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 340 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 173 photo, 152 years of turmoil, 189, 192, 197 Archer Sr., Franklin Morse, 67, 75, 87, 124–125, 151–152 Armed Forces, U.S., 403 Armstrong Cork, 182 army, hospital physicians and nurses in the, 118–119 Association of Academic Health Cen‑ ters (AAHC), 350 autoclave, hospital, 175 auxiliaries. see Women’s Auxiliary programs Ayer, Le Roi A., 116, 123, 132, 138, 146 B Bailey Jr., George, 77 Baraldi, Raymond L., 308–309 Bariatric and Metabolic Surgery Cen‑ ter, 406 Barnshaw, Harold D., 114, 143, 254 Barton, Diane, 263–264, 264 Barton, Lewis, 182 Basile, Michele, 217 Bass Levin, Susan, 324, 328, 331–332, 372, 373, 388–390 Baumann, Brigitte, 375 Bea,Vivian, 385 Bean, Henry D., 199–201 Bekes, Carolyn, 262, 286–287, 292– 293, 296, 297, 309, 353 Bellmawr Business Center, 284 Bellmawr Post Office, 284 Bell’s Farm, 146 benefiting pediatric patients, philan‑ thropic gifts, 400 benefits from new medical school, Camden’s, 348–349 Benites, Jefferson, 356 Benjamin, R. Dowling, 47, 52, 55–56, 59, 64, 102, 115 Benjamin Franklin Bridge, 74 Bentley Jr., David, 102 Bergen Jr., Stanley S., 210, 224, 225 Berlin, Irving, 99

Index

Berry, Devyn, 396 Bezich, Louis S., 367 Biddle, Miller, 169 Bill 1540, 209 Bingham, Rudolphus, 29–30, 30, 60 Blue Cross, 146, 156, 173–175, 209, 243 Board of Health, 40 Board of Managers, hospital and auxiliaries, 95–96, 100 and a collision of changes, 145–147 Cooper comes of age, 233–234, 236–239 Cooper family builds a hospital, 29–34, 36–37, 40–43 decade of development, 151–154, 156, 158–159, 161–162 and the Depression years, 113, 115–116 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 25, 27 establishment of the hospital, 46, 48–50, 52, 54–69 expansion and end of free care, 73, 75–79, 83–85, 87, 89–92 and the home front, 121, 123–126 hospital split, expansion, and renovation, 205–207, 211–216, 220–227 and new management, 103–105, 107–109 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 171–173, 177, 179–180, 182 photos, 30, 169 and the 61st Station Hospital, 138 years of turmoil, 186–187, 189–194, 198–199, 201 Board of Trustees, hospital celebrating 125 years, 353, 357, 360, 368, 371 Cooper comes of age, 238–240, 244, 248–249, 251, 253 Cooper’s future without limits, 377 eleven years of challenges and change, 258, 260–263, 269–275 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 316, 318, 321, 340 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 279–281, 286–287, 289–294, 302, 304–307, 309 photo, 237 Board of Trustees, Rowan University, 352 Board Room and auxiliaries, 96 celebrating 125 years, 355 Cooper’s future without limits, 377 expansion and end of free care, 83 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 336 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 300 photo, 278–279

years of turmoil, 198 Bockarie, Jacqueline, 396 Bodofsky, Elliot, 268 Bourke, Rachael, 57 Bowen III, Frank, 320, 320, 372 Brennan, Nancy Gamon, 185 Brenner, Jeffrey, 324, 364–365, 365, 367, 369 Brill, Kristin L., 385 Bristol-Myers Squibb Foundation, 365 Broadway Stevens Building, 193 brochure, hospital, 66 Brockie, Arthur H., 117 Brown, A. P., 41 Browning, Robert, 321 Buerki, Robin Carl, 145 building, original hospital, 10–11, 28–29, 39, 41, 44–45, 110–111 building, second hospital, 41 building a hospital, Cooper family, 28–43 Building Committee, 124–125 building for the future, 293–296 building the hospital, 33–36 buildings, Cooper as more than, 331–339 Buildings and Grounds Committee, 191 Burdette Tomlin Hospital, 267 Burke, Thomas, 359 Busby, Franklin, 102 businesses, Cooper and its, 244, 249 Byrne, Brendan, 210, 353 C Caduceus on hospital cornice, 166– 167 CADV Group, 298 Cahill, William T., 199, 199, 207 CAMcare Health Corporation, 244, 368 Camden, aerial view of, 210 Camden, Brenner as a hero to, 364– 365 Camden, Cooper staying in, 180–183, 191–192, 194, 198–201 Camden Ball Club, 16 Camden Cancer Center, 394 Camden City Council, 23–24, 32, 40, 325 Camden City Dispensary. see dispen‑ sary, Camden City Camden City Hall, 100 Camden City High School, 333 Camden City Medical Society, 23, 56 Camden City Planning Board, 316 Camden Coalition of Health Care Providers, 324, 364–365, 407 Camden Community Mental Health Center, 233 Camden Construction Career Initia‑ tive, 395 Camden County Board of

Freeholders, 190, 211 Camden County Cancer Screening Project, 324 Camden County Chamber of Com‑ merce, 157 Camden County College, 281, 314 Camden County Health Services Center, 281 Camden County Improvement Au‑ thority, 283, 315 Camden County Medical Society, 19, 21, 23, 26–27, 59 Camden County, New Jersey, 1616-1976: A Narrative History, 197 Camden County Police Department Intelligence Center, 386 Camden Courier Post, 182 Camden Day Nursery, 97 Camden Health and Athletic Associa‑ tion (CHAA), 398 Camden Higher Education and Healthcare Task Force, 327, 379 Camden Homeopathic Hospital and Dispensary Association, 40, 42 Camden Hospital Improvement and Enlargement Fund (CHIEF) campaign, 158–159, 162, 170, 177 Camden Municipal Hospital for Con‑ tagious Disease, 190 Camden Public Library, 12–13, 368 Camden Redevelopment Agency, 325, 368 Camden Rotary Club, 162 Camden School District, 387 Camden Trust Company, 147 Cameron, Walter, 103 Camishion, Rudolph Cooper comes of age, 255 eleven years of challenges and change, 267 hospital split, expansion, and renovation, 213–215, 220, 222, 225–226, 229 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 340 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 179–180 photos, 178, 224, 353 years of turmoil, 188 Campbell Soup Company Cooper comes of age, 239 and the Depression years, 116 eleven years of challenges and change, 274 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 223, 225 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 331 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 286 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 182 campus, 1941 hospital, 120–121 campus, clinical, 216–223 campus changes, Cooper, 209–213

Index

Cancer Institute of New Jersey, 301 Canning, Ann, 87 Canuso Foundation, 243 Cape Regional Medical Center, 384 Caputi, John H., 179 car ambulance, 90, 100 Cardelia, James, 228 Cardiac Care Unit, 178–179, 313 cardiac catheterization celebrating 125 years, 351, 371 Cooper comes of age, 239–240, 244–245, 250–251 eleven years of challenges and change, 268 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 227–229 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 322 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 287, 299 photo, 250 years of turmoil, 199 Cardiac Center, 260 Cardiac Partners, 401 cardio showdown, 177–180 Cardio Vascular Stress Testing Labora‑ tory, 212 Cardiology Associates of Delaware Valley, 272–273 Cardiology Department, 188, 241, 250, 272 care, patient-centered and innovative, 366–370 care, recruitment for serious, 297–303 The Care of Strangers:The Rise of America’s Hospital System (Rosenberg), 35 Carlander, Oswald, 102 Carpenter, Jeffrey P., 320–321, 351 Carr, Bridget, 54 Catalano, Edison, 267 Catholic Health East, 273, 286 celebrating 125 years, 343–373 centennial celebration, 230–231, 251–255, 253 Center for Bioethics, 349 Center for Critical Care Services, 407 Center for Family Services, 332 Center for Population Health, 407 Center for Urgent and Emergent Services, 407 Centers for Disease Control and Pre‑ vention, 284, 375 Centers of Excellence, 279, 295, 299, 301, 303, 371, 407 CHAA (Camden Health and Athletic Association), 398 challenges and change, eleven years of, 256–275 challenges and competition, facing, 370–372 Chambers, David M., 60 Chandler, Joseph, 333–334 change, eleven years of challenges and,

421

256–275 change, unexpected, 126–127 change in philosophy, 70–117 changes, collision of, 142–147 changes, Cooper campus, 209–213 changes, innovative initiatives and, 361–366 changes, rate-setting, 173–177 Chansky, Michael, 248, 298, 299, 349 Chapman, Kathrina, 396 charging patients, 76–83 charity ball, women’s auxiliary about the, 98–99 and a collision of changes, 146 and the Depression years, 115 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 215 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 172 photos, 98, 101 and the 61st Station Hospital, 132 CHIEF (Camden Hospital Improve‑ ment and Enlargement Fund) cam‑ paign, 158–159, 162, 170, 177 Children’s Committee, 99 Children’s Pavilion, 261 Children’s Regional Hospital Cooper’s future without limits, 400, 406 eleven years of challenges and change, 259, 261, 265, 268 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 295 photo, 263 children’s ward, 83, 84, 85, 87, 105 Childs, S. Canning, 87, 125–126 Christie, Chris, 342, 370, 383, 403, 404 Christman, Michael F., 374 Chung, M. Kyu, 267 Cilo Group of Philadelphia, 39 City Hall, 42 Civil War, 23, 31, 40 Civil War Soldier Memorial, 38 Clark, Walton, 102 Clinic for Diseases of Women, 61 clinical campus, 216–223 Clinical Decision Unit, 314 Clinical Laboratory Center, 259 Clinical Simulation Center, 344 Clinical Trials Participation Award, 352, 374 Clinton, Bill, 259 Clinton, Hillary, 396, 396 Clio Group, 159 CMSRU (Cooper Medical School of Rowan University). see Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMRSU) CNN, 307 Collazo, Samantha, 397, 397 Collazo, Susana, 397, 397 College of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (CMDNJ), 191, 207, 210, 217, 224, 233, 240

422

Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, 312 Comey, Robert H., 75 coming of age, Cooper’s, 230–255 Commission on Health Science, Edu‑ cation and Training, 294–295 commitments, a time of, 148–201 community, Cooper embraces the, 321–327 community, Cooper serving the, 393–399 community, partnership with Cooper and the, 368 Community Health Affairs Depart‑ ment, 267 community hospital, leader seeing beyond a, 355 community on the move, 386–390 Community Outreach, 284 Community Outreach Award, 401 Community Services Division, 269 Community Urban Resource Efforts (CURE) project, 269 competition and challenges, facing, 370–372 complaints about Dr. Garrett Jr., 170–174, 177–183 concepts, new medical, 160–163 conditions, 1840 Camden, 18–24 conditions, hospital, 22 conflicts over growth, 170–172 Congress, 259 Connelly, J. Halbert, 102 Connelly, Lacy Newton, 103 Conners, Stephanie, 380, 384 Conquer Cancer Foundation, 352 conservative leadership, 151–158 Consumer Choice Award, 311–312, 399 continued growth at Cooper, 390–393 The Cooper, 329, 329 Cooper, Abigail, 15, 22 Cooper, Alexander Cooper family builds a hospital, 29–30, 32–33, 38, 43 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 15, 22, 24, 27 establishment of the hospital, 47, 58–60 expansion and end of free care, 75 photos, 22, 30 Cooper, Caroline, 15, 22 Cooper, Dr. Richard M. Cooper comes of age, 255 Cooper family builds a hospital, 29, 31–33, 38, 43 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 13–19, 21–27 establishment of the hospital, 54, 59 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 219 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 182 photos, 16, 22, 24, 218 Cooper, Elizabeth Cooper family builds a hospital, 32–33, 38, 40, 43

Index

Dr. Cooper’s dream, 14–15, 22, 24–25, 27 establishment of the hospital, 54, 58–59 photos, 22, 25, 54 Cooper, John, 31 Cooper, Joseph B., 29–32, 30 Cooper, Margaret, 15 Cooper, Mary (mother of Dr. Cooper), 15, 26 Cooper, Mary (sister of Dr. Cooper), 15, 22 Cooper, Richard (father of Dr. Coo‑ per), 15–17, 22, 54 Cooper, Richard (nephew of Dr. Coo‑ per), 22, 43, 60, 75 Cooper, Sarah Cooper family builds a hospital, 32–33, 37–38, 40, 43 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 14–15, 22, 24–25, 27 establishment of the hospital, 54, 59 photo, 22 Cooper, William (ancestor of Dr. Coo‑ per), 15 Cooper, William (brother of Dr. Coo‑ per) Cooper comes of age, 243 Cooper family builds a hospital, 29–34, 38, 43 Cooper’s future without limits, 377 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 14–17, 22, 24–25, 27 establishment of the hospital, 54, 59 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 212, 219 photos, 22, 219 Cooper Advanced Care Center, 367, 369, 407 Cooper Advantage Network, 362 Cooper Ambulance EMS, 392 Cooper Aortic Center, 406 Cooper Bone and Joint Institute, 295, 300–301, 399, 406 Cooper Cancer Institute, 295, 301– 302, 305, 308, 342–343 Cooper Capers, 94–95 Cooper Cardiac Monitoring Unit, 178 Cooper Collaborative Care, 367 Cooper Commons Park, 325, 330, 334, 381 Cooper Court, 254 Cooper Critical Care Medicine, 295, 297–298, 301 Cooper Cyberknife Center, 300 Cooper Digestive Health Institute, 322, 406 Cooper Experience, 385–386 Cooper Foundation celebrating 125 years, 373 Cooper comes of age, 233, 244, 254 Cooper’s future without limits, 388–389, 394–395, 398, 400

eleven years of challenges and change, 260, 269, 272 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 324, 331 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 281 Cooper Health Care Careers Initia‑ tive, 401 Cooper Health Delivery System, 263, 265 Cooper Health Sciences Campus celebrating 125 years, 343, 348, 355, 358, 362, 371 Cooper’s future without limits, 377, 405 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 311–312, 314, 316, 321, 327–328, 341 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 278, 293–295, 297, 299, 305 photos, 315, 344, 389 Cooper Health System, 263–271, 284, 307, 362 Cooper HealthCare Inc., 244 Cooper HealthCare Services, 244 Cooper Heart Institute, 295, 297, 301, 322–323, 380, 406 Cooper Hospital Medical Library, 115 Cooper Hospital/University Medical Center, 240, 244, 260, 265 Cooper I, 407 Cooper Lanning Civic Association, 325, 328, 332 Cooper Lanning Promise Neighbor‑ hood Initiative, 332 Cooper Medical School of Rowan University (CMRSU) celebrating 125 years, 343–357, 361, 370, 374 Cooper’s future without limits, 378–380, 386–387, 389, 394, 396–399, 403, 405 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 315, 334 photos, 333, 337, 348 Cooper Neurological Institute, 301, 406 Cooper Physician Association, 263, 288, 291 Cooper Physician Spouses Association, 268 Cooper Plaza Neighborhood Associa‑ tion, 242 Cooper Red Hot Gala, 373 Cooper Research Institute, 348, 374–375 Cooper School of Nursing. see Train‑ ing School for Nurses at the Cooper Hospital Cooper Sprouts Community Garden, 331 Cooper Transfer System (COTS), 297

Cooper University Health Care, 357, 362, 382, 388, 403, 405 Cooper University Hospital, name change to celebrating 125 years, 343, 364, 369 Cooper’s future without limits, 381, 393–394, 405 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 311, 317, 319, 321–323, 326–327, 333 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 293, 301–303 photos, 302 Cooper University Physicians (CUP), 293, 353 Cooper Urgent Care, 363, 367, 407 Cooper without the 61st Station, 132, 138 Coriell, Lewis L. Cooper comes of age, 234, 243, 249, 254 decade of development, 151, 158, 161 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 208, 227 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 330 photos, 161, 234 years of turmoil, 189–191, 201 Coriell Biobank, 374 Coriell Institute for Medical Research, 161, 330, 348, 374 Coronary Care Unit, 258, 287 Corzine, Jon, 315–316, 334–338, 334, 335, 352, 404 Costabile, Joseph P., 263 COTS (Cooper Transfer System), 297 Cotto, Maritza, 313 Covenant Bank, 291 Cowen, Claire, 265–266 Cramer Jr., Alfred, 103 Creamer, Andrea, 357 Cruth, Mary, 36 Cullen, Thomas B., 29–30, 30 CUP (Cooper University Physicians), 293, 353 CURE (Community Urban Resource Efforts) project, 269 Curtis, Howard C., 102 CyberKnife System, 300, 323 D Daily Rate Schedules, 248 daVinci Surgical System, 323 Davis, Albert B., 103 Davis, Joan celebrating 125 years, 353, 368, 370–371 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 321 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 293 photos, 324, 368, 372

Index

Davis, Sheila, 325 Davis, William A., 47 De La Cour, Carl, 121 Dean, Ralph, 284 deaths of hospital founder and sup‑ porter, 54 Deborah Heart and Lung Center, 401 decade of development, 150–165 deed, 1875 Cooper, 32 Deibert, Irvin, 81, 102, 104, 138, 147, 167 Deiter, Sean, 396 Del Duca,Vincent, 79, 79, 103, 163, 254 Delaware River Port Authority, 368 delay of hospital opening, 37–43 Dellinger, R. Philip, 296, 297–298, 300 DelRossi, Anthony, 268 Democratic Party, 396 Department of Defense, U.S., 402 Department of Development and Planning, 325 Department of Education, U.S., 395 Department of Health, New Jersey, 226, 247, 249, 260, 383 Department of Housing and Urban Development, U.S., 181 Department of Justice, U.S., 383 Department of Medicine, 163, 167, 178, 233, 374 Department of State, U.S., 402 Department of Surgery, 320, 335, 357 departure, 61st Station’s, 129–130 DePinho, Ronald, 370 Depression, Great, 86, 92, 107, 110– 117, 189 Desert Fox, 131 design, hospital, 39 deterioration of Camden, 180–183, 197–198 development, a decade of, 150–165 Diagnostic Radiology and Nuclear Medicine Department, 267 Dickensheets, James, 178 Dietary Department, 199 DiFlorio Family Healing Garden, 319, 359 DiFrancesco, Donald, 289–290, 404 dining room, Cooper family, 14 dining room, physicians’, 85 diplomatic services, expansion of, 401–403 Direct Meds Inc., 380 directions, a vision in two, 207–209 directions, new, 290–293 Disaster Preparedness and Medical Coordination Center, 284 dispensary, Camden City, 20, 23–24, 27, 30 Distinguished Health Care Profes‑ sional Award, 254 Distinguished Service Award, 296 District Medical Society of the County

423

of Camden. see Camden County Medical Society Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, 320 Division of Cardiovascular Disease, 375 Division of Colorectal Surgery, 346 Division of Critical Care Medicine, 374 Division of Emergency Medical Ser‑ vices and Disaster Medicine, 284 Division of Hematology/Oncology, 374 Division of Infectious Diseases, 284 Division of Nephrology, 288, 323 Dix, Jeanette, 223 Donaldson, Mickey, 267 Dorrance, Ethel M., 159 Dorrance, John T., 116 Dorrance Memorial Building. see John Thompson Dorrance Memorial Dr. Charles E. Brimm Medical Arts High School, 397 Dr. Diane Barton Complementary Medicine Program, 374 dream, Dr. Cooper’s, 12–27 Drexel University College of Medicine, 301, 371 DRG system, 247–249 Driscoll, Alfred, 152 Driscoll, Peter E. Cooper comes of age, 253 eleven years of challenges and change, 260–261, 270, 274–275 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 206, 209 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 340 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 280 photo, 252 years of turmoil, 189 Dubocq, Carole A., 283, 285 E Economic Impact Report, 379 educate, Cooper’s mission to, 399–401 Education Committee, 191 EHR (electronic health record) sys‑ tem, 307, 307 Eisenhower, Dwight D., 129 Electro-Cardiography Department, 100 Elwell, Alfred M., 102 embracing the community, Cooper, 321–327 Emergency Department celebrating 125 years, 364, 371 Cooper comes of age, 248 Cooper’s future without limits, 407 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 314, 328,

424

336 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 284, 299, 307 photos, 190, 293, 307, 345 Emergency Medicine, 299, 349 emergency operating room, 88 Emergency Preparedness Committee, 284 emergency room, 72–73 emergency ward, 66 Employee Centered Medical Home, 366–367 EPIC, 307, 323 Errichetti, Angelo, 202, 223 Erskine, Richard, 85–87 establishment of the hospital, 44–69 Esterbrook Pen Company, 182 Evans, Robert L. Cooper comes of age, 231, 235– 236, 239, 254 hospital split, expansion, and renovation, 214–216, 219–222, 225–229 photo, 224 Evans, Winborne, 103 Evergreen Cemetery, 26–27, 37, 54 Excellence in Patient Care Award for Physician Engagement, 401 Executive Committee, 76, 220, 260 executive leadership, new, 382–384 expansion, hospital, 83–93, 86, 108, 157, 210 expansion of services, 401–403 F facing problems, 270–273 fair, county, 146, 211, 212 Faison, Gwendolyn, 268, 353 family, hospital staff as Cooper comes of age, 231, 236 decade of development, 163–165 and the home front, 123–126 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 208 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 177, 183 years of turmoil, 195 family, the Cooper, 15–18, 22 family affair, a, 10–69 family builds a hospital, Cooper, 28–43 Family Medicine Department, 267 Farish, Donald, 352 Farley, David L., 102, 113 Farr, Edward L. and a collision of changes, 147 establishment of the hospital, 65–66, 68 expansion and end of free care, 75–78, 80–82, 85, 87 and new management, 107–108 photo, 64 federal programs, new, 173–174

Index

Feldman-Winter, Lori, 375 Fels Institute of Government, 325 Ferry Development Corporation, 368, 398 Ferry Partnership, 381 Ficco, Joseph, 153 Fifis, Chris, 372 Fifis, John, 372 Fifis, Nick, 372 Fifis,Violetta, 372 Filkins, Cedric E., 102 Finance Committee, 76–77, 225–226 financial condition, healing Cooper’s, 280–287 financial picture, Cooper’s, 247 financial report, 168 financial security, Cooper’s, 287–291 Finch, Stuart, 233, 233, 248, 267 First Methodist Episcopal Church, 192, 193 First Union Bank, 283 first year of operations, hospital’s, 52–59 Fisk, Trevor A., 239 Fisler, Lorenzo F., 19, 23 Fixing Broken Cities (Kromer), 325–326, 372 Florio, James, 203, 223, 404 Flower Mart, 97, 98–99, 115, 146, 172, 254 focusing on the future, 262–266, 287–291 Food and Drug Administration, 241 food service building, hospital, 157, 158 Fooks, Carlton C., 102 Forsythe, Edwin B., 223 Fort Dix, 124 fraud, a case of, 261–262, 273–275, 285, 287, 293 free care, end of, 72–93 Freeland, Andrew R., 77 Freeman, Ralph L., 78 French Foreign Legion, 130 Friends Hospital, 60, 85 friendship, Camishion’s, 213–216 Frontline, 364, 369 Fuentes, Angel, 388 Furness, Frank, 31 future, a soaring, 339–341 future, building for the, 293–296 future, focusing on the, 262–266, 287–291 future, looking at the, 403–405 future without limits, Cooper’s, 376–407 G GammaKnife System, 300, 323 Gamon, Mary, 185, 213, 237, 252, 340 Gamon Jr., Robert S., 185

Gamon Sr., Robert S., 102, 104, 132, 138, 185 Gannett Newspaper Foundation, 179, 188–189 Garden State Community Hospital, 200, 205–207, 222–223, 233 Garden State Park, 212 Garden State Racetrack, 211 Garrett Jr., Robert Y. and a collision of changes, 146–147 decade of development, 156–160, 162–163, 165 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 170–174, 176, 178–180, 182 years of turmoil, 192–197 Gawande, Atul, 364, 369 General Surgery Department, 167 George Zinniger Center for Radiation Oncology, 233 Geraldine Dodge Foundation, 364 German, Edith, 126, 132, 136, 139, 141 German, George and a collision of changes, 143, 147 decade of development, 156 and the home front, 126 photo, 102 and the 61st Station Hospital, 131–132, 136–137, 139, 141 Get Healthy Camden Initiative, 398 Gibbon, John, 179 gifts benefiting pediatric patients, phil‑ anthropic, 400 Gilbert, Philip D., 154, 162, 169–170, 187, 254, 255, 267 Ginsberg, Frederic, 313 Girard, Steven, 26 Godfrey, E. L. B., 18, 47, 52, 56, 59 Gold Award for Organ Donation and Transplant Awareness, 401 Goldberg, Michael E., 267, 271 Goldman, H. Warren, 300, 301 Gorham, Anthony, 102 gown vs. town, 207–209, 226, 229, 254, 263 Gradel, Andrew, 305 Graf, Robert, 182 Grana, Generosa, 299, 343, 358–361 Grand March, 172 Greenwald, Louis D., 316 Gross, Evelyn, 82 Gross, Onan B., 47, 56, 58, 59 Gross, Phamie, 82 Gross, Ruby Cooper comes of age, 255 and the Depression years, 113 eleven years of challenges and change, 267 expansion and end of free care, 74, 82–84, 92 and the home front, 123–124, 126 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑

vation, 224 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 339 and new management, 104–106 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 177 photos, 131, 267 and the 61st Station Hospital, 130–131, 134 years of turmoil, 194–195 grounds, hospital, 37 growth, conflicts over, 170–172 growth at Cooper, continued, 390–393 growth statement, hospital, 115 H H. C. Sharp Elementary School, 397 Habitat for Humanity, 329–330, 389 Hageboutros, Alexandre, 352 Hahnemann University, 169, 312, 371 Haines, Robert A., 156 Halpern, Kevin G. celebrating 125 years, 357 Cooper comes of age, 231–237, 239, 242–245, 248–253, 255 eleven years of challenges and change, 258, 260–262, 266, 270– 271, 273–275 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 278, 280–281, 293, 300 photos, 235, 252, 255, 355 Halpern Board Room, 377 Hansen, Katherine, 385 Hare, George T., 163, 169, 177–179, 185, 208, 254 Harris, Samuel, 19 Harvard University, 125 heal, Cooper’s mission to, 399–401 Healing Garden, 359 Health Care Tower, 259–261 Health Education Center, 267 Health Facilities Planning Act, 196–197 Health Facilities Planning Council (HFPC), 175 Health Outreach Project (HOP) Clinic, 332, 349 Health Systems Agency, 240 Healthgrades, 399 heavy hearts, moving forward with, 382 Heintz, Kathleen, 313 helipad, hospital, 260, 288, 288, 290 hero to Camden, Brenner as a, 364– 365 HeroCare Connect, 401 Herzberg’s Band, 99 Hewitt, George W., 31 HFPC (Health Facilities Planning Council), 175 Highbloom, Richard Y., 320, 320 Higher Education and Regional Health

Index

Care Development Fund, 295 Highland Woolen Mills, 182 Hilferty, Daniel, 360 Hill Burton Act, 145, 155–156, 175 HIMSS Analytics, 401 HIP Health Care Plan of New Jersey, 273 Hirsch, Leslie D., 281–283, 286–287, 290–291, 290 Hirst, Levi B., 102 Hirst, Reed, 103 historic neighborhood, revitalizing Cooper’s, 327–331 The History of Camden County (Prow‑ ell), 40 Hollenberg, Steven, 299 Hollinshed, Ralph K., 21, 102 Delete ‘e’ in “Hollenshed”, replace with ‘i’ Holman Automotive Group, 400 Holtec International, 395 home, Cooper family, 12–13, 14, 15 Home for the Friendless Children, 37 home from the war, coming, 139–141 home front, the, 120–127 Home Port Alliance, 368 Hong, Rick, 284 HOP (Health Outreach Project) Clinic, 332, 349 hope as promise realized, 358–361 HopeWorks, 401 Hopkins, Johns, 26 Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield, 331, 401 horse ambulance, 21, 88 horse show, 146, 172, 211, 212, 268 Hospital of the University of Pennsyl‑ vania (HUP), 320–321, 371 Hospital Service Corporation of New Jersey, 146 Hotel Dennis, 60 Housekeeping Department, 123, 199 houses, Cooper as more than, 331– 339 Hughes, Frank, 132, 143, 156, 173 Hughes, James, 228–229 Hull, Caroline Cooper. see Cooper, Caroline Hull, Charles Wager, 22 Humana, 222–223 Hume, Eric, 300 Hummel, Ernest G., 83, 85–86, 105 Hummel, Lee, 102 Hummel, Mervin, 102 Hummell, Ernest G., 102 Hunt, Whitelaw H., 146, 153, 156 HUP (Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania), 320–321, 371 I Ibbeken, Betty, 173, 182 ICU, hospital

425

Cooper comes of age, 242, 250, 252 decade of development, 160, 162–163 eleven years of challenges and change, 262 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 212 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 314, 319, 323, 336 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 283, 287, 299 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 171, 178–179 photos, 282, 350 identity, reaching agreement on, 177–180 Imhoff, Robert, 102 incorporation papers, Camden Hospi‑ tal, 31 increase in patient volume, 391 Independence Blue Cross, 360 infants ward, 83 initiatives and changes, innovative, 361–366 Innovation Hero Award, 364 innovative care, 366–370 inside and out, changes, 146–147 inside the hospital, 50–51 Inspira, 401 Institute for Medical Research, 243 institutes, Cooper’s premier, 406–407 Intensive Care Unit. see ICU, hospital Intermediate Care Pediatric Unit, 287 invoice for original hospital building, 34 Italy, the 61st Station Hospital in, 136–137, 139 J J. B.Van Sciver and Company, 38, 182 Jackson, Rev. Larron D., 269 Jacoby, James, 255, 267 Jaffe, Ronald M., 185, 267 Janet Knowles Breast Cancer Center, 384 Jarrett, Harry, 47, 47 JCAH (Joint Commission on Accredi‑ tation of Hospitals), 155–156 JCAHO (Joint Commission on Ac‑ creditation of Healthcare Organiza‑ tions), 399, 406 Jefferson Hospital, 172 Jefferson Medical College celebrating 125 years, 346–347, 371 decade of development, 155 and the home front, 122 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 209, 214 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 312

426

new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 292, 305 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 168, 179 Jenkins, Eliza Glover, 54 Jenkins, Willis Herman Cooper comes of age, 254 hospital split, expansion, and renovation, 205, 207–208, 211, 214–217, 220 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 180, 182 photos, 184, 202 years of turmoil, 193–199, 201 Jewish Hospital, 31, 50 Jim Fifis Lung Cancer Research Fund Dinner, 372, 373–374 John E. Kostic Pediatric Infusion Cen‑ ter, 400 John Greenleaf Whittier School, 388 John Thompson Dorrance Memorial celebrating 125 years, 371 Cooper comes of age, 232, 251 decade of development, 159–160, 162–163 and the Depression years, 116 eleven years of challenges and change, 261 and the home front, 123–125 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 208, 211 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 313, 315 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 170–171, 182 photos, 124, 127, 142–143, 148– 149, 150–151, 155, 164 John W. Wright Building, 61 Johnny M Foundation, 400 Johnny M Playroom, 400 Johns Hopkins University Hospital, 312 Johnson, Eldridge R., 78, 143, 156 Johnson, Lyndon B., 173 Johnston, Art, 305 Johnston, Hillary, 305 Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO), 399, 406 change to full name on either 399 or 406 Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals (JCAH), 155–156 Joint Health Sciences Center, 378, 386 Jones, Thomas, 54 Joseph Campbell Company, 38, 78, 116 Journal of the Medical Society of New Jersey, 64 journey, transformational, 384–386 Judson Jr., G.Vernon, 156, 254 Junior Auxiliary programs, 94–95

Index

K Kaigh, Caroline, 357 Kain, Paul Eugene H. Cooper comes of age, 254 eleven years of challenges and change, 267 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 225, 228–229 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 167, 174, 178–179 photo, 227 and the 61st Station Hospital, 138 years of turmoil, 189, 194, 201 Kain Jr., Thomas M., 167, 178 Kain Sr., Thomas M., 79, 102, 138, 167 Kaloupek, David, 201, 211, 227 Kasserine Pass, 131 Katz, Paul, 340, 345–346, 349, 349, 356, 394, 397–399 Kawata, Michitaka, 347 Kean, Thomas, 253, 285, 404 Keleher, Nancy, 284 Kelemen, Eleanor, 212 Kelemen, Frank K. Cooper comes of age, 234, 236–237 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 205–206, 213–215, 217, 219–224, 228–229 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 340 photos, 203, 212, 224 years of turmoil, 198 Kelemen Pavilion celebrating 125 years, 371 Cooper comes of age, 231, 244 Cooper’s future without limits, 400 eleven years of challenges and change, 259, 264, 267 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 222–224, 226 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 313, 315 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 287–288, 290, 302 photos, 203–205, 215, 220, 221, 231, 345, 389 Kenney, Martin, 45–46 Kerr, George, 135 Kessler, Irving K., 223, 229 Kimler, William, 122, 132, 146, 170, 254 KIPP Cooper Norcross Academy Cooper’s future without limits, 378–380, 386–389, 395–396, 398, 403, 405 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 316 photos, 387, 389 KIPP NJ, 388

Kirby, Adrienne celebrating 125 years, 362–363, 365–366 Cooper’s future without limits, 380, 382–385, 390, 392, 394, 401 photos, 362, 404 Kirk, Grant E., 59 kitchen, hospital, 89, 89 Kromer, John, 325–326, 372–373 Kurnick, Peter B., 250–251, 272, 298 Kuroda, Koson, 254 L labor strike, Cooper during a, 153, 153, 173, 197 laboratory, hospital, 127, 250 Lang, Patricia, 258 Lanning Square School, 387 Lanning Square West Residents, 332 Lanning Square West Residents in Ac‑ tion, 325 Lashkevich, P. John, 262, 274 Lawlor, Jill Sayre, 304, 371 lawn, hospital front, 56 Leach, Rosemary, 267 leader who saw beyond a community hospital, 355 leaders in different styles, natural, 316–321 leadership, conservative, 151–158 leadership, Kelemen’s, 213–216 leadership, new, 290–293 leadership, new executive, 382–384 Leadership Development Institute, 366, 384 Lean Six Sigma, 382 Lee, Hae Min, 356 Lee, Thomas B., 66, 102, 104 Lesmerises-Leibovitz, Monica, 314, 327, 331 Lesneski, Gary, 382, 384, 385 Level I Trauma Center celebrating 125 years, 355 Cooper comes of age, 242 Cooper’s future without limits, 391, 399, 402–403, 406–407 eleven years of challenges and change, 259–260, 264, 268 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 321, 335, 338 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 295, 298, 301, 305 Level II Pediatric Trauma Center, 384, 399, 406–407 Level III Perinatal Center, 220 Levy, Howard, 217 Lewis, Thomas K., 102 Liaison Committee on Medical Educa‑ tion, 294, 353 limits, Cooper’s future without,

376–407 Lippincott, A. Haines, 66, 102, 104 Live with Regis and Kelly, 303 Logan, Harold C., 224 Lombardi, Joseph V., 320 Long-Range Planning Committee, 187, 191 looking at the future, 403–405 Loveland-Jones, Catherine, 385 Lubin, Sol, 163, 169–170, 178, 185, 191, 206–207 Lyman, Robert H., 102 M M&M Development, 329, 389 MacArthur Foundation Genius Fellow‑ ship, 364, 369 MacFarland, Burr W., 47, 47 Mader, Leanne, 350 Mahaffey, J. Lynn, 102 Main Line Health, 308 Maintenance Department, 199 management, new, 102–109 mannequins, practicing on simulation, 309 marketing, medical, 239 Marketing and Community Outreach, 305 Markley, Albert W., 29, 30 Markley, Helen, 114 MASH units, 241 Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 215 Match Day, 394 Maternal and Infant Care Center, 232, 259 Maternity Department, 84, 88 maternity ward, 87, 115, 125–126 Mayo Clinic, 312 Mayor’s Committee, 111 Mazurek, Harry, 374–375 Mazzarelli, Anthony J., 338, 339, 349, 382, 383, 384 McArthur Jr., John, 31 McCans, Kathryn, 375 McGeehan, John, 354, 356 McGreevey, Jim, 404 McNichols, Mickey, 123 MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper celebrating 125 years, 343, 357–359, 361, 368, 373–374 Cooper’s future without limits, 378–381, 384–385, 393–394, 396, 403, 405–406 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 315–316 photos, 359, 370, 376–377, 393 MD Anderson Cancer Center (Hous‑ ton), 357–359, 368, 379. 379, 381, 393–394, 403, 418

Index

MD Anderson at Cooper Voorhees, 359 Mecray, Alexander M., 45, 47, 49 Mecray III, Paul, 340, 353 Mecray Jr., Paul M. Cooper comes of age, 254 decade of development, 153, 164 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 225 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 340 and new management, 104, 108 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 167, 170, 174, 178–179 photos, 353 Mecray Sr., Paul M. and a collision of changes, 145–146 and the Depression years, 116 expansion and end of free care, 75, 78, 81, 83 and the home front, 122 and new management, 103–105 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 167 photos, 49, 103, 105, 109 and the 61st Station Hospital, 138 years of turmoil, 189 Medi Prop Co., 206 Medicaid, 173–174, 209, 238, 274, 289, 300, 364 medical advances, 64–67, 187–190, 245–246, 245, 269, 322–323. see also technology at Cooper Medical Arts Building, 193, 195, 252 Medical College of Pennsylvania, 254 medical conditions, Camden, 19–24 medical school, new, 190–191, 207– 209 medical society, first, 19–24 Medical Society of New Jersey, 21 medical staff, 1928, 102–103 Medical Staff Committee, 187 Medicare, 173–174, 209, 238, 274, 289 Medicine Department, 267, 271–272, 299 Meillier, Raymond A., 272, 274, 280– 283, 286, 371 men’s ward, hospital, 45, 50–51, 51, 53, 99, 115, 254 Merck Foundation, 364 Meyers, George, 102 military services, expansion of, 401– 403, 402 Miller, Lawrence S., 300 mission, Cooper’s, 399–401 Moncure, Michael, 269 Montefiore Hospital and Medical Cen‑ ter, 231, 234 Moody’s Investors Service, 275, 282 Moor, Betty, 153 Morris, George Spencer, 85–87 Morrison, Ashton, 248

427

mosaics, hospital, 341 Most Wired Award, 401 move, community on the, 386–390 moving forward after centennial, 270–273 moving forward after founders’ deaths, 60–62 moving forward after split, 202–275 moving forward with heavy hearts, 382 Mulford, Isaac S., 19 Mullen, Gerald M., 308–309 Munger and Long’s Department Store, 38 Municipal Rehabilitation and Economic Recovery Act (MRERA), 295 Murray, Edwin N., 178 Musulin, Nicholas, 138 N Naden, Randall S., 178 National Cancer Institute, 301 National Committee for Quality As‑ surance, 401 National Disaster Life Support Re‑ gional Training Center, 284 National Institutes of Health (NIH), 298, 374 National Quality Award for Excellence in Cranial Neurosurgery, 399 National Research Corporation, 311, 399 National State Bank of Camden, 16 National Surgical Quality Improve‑ ment Program, 399 Needle Park, 329 Needle Work Guild of America, 113 neighborhood, revitalizing Cooper’s historic, 327–331 Neighborhood Revitalization Tax Credit (NRTC) project, 330–331 Neonatal ICU, 282 new, hospital’s migration from old to, 224–229 new executive leadership, 382–384 New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry, 191, 207, 210, 217, 224, 233, 240 New Jersey Hospital Association, 175, 372, 401 New Jersey Housing Mortgage Finance Agency, 328 New Jersey Legislature, 393 New Jersey Manufacturers Insurance, 331 New Jersey Medical and Health Sci‑ ences Education Restructuring Act, 378 New Jersey State Home for the Deaf, 97 New Jersey Turnpike Authority, 285 New York Harbor, 129 New York Shipbuilding Corporation,

428

78, 182 New York Times, 338 New York University, 336 New Yorker, 364 Newark Diocese, 152 Newcomb Medical Center, 253 Newmark, Thomas, 268 Newmeyer, Joseph, 132, 135 newsletter, hospital employee, 152 Nicholson, Joseph L., 102 NIH (National Institutes of Health), 298, 374 911 Emergency Medical Services, 407 nineteenth-century hospitals, 35 NJ American Water, 395 NJ Sharing Network, 401 NJBIZ, 364 Norcross, Donald, 343, 388, 395 Norcross Foundation, 339, 388, 398 Norcross III, George E. celebrating 125 years, 352–353, 357, 359, 362, 366, 368 Cooper’s future without limits, 382, 403–404 eleven years of challenges and change, 275 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 312, 316–317, 321, 326–327, 339–341 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 279, 285, 289–290, 293, 295, 300, 302–303, 305–307 photos, 275, 316, 342, 360, 370, 372, 379, 383, 404 Norcross Jr., George E., 202, 207–208, 213, 275, 353, 395 North Ward Bounty Association, 23 NRTC (Neighborhood Revitalization Tax Credit) project, 330–331 Nuclear Medicine Department, 199, 207, 246 nursery, hospital, 79, 217 nurses, 61st Station, 128–129 nurses’ home, 60, 61, 91, 99 nurse’s life in the 1920s, a, 74 Nurses’ Training School Committee, 125 nursing school. see Training School for Nurses at the Cooper Hospital O Obama, Barack, 386, 386 Obiora, Daisy, 357 Obstetrics and Gynecology Depart‑ ment, 233, 267, 293 Obstetrics Department, 61, 205 Occupational Health Center, 267 odd couple, the, 215 O’Dowd, Kevin M., 383–384, 383, 386, 393 Old Guard, 166–183, 185, 198, 207– 208 old to new, hospital’s migration from,

Index

224–229 Olivia, Christopher T. celebrating 125 years, 375 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 316, 321, 337 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 287, 291–293, 295, 299, 301, 305 photos, 286, 292 Opel, Justine (Sally) Mecray, 353 open-heart surgery, first, 179, 188 operating room, hospital Cooper comes of age, 241 decade of development, 164 establishment of the hospital, 47, 51, 61 expansion and end of free care, 76–78, 88 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 314, 318, 320, 322 photos, 55, 116, 127, 176, 241, 245, 280, 308, 390 and the 61st Station Hospital, 131 Orthopaedic Trauma, 299, 336 Ostrum, Robert F., 299, 336–337 Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital Cooper comes of age, 232, 244–245 decade of development, 152, 157–158 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 220, 228 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 170, 178 Our Lady of Lourdes Medical Center, 273, 286 OurVision, 312 outpatient building, hospital, 62, 66, 67 Outpatient Department and a collision of changes, 146 decade of development, 159 establishment of the hospital, 49, 52, 55, 57, 61–63, 66 expansion and end of free care, 78, 81, 85, 87–89 and the home front, 121 photo, 246 Outpatient Services Center, 259, 268 outpatient surgical center, 266 overflow, patient, 53 overnight ward, 24 Own the Bone, 399 P Pancoast, D. P., 47 parks, Cooper as more than, 331–339 Parrillo, Joseph E., 296, 297–300, 318 partnership with Cooper and the community, 368 Pathology Department, 267 Patient and Family Education Center, 340 patient experience, era of the, 313–

316 Patient in Need Fund, 374 patient volume, increase in, 391 patient-centered care, 366–370 patients, philanthropic gifts benefiting pediatric, 400 patients, taking care of, 334–339 Patterson, Jean, 193, 267 Patterson, Lillian, 126 Peabody, George, 26 Peach Blossom farm, 22 Pear, Louis, 90 Pediatric Emergency Center, 268 pediatric ICU, 252, 303 pediatric patients, philanthropic gifts benefiting, 400 Pediatric Trauma Center, 384, 399, 406–407 Pediatrics Department, 79, 83, 268 Peerless & Ruby Kid & N.J. Leather, 78 Peikin, Steven R., 281 Pello, Mark J., 263–264, 346–347, 347 Penn Allegheny Health System, 316 Pennsylvania Hospital, 19, 51, 270, 371 Performance Improvement Office, 366 Perinatal Center, 220, 232 pharmacy, hospital, 287 Philadelphia and Camden Ferry Com‑ pany, 68 philanthropic gifts benefiting pediatric patients, 400 Phillips, Benjamin, 347 philosophy, change in, 70–117 Physical Medicine/Rehabilitation De‑ partment, 268 Physical Therapy Department, 170 Physician Order Entry, 307 Pierucci, Louis, 225 PillCAM, 322, 322 Pink Roses Teal Magnolias Brunch, 373 pioneers, medical, 161 Plant One Million, 325 playroom, hospital, 84, 87, 265, 266 plot plan, 1877 city, 42 plot plan, Cooper family home, 15 PNC, 331 politics, hospital, 207–209 Population Health Institute, 366 Porter, John M., 403 Praiss, Donald E., 206 Premedical Urban Leaders Summer Enrichment (PULSE) program, 397 premier institutes, Cooper’s, 406–407 Presbyterian Hospital, 31 Primas, Melvin R. “Randy”, 236 Princeton, 125 Principato, Eugene R., 153, 347, 353 problems, facing, 270–273 programs, new federal, 173–174 Project Sheraton Poste, 201, 207–208 Promise Neighborhood Initiative, 395 promise realized, hope as, 358–361 Proper, Michael C., 258

Prowell, George R., 40 PSE&G, 331 psychiatric unit, 252 Psychiatry Department, 268 public face of Cooper, the, 303–309 Public Relations Committee, 146 PULSE (Premedical Urban Leaders Summer Enrichment) program, 397 Pyne Point, 15 Q Quaker Shipyard, 182 Quakerism Cooper family builds a hospital, 36 Cooper’s future without limits, 405 decade of development, 158–159 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 22 establishment of the hospital, 60, 65–66 expansion and end of free care, 76, 85 years of turmoil, 196 R Radiation Oncology Department, 268 Radiation Therapy Nuclear Medicine Department, 199, 207, 212 Radiology Department, 154, 254, 255, 308–309 Rajagoplan, Kumar, 352 Rancocas Hospital, 271 Randall, Huldah, 65, 77, 87, 107–108, 107, 113, 116 rate-setting changes, 173–177 Rauffenbart, Mary decade of development, 158–159 and the home front, 126 and new management, 106–108 photo, 137 and the 61st Station Hospital, 131, 134, 136 years of turmoil, 194–195 Ravitz Family Foundation, 400 RCA, 92, 178, 182 Read, William T., 138, 139, 153 realized, hope as promise, 358–361 Reboli, Annette, 284, 346, 346, 349, 357, 399 Records Department, 160, 218 Red Cross, 65, 113, 134, 136, 139, 141 Redd, Dana, 342, 395 Reeve, Augustus, 29, 30, 59–60, 65, 124 Reeve, Richard H., 60 Reeve, W. F., 75 Regional Perinatal Center for South Jersey, 232 Regional Trauma Unit, 241 report, financial, 168 Republican National Convention, 284 Research Foundation of Pittsburgh, 270–271 residents, first hospital, 47, 79 Review, Planning and Implementation

Index

Committee on the Proposed Re‑ structuring of New Jersey Research Universities, 294 Revitalization and Rehabilitation Initia‑ tive, 295 revitalizing Cooper’s historic neigh‑ borhood, 327–331 Richards, Thomas, 31 Richardson, Bob, 223 Ridge, James M., 18 Riebel, Joseph S., 177–179, 186–187, 191–192, 194, 201 Riebel parking garage, 196, 197, 288, 313 Rigilano, Dianne, 260 Riker, Danzig, Scherer, Hyland & Per‑ retti, LLP, 285 Ripa, Esther, 303 Ripa, Joe, 303, 304, 317 Ripa, Kelly, 303–305, 303, 304, 317, 321, 371, 404 Ripa Center for Women’s Health and Wellness, 339, 406 rising tide, Cooper on a, 372–374 Ristine, Edwin R. celebrating 125 years, 346 and a collision of changes, 144–145, 147 Cooper comes of age, 254 and the Depression years, 116 and new management, 104 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 167 photo, 116 and the 61st Station Hospital, 133–134, 136, 139, 141 Rivera, Carmen, 187–188 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, 364, 398 Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, 248, 264, 294, 349 Roberts, Brian, 350 Roberts, Joseph S., 102 Roberts, Sheila, 325, 328, 330 Roberts Jr., Joseph J., 318, 318 Roberts Pavilion celebrating 125 years, 343, 355, 371 Cooper’s future without limits, 377, 379, 381, 393, 398 establishment of the hospital, 47 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 313–315, 317–319, 321, 328, 331, 339–341 photos, 310–311, 313, 317, 340, 378 Rockford School of Medicine, 214 Roman, Judith, 360 Rommel, Erwin, 131 Ronald McDonald House, 242, 243, 315 Roosevelt Hospital, 31 Rorem, C. Rufus, 157 Rosenberg, Charles E., 35, 57, 63, 67

429

Rosenbloom, Michael, 320, 320, 350, 380 Ross, Alexander S., 102, 104 Ross, Steven, 242, 298, 335, 403 Ross Trauma Admitting Area, 403 Rowan University celebrating 125 years, 352 Cooper’s future without limits, 378, 386, 398 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 314–315, 332, 334 photos, 337 Rudolph, John P., 104, 133–134, 139, 141, 254 Rush University Medical Center, 298 Rushton, Frances, 219 Russo, Andrea, 323 Rutgers University Cooper’s future without limits, 378, 386, 397 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 207, 210 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 314 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 294 years of turmoil, 191 S SAFE Kids Coalition, 324 Salem Cardiovascular Health and Wellness Grant, 375 Salk, Jonas, 161 Samaha, Simon, 307–309 Sarah Cooper Building, 193, 195, 211, 303 satellite hospital, building a, 184–201 Saunders, Lewis, 254, 339 SCCM (Society of Critical Care Medi‑ cine), 296–297 Scheirer, Mrs. Harvey N., 99 school, new medical, 190–191, 207– 209 School of Osteopathic Medicine, 210 Schwarting, Roland, 318 Schwarz, John, 317 Scott, W., 246 Second Century Fund, 209, 216, 232 security, Cooper’s financial, 287–291 seeing beyond a community hospital, leader, 355 Seftel, Allen S., 321 serious care, recruitment for, 297–303 serve, Cooper’s mission to, 399–401 service analysis, 168 ServiceMaster, 195 services, expansion of, 401–403 serving the community, Cooper, 393–399 Sessa Jr., Charles E., 291, 292, 293, 295–296, 301, 305–306 setting the family record straight, 59

430

Seventh Street Linear Park, 326, 329–330, 368, 371 Shafer, Albert, 102 Shafer, F. William, 104 Shaffer, Lori, 336–337 sharing Dr. Cooper’s dream, 24–27 Sharrar, William G., 263, 268 Sheila Roberts Park, 381 Sheridan, Joyce, 381–382, 381, 403 Sheridan, Mark, 404 Sheridan Jr., John P. celebrating 125 years, 352, 357, 362, 371–372 Cooper’s future without limits, 381–382, 403 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 316–318, 324–327 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 279, 285, 305 photos, 285, 317, 330, 336, 343, 381 Sheridan Pavilion, 381, 403, 404, 405 Sherk, Henry H. (grandson), 163–165, 182, 185, 197–198, 217–219, 229, 254 Sherk, Henry Huber (grandfather), 59, 64, 164, 165, 254 Shipps, Hammill, 103 Sholette, Annette, 359–361 Shore Medical Center, 384 Shore Memorial Hospital, 267 Simon, William, 203 Simulation Laboratory, 309 simulation mannequins, practicing on, 309 site plan, 1964 hospital, 181 61st Station Hospital about the, 128–141 and a collision of changes, 143–144 Cooper comes of age, 241 eleven years of challenges and change, 267 and the home front, 126 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 339 photos, 118–119, 130, 131, 135, 137, 140 Smedley, Walter, 60–61, 80, 85 Smith, Edward N., 102 Smith, Emily Y., 95, 97 Smith, James D., 102 Snape, William A., 66, 122, 138, 254 snapshot, a Cooper, 209 Snyder, Harvey, 272–273 soaring future, a, 339–341 Sobel, James, 220 Social Security, 174 Social Services Committee, 125 Social Services Department, 95–97, 99, 111, 115 The Social Transformation of American Medicine (Starr), 68, 174, 189 society, first medical, 19–24 Society of Critical Care Medicine

Index

(SCCM), 296–297 solutions, searching for, 144–146 Somer, Robert A., 352 South Jersey Behavioral Health Innovation Collaborative, 384 South Jersey Builders League, 243 South Jersey Medical Education Program, 209 South Jersey Pathology Society, 318 Southern New Jersey Children’s Hospital, 261 Southern New Jersey Children’s Hospital Act, 252 Southern New Jersey Perinatal Cooperative, 232 Spagnola, Tom, 216, 226, 229 Special Care Nursery, 217 Special Utilization Committee, 173 Speech Correcting Clinic, 117 Spencer, Frank, 283 Spirit Day, hospital, 302 Spitz, Francis R., 320–321, 357 SpyGlass, 322 St. Barnabas Health Care System, 273, 286 St. Joseph’s Carpenter Society, 328– 330, 389 St. Mary’s Hospital, 195 staff, first hospital, 47 Star Performer Recognition Award, 399 Starr, Paul, 68, 174, 189 Stebbins, Paula, 132 stepping forward, Cooper, 245–251 Stokes, S. Emlen, 102 Strassman, Harvey, 233 Stratton, Charles P., 29, 30, 34 strike, Cooper during a labor, 153, 153, 173, 197 Strock, Daniel, 56 Studer Group, 401 styles, natural leaders in different, 316–321 Subaru of America, 395 Sudden Infant Death Syndrome Foun‑ dation, 241 Sugathan, Prasanna, 313 Sullivan, John M., 262, 274 Summerill, Garnett, 103 Summit Medical Group, 394 Sun National Bank, 331 Surgery Department, 225, 268, 287 Surgical Access Center, 400 Surgical Services Institute, 406 surgical ward, 82–83, 99, 104, 123 Survivorship Program, 374 Sussman, Sidney, 220, 252, 267 Swanson Division, 225 Swartz, Cora S., 116, 116 Sweeney, Stephen, 342 T tabular statement, hospital, 52, 93

taking care of patients, 334–339 Tama, Albert Cooper comes of age, 233, 236, 248 eleven years of challenges and change, 263–264, 266–267 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 206, 222 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 338 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 293, 306 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 169–170, 183 photos, 271, 353 years of turmoil, 185, 200 Taylor, H. Genet, 47, 60, 64 Taylor, Othniel H., 23–24, 47, 59 TD Bank, 331 technology at Cooper, 307–309, 322–323. see also medical advances Teen Lounge, 400 Temple, 371 Temple Theater, 59 terrorism, Cooper’s response to, 284 tertiary care celebrating 125 years, 363, 367, 371 Cooper comes of age, 232, 248, 250–252 Cooper’s future without limits, 382, 386, 390, 393 eleven years of challenges and change, 257, 260, 266 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 226 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 321 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 296 photo, 238 Third Regiment Armory, 42, 99, 211 Thomas, George, 39, 50, 85–86 Thomas Jefferson University, 318 3 Cooper Plaza celebrating 125 years, 360, 367, 369 Cooper comes of age, 244, 252 Cooper’s future without limits, 381, 403 eleven years of challenges and change, 267 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 283, 287 photo, 246 332nd Fighter Group, 161 Thrift Shop, 216 tide, Cooper on a rising, 372–374 Tobiason, Charlotte, 267 Tomar, William, 269 Tomlinson, Ephraim, 75, 87 Topalian, Simon K., 299 Tower Project, 259–261, 293 town vs. gown, 207–209, 226, 229, 254, 263 Training School for Nurses at the

Cooper Hospital celebrating 125 years, 346 and a collision of changes, 146 decade of development, 155, 159 and the Depression years, 115–116 establishment of the hospital, 49, 55–57, 63 expansion and end of free care, 74, 77, 82, 89–92 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 212 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 303 and new management, 106–107 photos, 58, 65, 70–71, 74, 75, 106, 110–111, 112 years of turmoil, 185, 193 Trainor, Theresa, 300 Tranquility Garden, 359 Transfer Center, 407 transformational journey, 384–386 transformative years, 276–405 transitional years, 273–275 Trauma Department, 307 Trauma Intensive Care Unit, 242 Trauma Step-Down Unit, 240 Trauma Unit, 241–242, 241, 249–250 treasure from original hospital, 218– 219 Tree of Life, 359, 393 “Tree of the Year” award, 325 Triangle Park, 330 Trotman, Nettie, 396 Trumbower, Mrs. Edwin A., 153 Trzeciak, Stephen, 299, 350 Turi, Zoltan G., 299, 375 turmoil, years of, 184–201 Turtz, Alan R., 301 Tuskegee Airmen, 161 twins at CMSRU, 397

and the Depression years, 114 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 16 expansion and end of free care, 79 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 325 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 288, 291 University of Pennsylvania Health System, 270, 305, 312 University of Pennsylvania Hospital, 31 University of Pennsylvania Law School, 349 University of Pittsburgh, 154 UOSS (Union Organization for Social Service), 348, 395–396 Urban Health Initiative, 332, 349 Urban Health Institute, 367, 406 Urban Hope Act, 388 Urgent Care Association of America, 399 US News & World Report, 399 USS New Jersey, 368

V Vagelos, P. Roy, 294 Vagelos Commission, 294 VanSciver, Cecil B., 102 Verdi, Frank J., 206 veteran programs services, expansion of, 401–403 Veterans Administration, 207, 210–211, 243 Veterans Memorial Middle School, 397 Veterans’ Stadium, 239 Victor Talking Machine, 78 Vietnam War, 241 Viner, Edward D. celebrating 125 years, 349–351 Cooper comes of age, 253 eleven years of challenges and change, 267, 272–273 U hospital transformation and new UMDNJ Camden Task Force, 305 academic medical center, 314 Underwood, J. Harris, 102 new leadership, vision, and centers Union League, 179 of excellence, 287–288, 293, 299 Union Organization for Social Service photos, 330, 336, 353 (UOSS), 348, 395–396 vision, new, 290–293 University of Illinois, 214 vision in two directions, a, 207–209 University of Maryland Medical School, vision taking hold, new, 311–312 214 Visiting Committee, 30–32, 49 University of Medicine and Dentistry volume, increase in patient, 391 of New Jersey (UMDNJ) von Uffel, George, 159 celebrating 125 years, 347, 350, 352 Voorhees, Peter L., 29, 30, 42–43, 46, Cooper comes of age, 241, 248, 253 48, 223 eleven years of challenges and Voorhees, Peter V., 60, 340 change, 264 new leadership, vision, and centers W of excellence, 294–295, 305 Walker, James C., 223, 224–227, 229, University of Pennsylvania 239, 243–244, 249, 340 celebrating 125 years, 349 Wallner, Paul, 233, 268 Cooper comes of age, 248 Walnut Street Wharf, 17 Cooper family builds a hospital, 35 Walsh, J. F., 47 decade of development, 155 Walsh, Most Rev. James Thomas J., 152

Index

431

Walt Whitman Hotel, 105 Walter Rand Transportation Center, 314 war years, the, 118–147 Waugh, Bascom, 161, 161, 330 Waugh, Dyann, 161 Waxman, Harvey L., 250, 272–273 Webster, Theodore L., 171, 207 Weil,Valerie P., 295, 297 Weimann, Elizabeth H., 65 Weimann, Robert B., 185–187 Weinroth, George, 269, 307, 353 Weinstock, Perry, 313 Weisberg, Lawrence S., 287, 288, 323, 375 welcomes from the front to home, 137–139 Werns, Steve W., 299 West, Gordon F., 102 West Jersey Hospital, 152, 157–158, 186, 191–192, 223, 233 West Jersey Railroad, 25, 68 West Philadelphia and Presbyterian Hospital, 272 Wharton School, 291 Whitman, Christine, 285 Wiggins, Ulysses S., 169 William Beaumont Hospital, 347 William G. Rohrer Cancer Genetics Program, 394 William G. Rohrer Charitable Founda‑ tion, 394 Williams, Charles, 34, 36 Williams, Harrison A., 223 Williams, Kathy, 354 Williamson, Michelle, 332 Wills, Joseph H., 47 Wilson, Gilbert “Whip”, 388 Wilson, Jeannie, 45, 50 Wilson, Lester, 102

432

Winkler, Arthur, 327 Women’s and Children’s Institute, 406 Women’s Auxiliary programs about the, 94–101 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 171 photos, 93, 98, 101, 133, 171 years of turmoil, 199 Women’s Auxiliary receipts, 97 Women’s Board. see also Women’s Auxiliary programs Cooper comes of age, 254 eleven years of challenges and change, 268 hospital split, expansion, and reno‑ vation, 212–213, 216 new leadership, vision, and centers of excellence, 287 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 171–173 photo, 172 years of turmoil, 185, 199 Women’s Care Center, 268 women’s ward, hospital and auxiliaries, 99 Cooper comes of age, 254 and the Depression years, 115 establishment of the hospital, 50–51, 61 expansion and end of free care, 83 and the home front, 123 and new management, 104 photos, 46, 80 Wood, Alexander C., 60 Wood, Edward S., 91 Woodrow, Sarah, 300 work week, new, 160, 162, 194 World War I, 65, 104 World War II and a collision of changes, 143 decade of development, 153–154, 161

Index

eleven years of challenges and change, 267 and the home front, 124, 126 hospital transformation and new academic medical center, 339 and new management, 105–106 Old Guard vs.Young Turks, 167, 169, 172 and the 61st Station Hospital, 128, 137, 140–141 Wright, Abigail Cooper. see Cooper, Abigail Wright, John W. Cooper family builds a hospital, 29–30, 32, 34, 42–43 Dr. Cooper’s dream, 22, 24, 27 establishment of the hospital, 54, 58–59, 61 photos, 22, 30 X X-Ray Department, 154, 162 Y Yarnall, Hibberd, 31 Yarnall and Cooper, 31–34, 50, 85 Yocom, Steven S., 280, 301 York Hospital, 214 Young, Catherine, 357 Young, Gary, 289–290, 293–294, 324 Young, Nicholas, 357 Young Turks, 166–183, 185–187, 198–201, 206–208, 223, 233 Z Zannoti, Sergio, 299