ISBN 978-0-578-11116-2 $45.95
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For the Good of My Patients
T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
E I L E E N M AT T E I A P U B L I C AT I O N O F T H E S O U T H T E X A S M E D I C A L F O U N DAT I O N
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In 1967, Hurricane Beulah’s devastating floods forced 14,000 Camargo area residents to flee to Roma and Rio Grande City. Dr. Mario Ramirez, Starr County Public Health Director, led the volunteer eort that operated an emergency hospital at old Fort Ringgold.
Rio Grande Valley physicians like Mario Ramirez rest only after long hours caring for their patients. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
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For the Good of My Patients
T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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For the Good of My Patients
T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y :
E I L E E N M AT T E I
A publication of the South Texas Medical Foundation Published and managed by Topp Direct Marketing 1117 N. Stuart Place Road, Suite 103 Harlingen, Texas 78552-4344 John W. Topp, President Alan Hollander
Tequila Group Advertising Art Director / Graphic Designer / Photo Editing & Digital Retouching
Eileen Mattei
Writer
Lynne Lerberg
Editorial Assistant / Administration
Nora Bollman
Marketing
Dr. Cayetano Barrera
Historian
Norman Roze
Historian
First Edition Printed in the United States of America by Signature Book Printing, www.sbpbooks.com Copyright Š 2012 South Texas Medical Foundation Publications All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without written permission from the publisher. All inquiries should be addressed to: South Texas Medical Foundation 2014 East Harrison Avenue Harlingen, Texas 78550 956.423.7200 ISBN: 978-0-578-11116-2
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Dr. Heinrich Lamm and Dr. Annie Lamm, a husband-wife/surgeon-anesthesiologist team, often worked together in the original Valley Baptist Hospital. When the windows in the operating room were opened, someone was assigned the job of swatting flies. (Michael Lamm)
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Foreword
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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he South Texas Medical Foundation is proud to play a role in the publication of For the Good of My Patients: The History of Medicine in the Rio Grande Valley. Like most stories about our part of the world, the history of medicine is sometimes exhilarating, sometimes sad or even tragic, almost always colorful, and shot through with both heroes and villains.
The heroes of our local medical history include physicians, nurses, and caregivers of every description. Among them are men like William Gorgas, an Army doctor at Fort Brown in the 1880s, who helped eradicate yellow fever in Havana and in the jungles surrounding the Panama Canal. J. B. F. McMillan, a family doctor, drove a horse and buggy from farm house to ranch house to see his Hidalgo County patients. Octavio Garcia, one of the Valley’s early surgeons, gained access to the McAllen hospital for Hispanic doctors in the 1930s. And there were heroines like Nora Kelly, a Brownsville social worker, who in 1917 helped establish Divine Providence, the first city hospital in this region, and Marian Strohmeyer, a Sister of Mercy nurse, who devoted her life to indigent healthcare and founded Comfort House, the first hospice for AIDS patients in the Valley. The villains of this story are the conditions which inspired those heroes in the first place. Diseases – ancient ones like malaria, cholera, yellow fever and tuberculosis as well as recent but equally insidious ones like Alzheimer’s disease, diabetes and obesity – have ravaged the Valley’s population. Geographic isolation, poverty, and conditions unique to the international border region have severely impacted access to healthcare for many local residents and have contributed to public health issues. We hope you will find the history revealed in the photographs and narratives of For the Good of My Patients to be informative and interesting. Learning about the past and the journey from there to the present enhances our ability to predict where our path will lead in the future. It is appropriate to remember and honor those individuals, institutions and events we find along that path. The future, rather than the past, of medicine in the Rio Grande Valley attracted the Trustees of the South Texas Medical Foundation to this project. We believe that the future is extremely bright and that we are standing on the brink of ground breaking developments in medical education which will forever change the landscape of our region. We believe the sequel to this history will include powerful and inspiring tales of a medical school which educates and produces the next generations of heroes and vanquishes the villains of the past.
Charter members of the South Texas Medical Foundation Board of Trustees. Standing: Nolan Perez, M.D.; Manny Vela; Randolph K. Whittington. Seated: Rosemary Breedlove; Anne Shepard; Elena Marin, M.D. Not pictured: Rene Capistran
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Acknowledgements
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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his history is a voyage of discovery, and my guides were both generous and numerous. Particular thanks are due to Georey Alger, Dr. Cayetano Barrera III, Javier J. Garcia, Dr. Marion Lawler Jr., Norman Roze, and Barbara Stokes, who helped me find the forgotten stories. John Topp engineered the publication with calm determination, Alan Hollander created the visual narrative, and Lynne Lerberg provided priceless assistance. Dr. Elena Marin and Dr. Nolan Perez opened doors to the medical community. Many other individuals contributed memories and insights that have enriched the tale told here. Eileen Mattei Photo Credits We gratefully acknowledge the many individuals and organizations who contributed the photographs and illustrations in this book. Photographs appear courtesy of: Cayetano Barrerra, M. D.; Brownsville Community Health Center; Diane Cameron; Bill DeBrooke; Jesus de la Llata; W. Benjamin Fry; Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum; Harlingen Public Library, Local History Collection; Alan Hollander; Glenn C. Housley; Knapp Medical Center; Michael Lamm; Larry Lof; Manassas National Battlefield Park; Eileen Mattei; McAllen Heritage Center; McAllen Public Library; Moody Clinic; Mother of Perpetual Help Nursing Home; The National Library of Medicine; Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection (George Tuley, Photographer), Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library, UTHSC Libraries, The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio; San Benito Historical Society; South Texas Community College; South Texas Health System; Texas A&M University Corpus Christi; Texas State Technical College; U S Army Medical Department Museum; The University of Texas at Brownsville Library; The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio; The University of Texas – Pan American; Dr Adela S. Valdez; Valley Baptist Health System; Antonio Zavaleta, PhD/Medicinal Plants of the Borderlands. Photographs and illustrations are reproduced with permission of: Brownsville Historical Association; Farm Security Administration Collection, Library of Congress; Museum of South Texas History; Benjamin Porter; The Robert Runyon Photograph Collection (CN, CT, di ore number 26, 168, 170, 306, 308, 309, 890, 892, 915, 1729, 1775, 1791, 1947, 2464, 2596, 3006, 3926, 5110, 8179, 8545, 8644 & 9491), The Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin.
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These skilled nurses were a valuable addition to the Rio Grande Valley medical community before World War I. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
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Table of Contents
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
Frontier Medicine 1535 - 1900................................................8 The Military and Medicine....................................................16 Epidemics and Emergencies..................................................26 Trailblazers ............................................................................34 Medicine in the Community 1900 - 1960 .............................38 Medicine in the Community 1960 - Present..........................48 The Evolution of Valley Hospitals .........................................54 Medical Education ................................................................64 Medical Research...................................................................70 Public and Community Health .............................................74 The Future of Medicine in the Valley.....................................78 Milestones .............................................................................82
The Army Medical Corps trained at Fort Brown – and across the Valley – prior to America's entry in World War I in 1917. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
Profiles .................................................................................101 Index ....................................................................................151
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“We all came to be physicians, although in daring and in readiness to attempt any cure whatever I was the most distinguished among them‌Castillo was a very timid physician especially when the cures were very doubtful and dangerous,â€? wrote Cabeza de Vaca, according to his journal translated in We Came Naked and Barefoot: The Journey of Cabeza de Vaca Across North America. MOSTH
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CHAPTER ONE
Frontier Medicine (1535-1900)
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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aked and barefoot, bartering their healing skills for food and safe passage to Tampico, the shipwrecked Spanish explorers left the Matagorda Bay area and trekked across dense, arid brushland in the summer of 1535. After six years in captivity with various Indian tribes, Alvar NuĹˆez Cabeza de Vaca and his three companions, Andres Dorantes, Alonso del Castillo and the slave Estavan, had finally escaped and were heading south. They crossed the Rio Grande west of present-day Roma in Starr County. During their captivity, Cabeza de Vaca had acquired a medicine man’s pouch and embraced the medicine men’s practice of calling on supernatural powers. “We all came to be physicians, although in daring and in readiness to attempt any cure whatever I was the most distinguished among them‌ Castillo was a very timid physician especially when the cures were very doubtful and dangerous,â€? wrote Cabeza de Vaca, according to his journal translated in We Came Naked and Barefoot: The Journey of Cabeza de Vaca Across North America. “When morning came, they brought the sick that they had, begging us to bless them and they gave us some of what they had to eat, which was tuna leaves and roasted green tunas‌And we never cured anyone who did not tell us that he got well‌They believed that as long as we were there none of them would die.â€? Praying, making the sign of the cross over the patients and blowing on them constituted most of the treatments given to their Indian patients. At Cerravalo, 30 miles south of Roma, a man with an arrow point embedded above his heart was brought to Cabeza de Vaca. The adventurer Exvotos are painted religious oerings expressing thanks for a recovery had great confidence that his faith and skills could heal. “With a knife that from an illness or injury. These expressions of faith graphically depict the extent of a medical complaint. (National Library of Medicine) I had, I opened his chest at that place and saw that it would be very diďŹƒcult to get it out. [I] cut more and with the point of the knife and great trouble finally got it out‌practicing my profession of medicine I made two stitches.â€? He staunched the bleeding with hide scrapings, and the man recovered rapidly. “This cure gave us much credit through all that land,â€? he said, recording the first known surgery in the border region.
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Herbalists, Midwives, Healers, and Curanderos
AnACAHuITA (wild olive) cough syrup:
Wash a few leaves and boil in a quart of water until strong tea. Add 2 cups of sugar, 2 lemons, half teaspoon of cinnamon. Let boil down, then strain and bottle. Dose: 1 teaspoonful 3 times a day or whenever cough is violent.
More than two hundred years later, JosÊ de Escandon established settlements on the south bank of the Rio Grande that grew into the cities of Reynosa, Camargo, Mier and Revilla. On the river’s north bank, ranches dotted the sparsely settled brushland where folk medicine provided trusted remedies for both minor injuries and serious ailments.
This authentic curandero’s prescription instructs the patient: Rub on olive oil and camphor and drink anise herb tea three times a day for 15 days and pray thrice daily. The patient could have visited a herberia for the anise leaves and camphor.
In the 1700s and 1800s, few doctors attended medical school. Most apprenticed with a practicing physician and learned the trade hands-on and by studying medical treatises. Medical professionals used leeches and herb-based medications; most diseases had unknown causes. Midwives aided a natural process, easing the pains of childbirth with herbs and skills gained from numerous deliveries. Midwives shared their remedies for life’s minor ills, and, with herbalists, curanderos and folk healers, formed a spectrum of practitioners devoted to restoring health.
Herbal preparations – traditional medicinals – had been shown to stop bleeding, lower fever, reduce pain, halt diarrhea, and relieve stomach aches, coughs, and headaches. The healing properties of some native plants may have been learned from Mexican herbalists or from surviving local Indian healers. North of the Valley, the nomadic Karankawa, for example, had used American wild ipecac to control dysentery. Border residents made a tea from manzanita (chamomile) leaves to soothe colicky babies while teas from sauz or willow bark, which contains the aspirin-like ingredient salicin, were drunk to reduce fevers, inflammation and pain. Mesquite sap was made into a tea for dysentery and mesquite leaf tea was applied as a compress for inflamed eyes. Mallow flower tea was a remedy for toothache, and mallow leaf tea served to clean wounds and wash fevered children. Garlic was a cure-all: a whole peeled clove inserted in an ear relieved earaches, while drinking brandy in which several cloves had been soaked for 14 days
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oered relief from asthma and heavy coughs. Cenizo leaves and branches were made into a cough medicine.
Opposite page, top right. Herbal medicine such as elm bark were used to treat wounds and burns. Sauz or willow bark was used for pain and headaches.
Hidalgo County ranches after 1850 typically had a garden with medicinal herbs such as basil, rue and hierba aniz. Yerba Buena or mint leaves were made into a tea to remedy nausea and stomach aches as well as to lift spirits and ease heart ailments. Cumin tea was given to teething babies. Amargoza leaves placed in boots were thought to stave o athlete’s foot, although a tincture made from the root was drunk for intestinal ills.
Opposite page, bottom. Fresh medicinal herbs like these are now rarely seen along the border.
(Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
(Dr. Antonio Zavaleta)
This page, far left. People of many cultures have relied on manzanita or chamomile to treat stomach aches and colicky babies. Other herbs had histories of helping ease coughs, swollen feet and fatigue. (Dr. Adela S. Valdez)
The 1858 yellow fever epidemic in Brownsville claimed the lives of Harriet Kimball and her daughter Delia, 17, in the space of two days. No one realized the deadly disease was transmitted by mosquitos.
When confronted with dire illness, people of many cultures turned to grandmothers, druggists, and popular beliefs to supply folk remedies. Hattie Case of Brownsville wrote out her Cure for Cholera in 1893: “Equal parts by measure of laudanum (a tincture of opium), tincture of capsicum, tincture of ginger, tincture of cardamom seeds. Dose 30-40 drops in two tablespoonsful of water. It is intensely burning but it will stop vomiting and spasms like magic. Prepare two doses. If the first is thrown o, give second as soon as the spasm ceases.â€? In contrast, folk healers used the simplest of ingredients. Don Pedro Jaramillo, the revered faith healer on Los Olmos Creek in Falfurrias, would often prescribe glasses of water or cumin tea in the name of God. He rode horseback circuits of the region and mailed pencil-written prescriptions. He received petitioners such as Bartolo and Eufemia Zavaleta, who traveled by wagon from Roma in the 1880s to consult him, concerned they had never conceived a child. The healer said the wife was already pregnant; that baby was named Pedro, according to anthropologist Dr. Antonio Zavaleta.
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Curanderos treated ailments such as susto (fright or anxiety) that exceeded the reach of herbalists and physicians. While herbs played a role in curanderos’ remedies, their eďŹƒcacy was entwined with the rituals and symbols invoked as the practitioners laid hands on their patients. Drawing on their shared beliefs and culture, curanderos were respected for treating patients holistically, addressing the emotional, physical and spiritual elements of an illness. The Practice of Medicine in the 1800s Swiss naturalist and pharmacist Jean Louis Berlandier in his Journey to Mexico during the years 1826-1834 wrote that in 1829, Matamoros had 500 people die in two months from “malign or rotten fevers which began with simple bilious fevers. Most of the aicted were abandoned to nature...I am inclined to believe that when the shores of the Gulf of Mexico are well populated...yellow fever will become endemic.â€? The inquisitive Swiss, soon known as Dr. Berlandier, noted that the disease called infantile tetanus
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Completed in 1868 with wide verandas, graceful arches and breezeways, the Fort Brown Hospital was designed to catch cooling southeastern breezes. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
(mocezuelo) was common in the towns set on the Rio Grande and that it killed three to four newborns weekly in Matamoros. Dr. Berlandier settled in Matamoros and later treated soldiers wounded in the early battles of the MexicanAmerican War. The war that started in 1846 introduced the Rio Grande Valley to the U.S. Army Medical Corps, which had doctors but no nurses or orderlies. After the carnage of the first battle at Palo Alto, as recorded in On the Prairie at Palo Alto, military band members removed the wounded from the battlefield and soldiers were pulled from the ranks to care for the wounded. “The surgeon’s saw was going the livelong night� as injured limbs were amputated. Wounds were bandaged, with
During the Civil War, doctors’ medical kits included medicines in corked bottles and a supply of bandages. (Manassas National Battlefield Park)
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Potions used to concoct remedies for fevers and pain often included poisons such as arsenic and mercury.
or without poultices, but not cleaned. Recovery from wounds was “dependent largely on the stamina of the wounded and not a little luck,� because treatment was so primitive. Many wounded died of lockjaw (tetanus). Major Jacob Brown, shot at the earthen fort opposite Matamoros, “died from mortification of the wound caused by the air of the bomb proof (a shelter),� according to Lt. William Chatfield.
(W. Benjamin Fry)
Observant and level-headed, Helen Chapman documented the devastating illnesses and ailments she witnessed after her arrival at Fort Brown in 1848. (Benjamin Porter) The Miller-Webb Drugstore, the first in Brownsville, was built in 1852 on 13th Street.
Helen Chapman, wife of Fort Brown’s first quartermaster, moved between Brownsville, Brazos Santiago, and Matamoros, chronicling an era marked by epidemics and rumors of epidemics. In News from Brownsville: Helen Chapman’s Letters from the Military Frontier, 1848-1852, she observed that the Mexican city had “rank vegetation and standing water, the great causes of disease in tropical climates,â€? although no one then knew the causes of cholera, malaria and yellow fever. In March 1849, a cholera epidemic in Brownsville took the lives of 40 to 50 in 10 days. “Those who die suer the least. Here at Brazos, we have lost one-third of the population. In Monterrey it is raging.â€? In Matamoros the cemetery had to be enlarged, and almost every family was in mourning following 1,000 deaths out of a population of 4,000. Helen Chapman and many others relied on blue mass, a popular, mercury-laced, all-purpose medication, to treat what they did not realize was a bacterial disease transmitted by contaminated water. She reported giving one man tinctures of rum and camphor mixed with peppermint and asafetida, a teaspoon every hour plus a mustard plaster. Limited medical care had repercussions on daily life, Chapman revealed. “During my labor and even at the moment of delivery no one was with me but Aunt Phyllis, an old mulatto woman...not even a professed midwife though‌she often oďŹƒciates in that capacity.â€?
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Two brothers opened the Botica de Leon, also known as the Putegnat Pharmacy, in 1860 in Brownsville. George Miin Putegnat, pictured here, took over the drug store from his father and uncle. (Brownsville Historical Association)
Fifteen years later, during the Civil War, doctors still had few treatments to oer. The use of drugs such as quinine for malaria, opium/morphine for pain, or anesthesia for surgery was rare. Arsenic was given to stop fevers and mercury-based calomel was a common antidiarrheal drug. Digitalis and paregoric were administered in wrong dosages. Cleanliness was never a consideration, with unwashed bandages and instruments routinely used on a succession of patients. Throughout the 1800s, epidemics continued to ravage the population. Few doctors lived north of the Rio Grande, although physicians in Matamoros and Camargo saw American patients.
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ROBERT RUNYON PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION
In November 1888, intermittent fever (malaria) struck 58 percent of the soldiers. The Surgeon-General of the Army in 1889 cited Fort Brown “as the most unhealthy post in the country, 286 cases of malarial disease or nearly two attacks yearly for each man of the garrison...� Yet by 1893, Assistant Post Surgeon George Torney was describing Fort Brown as one of the healthiest posts in the Army. The turnaround had been accomplished, he stated, by purified drinking water being always available, purified ice, use of lightweight clothes suitable to the climate, improved sanitary drainage, and below average rain for three years.
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C H A P T E R T WO
The Military and Medicine
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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n 1846 American Army doctors arrived with General Zachary Taylor at Point Isabel and the new Fort Texas, opposite Matamoros. Within six weeks, the battles at Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma immersed the physicians in battlefield medicine as the Mexican-American War began. Following the first battles, more than 130 wounded soldiers were moved in supply wagons over dirt roads to Point Isabel where regimental hospitals had been prepared. Amputation was the standard treatment for arms and legs badly injured by field artillery, bayonets or lances.
Tourniquets, like this one in the Palo Alto Battlefield collection, stopped the flow of blood to a limb before it was amputated. In Fort Brown’s Morgue or Dead House, young Dr. Gorgas studied cadavers in 1882 attempting to learn the cause of yellow fever.
Surgeon John Porter of the Third Infantry said, “There was almost no provision either in personnel or material. Hospital furniture, clothing, bedding, even cooking utensils were lacking‌ The surgeons went from patient to patient cleaning all wounds with the same sponge, and infection was expected as a matter of course.â€? Bandages were reused; gangrene took its toll. The mortality of the wounded was 12 to 15 percent. Major Ringgold, wounded by a shell through both thighs on May 9 and attended by Navy Surgeon J.M. Foltz, died within 60 hours. Major Jacob Brown, struck by a bursting shell,
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In 1916, military field hospitals, like this one at a cavalry headquarters in Harlingen, were familiar sights across the Valley. (Harlingen Public Library)
had his leg amputated above the knee and died three days later. General Taylor, who named Fort Brown after the fallen oďŹƒcer, requested Matamoros send surgeons to give aid to the Mexican wounded.
This Union Army surgical kit contained instruments for removing limbs and digging out bullets, although some doctors insisted fingers were the most eective way to remove miniÊ balls.
In letters written between 1848 and1852, Helen Chapman said a bottle of Cholera Mixture was ready in her bedroom. The wife of Fort Brown’s quartermaster mentioned at least six army doctors including Dr. Nathan Jarvis, who became “one of the family‌ a firm friend in emergenciesâ€? and who cared for her dengue fever-stricken husband. Dr. Abadie, Dr. Grayson Prevost, Dr. Leonard McPhail, Dr. Peter Ten Broeck, and Dr. Thomas Madison (“a good surgeonâ€?) tended to the health of soldiers and their families during cholera and yellow fever epidemics, assorted fevers, asthma attacks, and other illnesses.
(Manassas National Battlefield Park)
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The Civil War Era During the Civil War, Confederate cotton moved through the Rio Grande Valley to the Mexican port of Baghdad to be exchanged for guns and war supplies. Fort Brown, Fort Ringgold and the salt lakes changed hands several times with limited fighting. Israel Bigelow, Brownsville
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mayor and the first Cameron County judge, saw his house used as a hospital by Union and Confederate forces, successively. Col. “Ripâ€? ( John Salmon) Ford, a one-time physician who gained his nickname from writing RIP (Rest in Peace) on condolence letters sent to families of fallen soldiers, commanded the Confederate cavalry at Fort Brown. Union Army doctors were issued five separate instrument cases: one each for amputation, exsecting (cutting out), trephining (removing circles of bone from the skull), general operations and a pocket medical kit. Morphine, chloroform and quinine – when available – were the most eective medicines. Large caliber miniĂŠ balls shattered bones and made amputations the most common surgery. Of the Civil War’s 600,000 deaths, only one-third were battle-related. The other 400,000 men died of illnesses ranging from measles and pneumonia to cholera and malaria, as well as from injuries and heat. In Brownsville, the 38th Iowa Volunteer Infantry lost 29 soldiers (nearly half its muster) to diseases such as smallpox, chronic diarrhea and tuberculosis. In 1864, two-thirds of Union Col. H. M. Day’s troops on Brazos Island were hospitalized with scurvy, a vitamin C deficiency. Brazos maps show tiny Dyers Island with five isolated hospital buildings, possibly set aside for treatment of soldiers with the most feared diseases. An army ambulance company bivouacked at Point Isabel next to the train track in the rainy summer of 1916. Their equipment had changed little from the Civil War era. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
The Fort Ringgold hospital, built a year after Fort Brown’s, suited a tropical environment where malaria, cholera, and yellow fever were common. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
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Prior to America’s entry into World War I, the Army Medical Corps, including ambulance drivers, trained in the Rio Grande Valley. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
In 1865, in the post-war battle at Palmetto Ranch, the surgeon of the 62nd US Colored Troops, Corydon Allen, and the acting surgeon of the 34th Indiana, Godfrey Bohrer, dressed wounds of injured soldiers “under heavy enemy fire...Rebel shells passed unpleasantly near‌as the casualties were loaded in the ambulances.â€? In 1868, Quartermaster Alonzo Wainwright supervised the construction of Fort Brown’s brick hospital, the region’s first. He deviated from the standard army blueprint by adding two wide breezeways and arched verandas that captured sub-tropical breezes. Fort Ringgold (named after the soldier mortally wounded at Palo Alto) followed the same architectural plan – two wards with a total of 24 beds – and was completed by 1879 with the assistance of mason Heinrich Portscheller. Advances in Medicine For nearly 100 years, the U.S. Army channeled to the Valley a stream of younger doctors primed with the latest medical knowledge and practices. Given the scarcity of private physicians, the army doctors were often called on to treat the general population, usually
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without compensation. Often the military doctors opted to settle on the border. Dr. Wole of the Union Army became quarantine oďŹƒcer at Point Isabel. An 1870 Army health report for Fort Brown reported “the principal diseases being diarrhea, intermittent and remittent fever, venereal diseases, a few cases of rheumatism and pulmonary complaints and after pay-day, some cases of delirium tremens.â€? In 1882, yellow fever raged through the region for four months. Fort Brown’s 120 soldiers and their families accounted for 92 cases of yellow fever and 41 deaths. Dr. William Gorgas arrived when the epidemic began and examined cadavers of yellow fever victims in an attempt to understand the cause of the disease. He contracted yellow fever and thereby gained immunity to it. After Drs. Finlay and Reed discovered that mosquitos transmitted yellow fever, Dr. Gorgas was the first person to apply their finding and in the process eradicated the disease in Havana in 1902 and later along the Panama Canal.
Young soldiers injured on duty in 1916 recuperated at Weslaco’s Camp Llano Grande Hospital. (Glenn C. Housley)
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Nurses Hilda and Ida Twedten of Minnesota were among the Red Cross nurses who lived in a Mercedes dormitory and rode in an Army ambulance to work at Camp Llano Grande hospital. (Glenn C. Housley)
In November 1888, intermittent fever (malaria) struck 58 percent of the soldiers. The Surgeon-General of the Army in 1889 cited Fort Brown “as the most unhealthy post in the country, 286 cases of malarial disease or nearly two attacks yearly for each man of the garrison...� Yet by 1893, Assistant Post Surgeon George Torney was describing Fort Brown as one of the healthiest posts in the Army. The turnaround had been accomplished, he stated, by purified drinking water being always available, purified ice, use of lightweight clothes suitable to the climate, improved sanitary drainage, and below average rain for three years. Nevertheless he noted that “convalescence is not easily established in sick patients in this climate.� Despite smallpox prevailing in the towns, no one at Fort Brown contracted it, Dr. Torney said. “Every individual in the garrison was vaccinated and revaccinated with bovine virus...until full protection against the variola had been secured.� (He, like Dr. Gorgas, became Surgeon-General of the Army.)
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Unlike the Mexican-American War when military physicians had no orderlies or nurses, by 1916 the U.S. Army was training soldiers to assist the doctors. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
Into the 20th Century Bandit raids that followed the 1910 Mexican revolution prompted Fort Brown to place a machine gun on the Post Hospital roof. In 1916, over 100,000 U.S. Army and National Guard troops, complete with hospital and ambulance units, were stationed in the Valley. While their massive presence certainly deterred bandits, the military’s primary purpose was to train for the battlefields of Europe as the U.S. prepared to enter World War I. Hospitals, some of canvas, were set up in Weslaco, McAllen, Harlingen, San Benito and Rio Grande City. At Weslaco’s Camp Llano Grande, the regional military hospital treated soldiers for illnesses and injuries, some caused by horses. From July 1916 to
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Army medics trained with their gear at Fort Brown. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
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February 1917, the hospital occupied a mansion built to entertain land seekers, and it also used a railroad hospital car. A hospital roster on Thanksgiving listed 14 doctors, 18 Army nurses, 12 NCOs, 84 privates, and six cooks. Fifteen Red Cross nurses stayed in a Mercedes dormitory and traveled in an ambulance to the hospital. World War II brought large military training contingents, accompanied by their medical corps, to Moore Field and Harling e n Ae r i a l G u n n e r y schools. Some soldiers had never visited a doctor before. Fort Brown’s hospital had separate wards for patients with infectious diseases and non-infectious diseases and a second floor newborn nursery. The Berry Plan, started during the Korean War, drafted new MDs, usually after their internships. Many Valley physicians served a two-year stint. In 1952 Harlingen Air Force Base opened and until medical facilities were ready for dependents, Dr. Paul Maxwell of Harlingen delivered “Air Force brats� for $75. The military has returned during crises to the Valley and set up emergency hospitals. Since 1998 the Texas State Guard, Texas Army and Air National Guard have participated each summer in Operation Lone Star, providing free medical care to underprivileged families along the border. Typically 400 military medical corps members immunize, give medical exams and referrals and do dental work for about 6,000 individuals during each week of the two-week exercise. An army hospital train, complete with operating room, was stationed at Camp Llano Grande. (Glenn C. Housley) Dr. Hector Garcia of Mercedes was among the Valley doctors who served in the Army Medical Corps during World War II. He later started the American G.I. Forum and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom. (Texas A&M University Corpus Christi)
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Smallpox, which had wiped out many Indian tribes, occurred along the border into the early 1900s, even though smallpox vaccinations first came to the Province of Texas in 1804. “The destroying angel is among us,� wrote Helen Chapman of the 1849 cholera epidemic around Brownsville. “It is a worse enemy than hostile Indians...
much more alarming than the spasms and cramps.�
ROBERT RUNYON PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION
The rapid decline of strength is
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CHAPTER THREE
Epidemics and Emergencies
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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uring the 1800s and into the 20th century, epidemics were a hazard of life on the border and elsewhere. Yellow fever, cholera, smallpox, influenza, polio, measles, and diphtheria would rage through the population, killing thousands and debilitating more. At the first appearance of a deadly disease, panic spread faster than the illness. “Men of temperate habits resorted to liquor to drive away their fear.�
Attempting to control epidemic outbreaks in the nineteenth century, border residents used sulphur fumes to decontaminate baggage and sick rooms; they burned victims’ bedding and clothing, quarantined cities, and closed international borders. Because no one knew what triggered the epidemics, treatment of the plagues was equally misguided. Patients, weakened by disease, were dosed with medications laced with arsenic and mercury as well as being subjected to multiple bloodlettings. “The destroying angel is among us,� wrote Helen Chapman of the 1849 cholera epidemic around Brownsville. “It is a worse enemy than hostile Indians...The rapid decline of strength is much more alarming than the spasms and cramps,� she said from first-hand knowledge. The epidemic spread upriver that spring: Artist James Audubon’s Western Journal detailed his “Disaster in the Rio Grande Valley� when his expedition to the California gold fields was felled by cholera near Fort Ringgold. Treatment with calomel, mustard plaster, opium for pain and stimulants of camphor and brandy did not prevent the deaths of 10 companions, many within 12 to 24 hours of becoming ill. “His broad forehead was marked with the blue and purple streaks of coagulated blood, and down both sides of the nose and blackening his whole neck, the veins and arteries told that it was all over with him,� wrote Audubon, who himself contracted cholera. “One month lost in sickness and sorrow.� At Rio Grande City in November 1858, one-fifth of the population died of yellow fever with three or four deaths every day. In Brownsville, the same epidemic in “malignant form and so rampant� killed 53, between September 13 and September 25, plus Fort Brown’s
Yellow fever epidemics struck the Valley frequently in the 1800s, at times killing one-fourth of the population. Bitten by mosquitos carrying the disease known as Yellow Jack, young healthy men and women died as well as those already infirm. Opposite. Smallpox victim, Brownsville, 1915.
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Cholera and yellow fever epidemics filled this hospital ward at Fort Brown. With the cause of the illnesses unknown, physicians used violent and desperate treatments that often weakened the patients further. (Brownsville Historical Association)
commanding oďŹƒcer and 25 others on the post. One observer said the victims’ “change of color before death was very remarkable; some were perfectly yellow and others almost black.â€? A community responds When the first cases of yellow fever appeared in Brownsville in the summer of 1882, a Relief Committee was formed to manage the epidemic and to care for those in need. Leading citizens – Thomas Carson, John Haynes, Jose Fernandez, Lewis Cowan, William Kelly, and Simon Celaya – raised $1,035 by August 8. The next day, the committee organized a hospital and contracted for bedding, drugs, ice, and provisions. Circulars were printed in Spanish to explain the Relief Committee’s work. The Oblate Fathers oered St. Joseph College as a hospital during the crisis. Incarnate Word lay sisters would tend the sick during the day, returning to the convent at dark. Physicians A.J. Wole, J.M.Main, Alton Graybill, Rodolfo Matas, Melon and Combes agreed to care for the sick throughout
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the city and at the hospital. Dr. Robert Murray of the U.S. Marine Services (forerunner of Public Health Service) arrived to lead the community’s battle. Dr. William Gorgas and Dr. Etienne Melou were among the Fort Brown doctors. Three nurses stepped up: Mary Butler, O.B. Walton and Howard Ross. Daily inspection of city sanitary conditions began along with assessment of the sick requiring care. The daily yellow fever census shows the toll rising: August 18: 12 new cases; September 1: 71 new cases under medical treatment; September 2: 103 new cases; September 4: 78. A telegram from New Orleans stated: “...can get pharmacist at $60 per month but can hardly induce good physicians to go (to Brownsville) for much less than $25 per day.â€? Donations to the relief fund came from Laredo and Galveston, from Miin Kenedy and Richard King. A shelter for the homeless poor was established. Meanwhile a quarantine prevented people from entering or leaving Brownsville, enraging business owners, even as the disease spread upriver to Mier. Cattle hides were impounded. During this turmoil, Dr. Murray and Mayor Carson fought each other for control of the situation, as evidenced in the telegrams flying between Brownsville and the U.S. Surgeon General.
Many wrongly assumed they would not be in danger if they kept sanitary habits and diet. The stricken endured treatments that included sponge baths of vinegar and water or brandy and lemon juice; mustard footbaths; lemonade; 16 grains of quinine; two ounces of castor oil; calomel with quinine. Matamoros physician I. Martinez objected: “The sweats, footbaths, bleeding, purges, or purgatives...must all be abolished.�
The promise of deliverance from polio, first via the Salk vaccine and later from Sabin vaccine on a sugar cube, elated the nation. A uniquely Texas approach was the drive-by administration of polio vaccine, shown here on Jackson Street in Harlingen in 1960. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
Iron lungs kept children and adults alive at Grandview and Valley Baptist hospitals. Paralyzed by polio, the patients continued to breathe because of the machines’ movements. (Valley Baptist Health System)
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The 1933 Hurricane brought death and destruction to the Valley. Medical help soon arrived from Houston and San Antonio, setting up tents outside Valley Baptist to care for the less seriously injured. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
The treatments failed to save the lives of 1,500 residents, as shown by 31 pages of burial records for the Brownsville cemetery during the two-month epidemic. The relief committee praised Dr. Murray “who has never abandoned the fever-stricken poor in their misery and distress...swashing through much mud, slush, fetid water, ants, snakes, rats, scorpions and other insects...both by day and by night.� Yellow fever epidemics gripped the border frequently until Dr. William Gorgas, formerly of Fort Brown, rid Havana and then Panama of the disease by eradicating mosquito breeding areas. That put an end to yellow fever in the early 1900s. Smallpox, which had wiped out many Indian tribes, occurred along the border into the early 1900s, even though smallpox vaccinations first came to the Province of Texas in 1804.
new diseases Other scourges arrived. In December 1918, a newspaper reported that “Spanish influenza was raging throughout the Valley. At San Benito a call has been made for any able-bodied men to assist in burying the dead. At this time, there are 14 caskets at the cemetery awaiting burial and others coming in every hour.� Healthy young adults were the primary victims. Harlingen set up a quarantine shelter at Salty Lonesome on the Arroyo Colorado where influenza patients were nursed by their families.
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Dr. Mario Ramirez, Starr County Health Officer, directed emergency medical efforts of the Texas National Guard and volunteers following Hurricane Beulah. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
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Polio, considered endemic in the Valley, began surging in 1948 and became the fastest growing infectious disease among children. Before an iron lung arrived at Edinburg’s Grandview Hospital in 1950, respiratory paralysis claimed the lives of four children from one family in only three days. With the polio vector unknown, terror spread. Victims’ toys and clothing were burned. Although both children and adults were stricken, the media built hysteria by showing children in iron lungs and on crutches. In 1953 Cameron County had 81 new cases of polio. Grandview and Valley Baptist operated large polio wards equipped with iron lungs for the most critically ill patients. In 1955 the use of Dr. Jonas Salk’s polio vaccination, an injection of dead polio virus, dramatically slowed the epidemic. Five years later, the Sabin vaccine, with attenuated polio virus served on a sugar cube, led to the near eradication of the disease. Tuberculosis, one of the nation’s leading causes of death in 1900, was still rampant along the border in the 1950s, linked to lack of medical care, poverty, and illegal immigrants (who, unlike legal immigrants, avoided mandatory chest x-rays.) The Valley’s TB rate was twice that of the rest of the state. Harlingen State Tuberculosis Hospital filled its 600 beds in 1957, one year after opening. New antibiotics brought tuberculosis under control and led to the facility’s closure in 1971. Nevertheless, Hidalgo County had 508 cases between 1988 and 1993 and Cameron County had 415 in the same period because of Multiple Drug-Resistant TB. A temporary pediatric ward set up during Beulah demonstrated that need triggers inventive approaches to medical care. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
Blackboard notations replaced medical charts for an elderly refugee patient in Rio Grande City. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
In 1991 a spike in Valley anencephalic and neural tube birth defects, at first feared to be an epidemic, was later linked to folic acid deficiencies. With the arrival of the 21st century, diabetes among the Hispanic population reached epidemic levels. In times of great need While communities rallied to battle epidemics, natural disasters like floods and hurricanes sparked massive medical responses as well. Medical professionals raced to aid the injured. “Harlingen Wiped Away!� screamed an almost-accurate San Antonio headline, following the Hurricane of 1933. High winds and Arroyo Colorado flooding injured thousands. Relief trains arrived from San Antonio and Houston with doctors and nurses, food and water. Huge tents were erected next to Valley Baptist Hospital to hold the overflow of less-critically injured victims, and others were treated at the Reese-Wil-Mond Hotel.
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Formula in improvised baby bottles nourished infants in Beulah’s aftermath. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
Nurses provided skilled care to hurricane victims. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
In 1967 Hurricane Beulah’s devastating floods forced 14,000 Camargo area residents to flee to Roma and Rio Grande City. Dr. Mario Ramirez, Starr County Public Health Director, led the volunteer eort that erected an emergency hospital at old Fort Ringgold. Medical sta from the UT Medical Branch in Galveston and Santa Rosa Hospital of San Antonio joined forces with the U.S. Army and the residents of one of the poorest counties in the nation to care for the refugees. Babies were born, emergency appendectomies were performed, geriatric patients were soothed. Empty soda and beer bottles were sterilized and filled with baby formula. Doing what had to be done to save lives and to comfort the ill and aicted, the medical community guided the beleaguered communities back to safety and health. Selfless courage and extraordinary improvisations marked the life-aďŹƒrming medical response.
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CHAPTER FOUR
Trailblazers
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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Dr. William Gorgas (1854– 1920) ieutenant William Gorgas arrived at Fort Brown on August 3, 1882 in the midst of a yellow fever epidemic. The chief surgeon of the army had described Gorgas as “the most progressive young surgeon under my command.” Dr. Gorgas was forbidden to enter the yellow fever wards of the post hospital, because he lacked immunity to the often-fatal disease. The Alabama native, however, wanted to learn about “Yellow Jack” and performed post-mortems on yellow fever victims in the morgue. Assigned to attend yellow fever patients such as Marie Doughty, the sister-in-law of the post commander, Dr. Gorgas himself was soon stricken with yellow fever. He recuperated with Marie, who later became his wife. She wrote, “It would not be true to say that Yellow Jack was the best man at our wedding, but…he was an usher.”
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THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT BROWNSVILLE LIBRARY
Immune to further attacks, Gorgas worked to discover the cause of yellow fever at a time when quarantines and the burning torch (to destroy all of a victim’s bedding and clothing) attempted to halt the spread of the disease. Initially he rejected the idea that mosquitos transmitted the disease. But in Havana in 1901, Dr. Gorgas became the first person to successfully apply the discovery by Dr. Walter Reed and Dr. Carlos Finlay of the disease’s mosquito vector. Dr. Gorgas brought yellow fever under control by eradicating mosquito breeding areas in the Cuban capital. He was then assigned to Panama where, under his guidance, yellow fever was again contained, enabling crews to construct the Panama Canal without horrendous death tolls due to the disease. Dr. Gorgas was appointed Surgeon General of the Army and honored internationally as the person responsible for saving more lives than any other man, excepting Pasteur.
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Nora Kelly (1871-1964)
MOTHER OF PERPETUAL HELP NURSING HOME
hen Nora Kelly completed her schooling at Visitation Convent, she returned to Brownsville where her mother and sister had begun caring for eight elderly, blind persons living in their own homes. In November 1901 Nora Kelly financed and began operating the St. Joseph’s Home for the Aged, caring for the poor and blind in a Washington Street house purchased by her father, one of the city’s richest men. In 1913 she spearheaded the opening of a ten-room charity home complete with a day nursery for children of working mothers. When General Blanco attacked Matamoros, 225 wounded soldiers were brought to the Brownsville charity home and from there assigned to improvised hospitals. A visiting philanthropist, impressed with Miss Kelly’s dedication, raised $15,000. That was enough for Nora Kelly to open the small Divine Providence Hospital, the Valley’s first public hospital, in 1917. She asked the Sisters of Mercy of Laredo to run the hospital which treated the poor and provided emergency operations. Nora Kelly remained actively if quietly involved in the operation of Divine Providence, which soon proved too small for the city. Construction of Mercy Hospital, run by the nursing nuns, was completed in 1923. Miss Kelly had a long career as a social worker at San Antonio’s Santa Rosa Hospital where she started the Crippled Children’s Association and raised funds for the children’s hospital. She returned to Brownsville and died at 93 in Our Mother of Perpetual Help Nursing Home, which many years earlier had been Divine Providence Hospital.
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Dr. Heinrich Lamm (1908-1975) and Dr. Annie Lamm (1907-1976) eeking a more accurate endoscope, medical student Heinrich Lamm ran experiments which proved that an image could be transmitted around an obstacle by using bundled glass fibers. This 1932 discovery in Munich would allow doctors to observe previously invisible parts of the body. Year later, Lamm’s discovery became the foundation of the fiber optic industry.
MICHAEL LAMM
Dr. Lamm, a German Jew, and his wife, Dr. Annie Lamm, immigrated to the U.S. and settled in 1939 in La Feria where their home doubled as their office. He specialized in surgery, and she became a popular obstetrician, delivering over 2,500 babies in 37 years and sometimes riding on horseback to visit her patients. Dr. Heinrich Lamm mentored a generation of young nurses and doctors such as Drs. Hesiquio Rodriguez, John Ferris, Max Harris, and Thomas Klug. He encouraged, inspired and stimulated them to continue their education and stay on top of medical innovations. A stickler for details, he demanded excellence from others and himself. Cosmopolitan and academic, he was a founder of the Valley Symphony Orchestra.
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Dr. Annie Lamm trained as an anesthesiologist and began assisting at her husband’s surgeries in the operating rooms (which had no air conditioning) at Valley Baptist Hospital on ‘F’ Street. The Drs. Heinrich and Annie Lamm Scholarship, established in their honor, has enabled over 440 hospital staff to achieve higher levels of medical skills.
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Dr. Ramiro Raul Casso (1922-2010) r. Ramiro Casso took good care of his patients but his heart and conscience drove him to a broader calling: taking care of others. He worked to make sure the poorest could get medical care. He fought for farm workers’ civil rights. Late in life, he devoted himself to expanding medical education, research, and health services.
From a Laredo childhood, Ramiro Casso went on to Texas A&M University, employment as an engineer with the International Boundary and Water Commission, and service as an Army officer during World War II. Following his graduation from University of Texas Southwestern Medical School, he opened his Family Practice office in McAllen in 1957. Several years of delivering babies in the homes of poor women convinced Dr. Casso to open the first charity clinic for migrant and indigent families, and he later helped establish El Milagro Clinic.
Dr. Casso was the first physician-member of the Board of Directors at McAllen General Hospital. He twice served on the Texas Board of Health and on the Texas Human Rights Commission. As the only Texas physician on the National Board of Healthcare for the Aged, Dr. Casso advocated for the creation of Medicare. His leadership was essential in establishing the University of Texas Regional Academic Health Center’s Valley campuses. After 37 years in practice, Dr. Casso retired in 1995 and took on the task of creating South Texas College’s nursing school. An educator as well as an inspiring leader, Dr. Casso through his support and advocacy helped establish medical training programs that led to the opening in 2000 of the Dr. Ramiro R. Casso Nursing and Allied Health Center at South Texas College.
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SOUTH TEXAS COMMUNITY COLLEGE
While practicing medicine and delivering over 2,000 babies, Dr. Casso continued to work within the political system to aid the less fortunate. In 1948 as a LULAC member, he had participated in the case that outlawed segregation of Hispanic school children. A determined advocate, Dr. Casso publicly condemned the Texas Rangers’ illegal treatment of striking farmworkers and worked to have laborers covered by workers’ compensation programs. People could register to vote at his office. He ran for mayor of McAllen.
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Dr. Mario Ramirez (1926) n 1950, young Dr. Mario Ramirez, the only physician in Starr County, was practicing frontier medicine in Roma. Accompanied by his R.N. wife, Sarah, he delivered babies on house calls to distant ranches. He treated patients with TB, rattlesnake bites, polio, tetanus, leprosy, and diphtheria. Patients in the poverty-stricken area sometimes paid him in vegetables and cabrito.
DR. MARIO E. RAMIREZ COLLECTION, MARIO E. RAMIREZ, M.D. LIBRARY
Delivered in 1926 by the first Valley-born physician, Dr. Mary Ann Edgerton, Mario Ramirez grew up wanting to be a doctor. He graduated from the University of Tennessee Medical School. After a two-year stint as an Air Force doctor in Japan, Ramirez returned to Roma and in 1958 transformed an old Roma mansion into the 15-bed Manuel Ramirez Memorial Hospital (honoring the grandfather who contributed to his medical education) and stocked it with second-hand autoclaves and beds. Dr. Ramirez launched glucose testing of every adult in Roma and discovered one of the highest levels of diabetes in the US. That led him to educate people on healthy diets. During Hurricane Beulah, Dr. Ramirez opened an emergency hospital at Rio Grande City and directed the care of thousands of refugees, including newborns and geriatric patients. In 1967 he was appointed Starr County Judge and then re-elected twice, securing funding for community centers and in 1975, the new Starr County Memorial Hospital, where he was named chief of staff. Dr. Ramirez’s “Letter to a Young Doctor” in Good Housekeeping magazine extolled the satisfaction of doctoring where there is great need – in rural communities. To that end, Dr. and Mrs. Ramirez organized the first of 25 banquets sponsored by UT and TAMU graduates to celebrate the graduation of exceptional high school students from border counties. Countless awards and appointments recognized the leadership of the tireless, affable, modest physician. In 1978 Dr. Ramirez was named the Family Physician of the Year and received his award at the White House from President Jimmy Carter. He became the first Hispanic president of the Texas Medical Association. In 1988 Dr. Ramirez was appointed to the University of Texas System Board of Regents and served with great pleasure until 1995. He then became Vice President for South Texas Programs at the University of Texas Health Center San Antonio and established the Med-Ed Program which introduced over 2,000 Valley students to a future in healthcare and science. On his retirement in 2007, Dr. and Mrs. Ramirez were honored as Texas Heroes. The medical library at Regional Academic Health Center is named for him.
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MOSTH
Dr. Mary Ann Headley Edgerton received her medical license in 1910 and was the first Rio Grande Valley-born physician. The daughter of political firebrand Dr. Alex Headley (seated), she brought a smallpox epidemic under control by vaccinating everyone, as part of earning her $50 monthly salary.
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CHAPTER FIVE
Medicine in the Community (1900-1960)
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
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t the start of the 20th century, physicians had no antibiotics to treat infections; no vaccinations to protect children from polio, measles, diphtheria or tetanus; and no way to control diabetes. The Texas border had few doctors, probably no more than 12 between Point Isabel and Rio Grande City, excluding military physicians. On the other hand, the small and scattered population, when ill or injured, first turned to home remedies before consulting herbalists, midwives or healers.
The enterprising Dr. J. B. F. McMillan erected this building in the new town of Chapin, soon to be renamed Edinburg. He had his medical office upstairs and a drugstore downstairs, and also ran a saloon. He later built the McMillan building which housed many doctors’ offices. (MOSTH)
Beyond that, druggists in Brownsville and Roma stocked patent medicines like Lydia Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound for Female Complaints. The popular nostrum was 40 proof alcohol and combined five herbs including black cohosh and fenugreek. Druggists commonly advised people about treatments for coughs, pains, or wounds as well as filling prescriptions by using a mortar and
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pestle to compound (mix) ingredients for powders, salves, and syrups.
Partera (midwife) Rita Rivera Rodriguez delivered about 100 babies on the Paso Real, Buena Vista, El Vallo, and Anacuitas ranches between 1900 and 1920. Dressed in a long black skirt and black-and-white blouse, she traveled with surgical scissors, homemade gauze, alcohol, and mint leaves for colicky babies. Her only payment was room and board.
With the arrival of the railroad in 1904, the construction of irrigation canals soon after, and the potential of two crops a year, the Magic Valley’s population increased as did its supply of doctors. Arriving in 1904, Dr. J.B.F. McMillan, 50, made his rounds in Hidalgo County in a horse-drawn buggy. After stints in Sam Fordyce and west McAllen, he moved in 1908 to Chapin (now Edinburg) where he opened a drug store, medical office, and the Buckhorn Saloon. In 1908 Texas began requiring physicians to be licensed. Sworn statements to the Texas Board of Medical Examiners (a requirement for licensing) revealed that many of the frontier doctors had not attended medical school. Instead they had apprenticed with physicians, and several had initially been pharmacists. Dr. McMillan, Dr. Harrison, Dr. Kent, Dr. Austin, and Dr. Strong, for example, attested they were physicians “by virtue of years of practice,” while others cited a diploma from a university or a school of medicine. After graduating from the Women’s Medical College of Philadelphia, Dr. Mary Ann Headley Edgerton received her medical license in 1910 and was the first Rio Grande Valley-born physician. The daughter of political firebrand Dr. Alex Headley, she became the Health Officer for Starr, Jim Wells and Brooks Counties and brought a smallpox epidemic under control by vaccinating everyone, as part of earning her $50 monthly salary. Physicians saw patients in small towns and
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Opposite. Dr. O.V. Lawrence fled Mexico during the revolution and established his medical office in Brownsville. He had the region’s first x-ray machine (a room-size piece of equipment) which shot this hand film about 100 years ago. Dr. Lawrence used the primitive machine until the 1950s. (Larry Lof )
Like Dr. McMillan, brothers Dr. Alfred Letzerich and Dr. Casper Letzerich saw patients upstairs while their brother Hugo ran the drugstore and post office downstairs. The building, still in use, is Harlingen’s oldest, dating to 1910. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
on far-flung ranches and farms. In 1910 Dr. Alfred Letzerich and Dr. Casper Letzerich along with their brother Hugo, postmaster and druggist, occupied two floors of a new brick building at Commerce Street and Jackson in Harlingen. The same year in McAllen, families without telephones who wanted Dr. Frank Osborn to make a house call signaled him by hanging a sheet on their porch. Nearby, Dr. William McGee saw patients at his practice located in the Jones and Sons Feed Store beginning in 1914. Dr. Clarence Cash opened his office upstairs in the San Benito Bank & Trust Co. building in 1914. He traveled the countryside in a Model T Ford, and his office telephone had to be cranked to connect to the operator. In Brownsville, once the Mexican Revolution ended, Dr. O.V. Lawrence set up the region’s first X-ray machine, a room-sized contraption that was used for nearly 40 years. Dr. Henry Schalaben settled in Edinburg in 1919 at age 38. His daughter wrote, “Every Thursday, father left Edinburg with a huge bag of candy for the children and drove through the Ranch Country seeing patients. If anyone needed to see him, they would send the children down to the road and stop him…to see the sick. He always followed the same route so they could depend upon him. In the evening he would return home with garden produce, cabritos, chickens, eggs, etc., and occasionally hard cash, but he never
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Before the era of paramedics, hearses functioned as ambulances, transporting the ill and injured to hospitals. The journey in this Kreidler Funeral Home hearse must have been disconcerting for conscious patients. (McAllen Heritage Center)
failed to care for someone even though he knew he would never be paid.” Dr. Schalaben developed a masa-based “baby food” for poor Hispanic families. Hidalgo County’s first two Mexican-American doctors arrived in 1920. Dr. Cayetano Barrera II began practicing in Mission, and Dr. Carlos Ballí opened a clinic and pharmacy in McAllen on 17th Street. Most doctors’ offices in those years were on the second floor, often over a drug store. The McMillan Building in Edinburg soon housed several physicians’ offices. Enterprising physicians established private hospitals and maternity clinics adjoining their offices, partially to make delivering babies more convenient for the doctor and safer for the patient, in contrast to waiting through labor at sometimes distant homes. In 1910 the three Works brothers, all physicians, opened the Works Hospital in Brownsville, and in 1920, Dr. Doss inaugurated his sanitarium
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in McAllen. Even after hospitals opened in Brownsville, Mercedes, Harlingen, McAllen and Edinburg, physicians such as Dr. Robert Johnston, Dr. Barrera, and Dr. Marion Lawler Sr. persisted in operating private hospitals, some with only four beds. Next to Dr. Johnston’s Mercedes home, a nurse was on duty round the clock at a clinic, and babies who arrived in the middle of the night were delivered by the doctor who was clad in a pajama shirt and slacks. The McCallip-Ivy Hospital was established by Weslaco doctors who wanted a local facility.
Dr. George Gallaher’s medical office, used from 1930 to 1971, has been recreated at the Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
Witch hazel, derived from the witch hazel bush, was used to ease sunburn, insect bites and itches. Borozone was an antiseptic containing camphor. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
Dr. Octavio Garcia, who in 1930 became the upper Valley’s first surgeon, had to fight to be allowed, as a Hispanic, to treat patients at McAllen General Hospital. Physicians such as Dr. Cash of San Benito and Dr. Edgerton of Rio Grande City came to McAllen to assist him in surgery. Dr. Garcia observed that blood transfusions were rare and that he had to make saline solutions for patients. He also continued to perform minor surgeries in doctors’ offices and at remote ranches as did other doctors into the 1960s. Dr. Garcia lamented that uneducated patients often turned “first to curanderos (faith healers)...and by the time my services were required the patient was terminal, a poor risk or beyond help.” A few doctors reportedly used a primitive test for diabetes: pouring urine from a suspected diabetic near an ant hill and observing if ants swarmed for the sugar. Home remedies, as well as curandero treatments through the 1930s and 1940s, were in part a reflection of distance to a doctor’s office and low incomes. Preventive practices of the time included swallowing nickel-size, yellow sulphur tablets daily to ward off mosquitos and ticks and the diseases they carried. The sulphur resulted in strong smelling perspiration, which deterred bugs as well as friends. During those years, some Valley children were dosed with kerosene at the first sign of a sore throat. Kerosene was also used to stop bleeding and clean a wound. For infections, bread soaked in sweet milk was applied “to draw out bad germs.” In Rio Hondo, old women would mash up selected leaves, Margaret
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Opposite. At the Farm Security Administration camp in Harlingen in 1942, a clinic doctor examined a young patient. (Library of Congress) In the battle to control tuberculosis, humor was the tool the San Benito Junior Service League chose to encourage people to get a chest x-ray. (San Benito Historical Society)
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Sana, sana, colita de rana. Si no sanas hoy, sanarás mañana. A rhyme that MexicanAmerican mothers sang to calm their children who were hurt or sick.
Housley recalled, and wet them and spread the mixture on a cloth bandage which was applied to wounds, boils and infections. The influx of physicians in the 1920s prompted one doctor to complain that Hidalgo and Starr Counties had too many doctors, one per 600 persons. Yet new physicians kept arriving, including Dr. Ralph Hamme who joined his father Dr. C.J. Hamme in Edinburg in 1937. Among the Valley’s husband and wife practices were Dr. Henry Forcher and Dr. Snow Forcher, who ran a Mercedes clinic from 1944 to 1973. During World War II, Valley doctors often found themselves providing free care for families with little income because their husbands and fathers were away serving in the military. After World War II, a flood of well-trained physicians with military experience came to the Valley, joining hospital staffs and opening practices. Specialists like Dr. John Packard, one of the Valley’s first urologists, said, “In those days the hospitals didn’t have restrictions on surgeons, so you could do whatever you wanted.” General Practitioners would assist surgeons like him with anesthetics, administering ether, chloroform, or spinal anesthesia in the years before gas machines. The Doctor’s Draft Law went into
Generous donors have enabled every Valley hospital to acquire new equipment, new buildings and provide scholarships. This couple donated the surgery light to Valley Baptist Hospital. (Valley Baptist Health System)
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effect in 1950. Over the next 23 years, approximately 30,000 men were called up to serve, usually immediately after medical school graduation or the first year of internship. Because of the draft, more than 90 percent of all new male doctors were commissioned as officers and sent to serve in Korea, Vietnam and other posts around the world, including Harlingen Air Force Base. A full generation of Valley doctors had this experience in common. Immunizations and vaccinations prevented countless deaths and illnesses, although it is impossible to convince a child that a shot won’t hurt. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
The San Benito Well Baby Clinic, like similar clinics throughout the Valley, tracked children’s growth and encouraged good nutrition. (San Benito Historical Society)
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Surgeons became more common in the Valley at a time when exploratory surgery remained a diagnostic tool, prior to CT scans and imaging advances. Guided only by x-rays, a physician in the operating room might expect to find a tumor or obstruction, but not know
or even the true problem.
DR. MARIO E. RAMIREZ COLLECTION, MARIO E. RAMIREZ, M.D. LIBRARY
the extent of the problem
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CHAPTER SIX
Medicine in the Community (1961-present)
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
I
n 1960, when the Valley had a population around 350,000, medical innovations trickled down to the tip of Texas. Trained medical emergency technicians had not yet arrived on the scene, so hearses continued to do double duty as ambulances, merely transporting patients to hospitals. Most doctors called themselves generalists, like John Ferris in Harlingen, who delivered babies, saw children and adults, and performed some surgical procedures. In McAllen, Dr. Rafael Garza charged patients two dollars for an office visit and three dollars for a house call. Migrant workers, back home at the end of harvest season, came to his office to pay their accrued bills. Physicians occasionally received chickens and cabrito in lieu of cash.
The Moody Clinic originated as the Brownsville Crippled Children’s Society in 1952 and initially provided therapy for children paralyzed by polio. Medical Director Dr. Ray Simmons performed surgery on children who were disabled and saw the clinic’s care extended to those with autism spectrum, cerebral palsy and other disorders. (Moody Clinic)
“At Mercy Hospital, the Sisters of Mercy never seemed worried about being paid. They were more concerned about taking care of people,” said Lois del Castillo, RN. Mercy had minimal charges: $85 for delivery of a child in the early 1960s. She recalled after Mercy was acquired by a corporation in the 1970s, stories circulated of wedding rings being held hostage until hospital bills were paid. Midwives, who learned their craft from older women, had mothers come to private birthing centers rather than giving birth at home. Doctors still ran private maternity clinics. School nurses across the Valley evaluated hearing and vision, gave the students diphtheria, tetanus and polio immunizations and kept their records. They rushed little boys with broken arms to doctors. They tapped into public health grants that provided minor surgery for children with webbed fingers and protuberant ears. Even in 1962, Cameron County still had so few doctors that the county medical society met in a doctor’s home. Doctors would share knowledge of new treatments gained on trips out of the Valley.
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Until the 1970s, Valley hospitals required surgeons to supply their own instruments for the operating room. (Valley Baptist Health System)
Before Knapp Medical Center opened, Weslaco physicians felt compelled to attend to seriously injured patients in their offices. “I’ve removed eyes in the office when they were all botched up, sometime spent three or four hours sewing up somebody’s face, fixed their arms, fixed fractures, but the complicated ones I always had to send out...,” Dr. Stanley Bohmfalk wrote in a hospital publication. Dr. Francisco Lazo faced the same problems. “We used to make house calls because of the lack of an emergency room, and there was nothing we could do for those poor people at home.” Later in the decade, the influx of specialists – obstetricians, pediatricians, and surgeons – was welcomed by Valley physicians. “It was great to have a specialist to turn to when thinking about what was best for patients,” said Dr. John Tucker. Harlingen family practice doctors would cover for each other and for Dr. George Toland, too, so the city’s only pediatrician could take a day off. Surgeons became more common in the Valley at a time when exploratory surgery remained a diagnostic tool, prior to CT scans and imaging advances. Guided only by x-rays, a physician in the operating room might expect to find a tumor or obstruction, but not know the extent of the problem or even the true problem. Then more than now, consultants would be called in during a surgery to lend their knowledge and skills.
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Nurses at McAllen Municipal Hospital prepared a syringe. (MOSTH) Physicians saw patients with a spectrum of illnesses and injuries. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
Up to the 1970s, major Valley hospitals still required surgeons to supply their own surgical instruments. Unaware of that anachronism, Dr. Marion Lawler, Jr. came to Valley Baptist as a young surgeon in 1971 and found he had to borrow instruments for his first operations. He convinced a doctors’ committee to create a surgical instrument fund to which the hospital contributed one dollar for every operation done. This eventually resulted in a common pool of instruments. At mid-century, heart attack victims were treated as invalids, “cardiac cripples.” Rehabilitation consisted primarily of rest, digitalis and diuretics until the 1970s. In 1977, when Dr. Lawler began performing the Valley’s first open heart surgeries, patients initially recovered in their rooms. A sun porch used for polio patients at Valley Baptist was converted into a four-bed Coronary Critical Care
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Unit. In 1983 Dr. Filiberto Rodriguez Sr. performed the first coronary artery bypass in Hidalgo County. In 1986, he was instrumental in opening the nation’s first stand-alone heart hospital, McAllen Heart Hospital.
Charitable groups donated state-ofthe-art medical equipment such as this incubator. (Valley Baptist Health System) Babies arrive at all hours and even during hurricanes. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
T h e n e e d f o r more physicians prompted Valley doctors to help establish medical residency programs, since a high percentage of residency graduates stay in their training area. Physicians got the Family Medicine Residency program started at McAllen General Hospital in 1977. The Family Practice Residency at Valley Baptist Medical Center began in 1996. Even prior to the opening of the Regional Academic Health Center in 2002, third- and fourthyear medical students did rotations with private practice physicians who exposed them to hands-on medicine. The RAHC and its Internal Medicine Residency program swelled the number of medical students and residents in the Valley and increased the number of local physicians serving as volunteer medical faculty and fostering clinical education. Private imaging centers were operating by 1981 in McAllen, before hospitals invested in the new technology. Soon diagnostic imaging modalities became essential in staging cancer, diagnosing diseases, looking at organs, and scanning brains. The field of Hospitalist emerged locally in 2004, with hospital-based physicians assisting primary care doctors by providing rapid and consistent care to their patients.
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Medical flights supplanted long ambulance rides when patients had to be transferred to larger hospitals. (MOSTH)
The number of young doctors practicing in the Valley increased after McAllen Medical Center and Valley Baptist Hospital started Family Practice residency programs. (Valley Baptist Health System)
Medical families appeared in new configurations, beyond the father-son, brothers, and husband-wife teams. Dr. Adela Valdez is Assistant Dean at the RAHC and her daughter, Dr. Dora Martinez, is a pediatrician. Dr. Samira Mohamed is an obstetrician/gynecologist like her late father, Dr. Carlos Mohamed, and her husband, Dr. Filiberto Rodriguez Jr., is a plastic surgeon, while his father is a cardiac surgeon. In Brownsville, sisters Dr. Patricia Cano and Dr. Cristina Cano-Gonzalez opened Family First Medicine in 2009. Technological advances helped make hospital stays shorter and led to better patient outcomes. Minimally invasive surgery, robot-assisted procedures, better targeted medications, and specialty units for stroke and trauma became part of a remarkable array of tools that help save lives, reverse strokes, and improve rehabilitation.
Harlingen orthopedic surgeon Rick Bassett has patented several knee prosthetics and performed over 10,000 joint replacements surgeries. (Valley Baptist Health System)
Only 100 years ago, more than half of the deaths in the United States were due to infectious diseases. Now less than three percent are. Vaccines have saved tens of thousands of lives, as have antibiotics, insulin, heart drugs, and other triumphs. But at the heart of medicine are the people – physicians and nurses, the caregivers – applying their healing skills for the good of their patients.
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In 1913 Mexicans wounded in the Matamoros battle were evacuated to Brownsville and makeshift hospitals set up in saloons and stores.
ROBERT RUNYON PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION
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CHAPTER SEVEN
The Evolution of Valley Hospitals
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
B
efore the Rio Grande Valley’s first public hospital opened in Brownsville in 1917, other hospitals had treated people in need. At Point Isabel, canvas tent hospitals harbored wounded and dying soldiers cut down at the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de Palmas in the first days of the Mexican-American War. During the Civil War, the two-story Brownsville home of Cameron County Judge Israel Bigelow was commandeered as a hospital by both Union and Confederate troops. At Brazos Island, Union maps show field hospitals, which would have held soldiers stricken by malaria, yellow fever, typhoid fever, pneumonia – some of the diseases which killed more soldiers than bullets and cannon balls did.
The home of Brownsville mayor and county judge Israel Bigelow was commandeered as a hospital by the Union Army and Confederate forces at different times. (Brownsville Historical Association)
The U.S. Army built the first permanent border hospitals in 1868 at Fort Brown and in 1869 at Fort Ringgold. The architecturally noteworthy hospitals were erected of border brick with breezeways and verandas that took advantage of the prevailing breezes to cool the double wards. Before the advent of public hospitals, the ill, injured, and dying were nursed at home after a doctor’s visit. Temporary facilities were organized during a crisis. For the 1882 yellow fever epidemic which killed 1,500 in Brownville, St. Joseph Academy volunteered its building as a hospital to consolidate the care of the stricken.
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The Buildings With the arrival of the railroad in 1904, it became common for Valley patients to be sent on the overnight train to San Antonio hospitals for treatment and surgeries. The practice persisted into the 1930s. Through the 1940s, San Antonio and Houston surgeons and specialists regularly took the train to the Valley to spend a day treating patients and performing surgeries. In 1901 Nora Kelly began running charity nursing homes for the elderly ill in Brownsville, with Fort Brown doctors tending her patients. The Valley’s first true civilian hospital opened in 1909 when the three Works brothers, all physicians, founded Works Sanitarium on Levee Street in Brownsville. Together Dr. Orah Works, a surgeon, Dr. Bynam Works, an obstetrician, and Dr. Royale Works, an ear, nose and throat specialist, provided medical services for residents including indigent citizens. Reputable physicians were invited to treat their surgical, medical and obstetrical patients there. Patients shared rooms with adjustable hospital beds, call Makeshift hospitals, like this one in Brownsville following a Matamoros battle in 1913, provided a place to recuperate but few amenities. (Brownsville Historical Association)
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bells, and electric lights for two dollars per day. Only registered nurses who had gradu a t e d f rom t h e b e s t s c h o o l s we re employed.
McAllen’s second hospital, built with a full basement in 1928, during the region’s boom time. (McAllen Heritage Center)
In 1913 Mexicans wounded in the Matamoros battle were evacuated to Brownsville and makeshift hospitals set up in saloons and stores. Turmoil following the Mexican Revolution brought over 100,000 Army and National Guard troops to the Valley between 1914 and early 1917. Posted at Fort Brown, San Benito, Harlingen, Weslaco, and up the Valley to Mission and Fort Ringgold, the medical corps took part in maneuvers that prepared the soldiers for World War I duty. McAllen alone had three military hospitals and three ambulance companies.
Stainless steel medical instruments, which can be easily sterilized, replaced the bone- and ivory-handled tools of the 1800s.
Appalled by the lack of medical facilities in Brownville, a New York philanthropist raised funds in 1916 for a small hospital to be established by Nora Kelly. Kelly then arranged for the Sisters of Mercy of Laredo to operate Divine Providence Hospital. Opening in 1917, the hospital was soon overcrowded. The 1920s brought Valley-wide growth and a booming economy based on agriculture and land sales. Towns and businesses had the wealth, pride and desire to build hospitals. Dr. James Doss located the private Doss Sanitarium on Hackberry in McAllen in 1920. The seven-bed Mercedes Surgical and Obstetrical Hospital opened its doors in 1921. In 1923, Mercy Hospital replaced Divine Providence which continued to be operated by the nuns until 1971. In 1923, Ida Gilbert and Registered Nurse Marie Yeager opened a seven-bed emergency hospital in Harlingen. At the barebones facility, Dr. Casper Letzerich and Dr. Noah Davidson performed appendectomies, operated on gunshot victims and delivered babies. The small hospital closed after Valley Baptist Hospital opened nearby on “F” Street in 1925. That new hospital’s board members had given personal notes to secure loans for the facility’s completion. An entire city block, reportedly given by McAllen founder William Briggs to railroad official W.E. Dougherty for allowing an East McAllen depot, was sold for $500 to the City of McAllen as a hospital site. Built in 1925 for $25,000 with only 25 beds, it soon proved inadequate. In 1928 the three-story McAllen
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Cobalt radiation treatments for Valley cancer patients began in the 1960s. (Valley Baptist Health System)
Municipal Hospital opened next door with 85 beds, three operating rooms and an elevator. The original hospital became a nurses’ residence. Physicians in Mission, Mercedes, and Donna set up tiny private hospitals or clinics next to their offices because of the lack of transportation to distant hospitals. In 1927 Edinburg opened the three-story Grandview Hospital. That same year the 20-bed Mercedes General Hospital opened, with some patients having to be carried downstairs to beds in the basement. Inside the Hospitals Poorly equipped and lacking laboratories, the early hospitals often had segregated Mexican wards. When Dr. Octavio Garcia, a surgeon, arrived in McAllen in 1930, he was refused permission to use the McAllen General Hospital operating rooms or to treat his patients there because he was Mexican-American. In his book Otros Dias, Dr. Garcia described the discrimination he overcame to gain the use of the city hospital. He noted that hospital conditions were primitive: “Instruments had to be provided by the doctor, while the hospital supplied the linens. Sponges, dressings, cotton balls and bandages were made from gauze by volunteer ladies. Syringes and needles had to washed and sterilized.” The lack of air conditioning complicated surgeries. “To alleviate the heat, a tin tub with a long cake of ice was placed on the floor,” and an electric fan blew over it, Dr. Garcia wrote. “A nurse was stationed with a can of ether to spray insects as they appeared.” In the cool of evening, bugs came to the operating room’s single overhead light. In those pre-ICU days, patients were returned to their rooms after surgery. Dr. John Packard recalled performing surgeries at Valley Baptist Hospital on “F” Street, prior to air conditioning: “The busiest man in the operating room was the fellow with the fly swatter.” There, also, surgeons were required to supply their own surgical instruments, both general and specialized stainless steel tools, well into the 1970s. The hospital sterilized the instruments and kept them for each doctor. The public did not go willingly to hospitals. The average patient stay in 1945 was 13 days. “It was hard to get people to go to a hospital, even maternity cases,” said Dr. Earl Reed of San Juan. The Modern Era After World War II, a thriving economy enabled new hospitals to be built and old ones to expand. McAllen, San Benito and Harlingen all had maternity hospitals into the 1960s. Since the birthing facilities did not provide meals, families brought food for the new mothers.
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In 1945 Dr. McCalip, Dr. Ivy, Dr. Ellis and Dr. Panzer opened a 30-bed clinic in Weslaco. A 1948 bill lists the charges: $15 for operating room fee, $15 for anesthesia, $4 for nurses’ meals.
Valley Baptist Medical Center, like other regional hospitals, continued upgrading their facilities to help improve patient outcomes.
In San Benito, a Kiwanis Club project to open a youth health clinic found such widespread community support that it mushroomed into an acute care hospital. Named for an Army nurse from San Benito who died in Germany in World War II, the Dolly Vinsant Hospital opened in 1949. Mission General Hospital opened in 1953. The Harlingen State Tuberculosis Hospital opened in 1956, when TB was not yet controlled by effective drugs. In 1956 Valley Baptist relocated to a $2.5 million, five-story facility on 18 acres in east Harlingen.
(Valley Baptist Health System)
In 1958 Mario Ramirez, Roma’s lone doctor, established the Manuel Ramirez Memorial Hospital named for his grandfather. For small town doctors like Ramirez, having women in labor in one location (a hospital or maternity clinic) made it easier to handle all their other patients. By 1960, the average patient stayed in a hospital for eight days, due in part to miracle drugs and evolving standards of care. Mid-Valley communities rallied to raise funds to open Knapp Memorial Methodist Hospital in 1962. Nevertheless, board members had to sign personal notes in order to pay the builder on completion. The hospital now known as Valley Regional Medical Center opened in Brownsville in 1975, the same year Starr County Memorial Hospital in Rio Grande City replaced Ramirez Memorial. In 1982 Rio Grande Regional Hospital opened in McAllen. McAllen Medical Center, the successor to the city-owned hospital and McAllen Methodist, opened its six-story facility in 1986. Heart surgeon Filiberto Rodriguez and cardiologist Hugo Blake led a group that founded the 60-bed specialty facility McAllen Heart Hospital in 1986. In 1995 eight Edinburg area physicians started an outpatient surgical center, and in 1997 they opened the $16.4 million Doctors Hospital at Renaissance. The physician-owners represented over 50 medical specialties at the 506-bed acute care medical and surgical hospital which added a separate Women’s Hospital in 2007. Edinburg Regional Medical Center with 124 beds opened in 1997. In Harlingen, Dr. Marion Lawler Jr., Dr. Cecil Simmons, Dr. Hugo Blake, Dr. Juan Garza, Dr. William Torkildsen, and Dr. David Yardley helped establish the physician-owned Harlingen Medical Center in 2002. The Edinburg Children’s Hospital with 107 beds opened in 2006. Multi-hospital systems first extended their reach to the Valley in 1986. South Texas Hospital System acquired McAllen Medical Center and then McAllen Heart Hospital, Edinburg Regional and Edinburg Children’s Hospital. Valley Baptist Health System acquired what had been Mercy Hospital/Brownsville Medical Center.
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Timeline of Valley Hospitals
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
Fort Ringgold 1869
MOTHER OF PERPETUAL HELP NURSING HOME
BROWNSVILLE HERITAGE ASSOCIATION
1860
ROBERT RUNYON PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION
Divine Providence 1917 1870
1880
Charity Home 1901
60
1900
1910
1920
BROWNSVILLE HERITAGE ASSOCIATION
MOTHER OF PERPETUAL HELP NURSING HOME
ROBERT RUNYON PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION
THE HISTORY OF MEDICINE IN THE RIO GRANDE VALLEY
MCALLEN HERITAGE CENTER
Fort Brown 1868
MOSTH
Bigelow House 1863
Mercedes Surgical Obstetrical Hospital 1920
Works Hospital 1909
Doss Sanitarium 1920
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McAllen Hospital 1925
MCALLEN HERITAGE CENTER
Harlingen Hospital 1923
Grandview Hospital 1927
1923
1924
MOSTH
HARLINGEN ARTS & HERITAGE MUSEUM
1925
1926
1927
ROBERT RUNYON PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION
1928
Mercedes General Hospital 1927
McAllen General Hospital 1928
Valley Baptist Hospital 1925 THE HISTORY OF MEDICINE IN THE RIO GRANDE VALLEY
61
MCALLEN HERITAGE CENTER
BILL DEBROOKE
Mercy Hospital 1923
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Harlingen State TB Hospital 1956
HARLINGEN ARTS & HERITAGE MUSEUM
MOSTH
Manuel Ramirez Hospital 1958
Mission General 1953 McCallip Ivy Hospital 1945 1940
DR. MARIO E. RAMIREZ COLLECTION, MARIO E. RAMIREZ, M.D. LIBRARY
1950
1960
1970
SAN BENITO HISTORICAL SOCIETY
Edinburg General Hospital 1962 KNAPP HOSPITAL VALLEY BAPTIST HEALTH SYSTEM
Dolly Vinsant Memorial Hospital 1949 Valley Baptist Medical Center 1956
Knapp Hospital 1962
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Doctors Hospital at Renaissance 1997
SOUTH TEXAS HEALTH SYSTEM
VALLEY REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER
HARLINGEN MEDICAL CENTER
SOUTH TEXAS HEALTH SYSTEM
McAllen Medical Center 1986
1980
Harlingen Medical Center 2002
1990
2000
2010
DR. MARIO E. RAMIREZ COLLECTION, MARIO E. RAMIREZ, M.D. LIBRARY
SOUTH TEXAS HEALTH SYSTEM
SOUTH TEXAS HEALTH SYSTEM
MCALLEN HERITAGE CENTER
Rio Grande Regional Hospital 1982
DOCTORS HOSPITAL AT RENAISSANCE
Edinburg Regional Hospital 1997
Valley Regional Medical Center 1975
McAllen Heart Hospital 1996 Starr County Memorial Hospital 1975
Edinburg Children’s Hospital 2006
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CHAPTER EIGHT
Medical Education
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
I
n the 1800s, medical schools had no entrance requirements, and they offered only a few months of lectures with no clinical training. In fact, apprenticing with a physician for a $100 fee was the most common pathway to learn medicine and become a doctor. Then again, medical courses or licenses were not prerequisites for being a doctor. In the Rio Grande Valley during this period, pharmacists like A. J. J. Austin metamorphasized overnight into physicians seeing patients. In the late 1800s, this lack of medical education standards prompted the Army to require their doctors to pass rigorous testing. A glimpse into rising medical standards is provided in the earliest pages of the Hidalgo County Record of Physician’s Certificates. The first doctor listed is J.B.F. McMillan, M.D., then residing west of Mission. In March 1908, he claimed his medical license by writing, “I swear I am a practicing physician by virtue of years of practice.” While about half of the physicians recorded in Hidalgo County in the next five years cited graduation from a university or a diploma from a medical school as their path to an M.D., the others were granted medical licenses “by virtue of years of practice,” or by examination by the Texas Board of Medical Examiners. In 1900 the 166 medical schools in the U.S. had no uniformity in curricula or standards. The Council on Medical Education in 1904 established a curriculum of two years of lab training and two years of clinical rotations. By 1930 only 76 medical schools remained, and their faculties of physician-teachers – following the Hippocratic Oath’s tenet to impart knowledge of the art of medicine – guided medical students in diagnosing and treating patients.
Opposite. In 1908, after Texas required physicians to have a license, Dr. McMillian of Hidalgo County swore he was entitled to have a medical license "by virtue of his long years of practice." (UTPA) In 1939, nurses at McAllen General Hospital resided in a building next to the hospital. (McAllen Heritage Center)
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Residency programs
The dedication of the Regional Academic Health Center Medical Education Division in June 2002 attracted physican-faculty members, medical residents and community supporters. (UTHSCSA)
A shortage of family practitioners prompted Hidalgo County physicians to collaborate with The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio to create a Family Medicine Residency at McAllen General Hospital in 1977. “We believed that young doctors were more likely to remain in the area where they did their residency,” said Dr. Kenneth Landrum, who was chair of the residency’s Obstetrics/Gynecology service. As part of the Family Medicine Board, Dr. Landrum, along with Dr. Cayetano Barrera II, Dr. Forrest Fitch, Dr. Rafael Garza, and Dr. Jesse Rodriguez, led the efforts to develop the program and recruited the hospital’s medical staff as faculty. “Experience is a big factor. The more they did as residents, the more capable they would be with their own patients.” Residents rotated through Internal Medicine, General Surgery, OB/GYN, and Pediatrics in the original two-year program, learning how to do Cesarean sections, fix broken bones, and handle most medical issues in order to practice in rural communities where each would be the sole medical provider.
A RAHC medical student examines an infant under the supervision of Dr. Luis de la Torre. (UTHSCSA)
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Today it is a three-year program that accepts six new M.D.s annually and operates a clinic, where residents see patients under the guidance of faculty, and uses McAllen Medical Center as the teaching hospital. Over half of the 175 graduates of the program practice medicine in the region. In 1996, Valley Baptist Medical Center’s Family Practice Residency program was established, prompted by the commitment of CEO Ben McKibbens and VBMC Board Chairman Billy Joe Simpson to bring more family doctors to the region. The faith-centered, three-year program, under the direction of Dr. Bruce Leibert, uses an apprenticestyle training to transform M.D.s into family doctors. Residents care for
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Dr. Garry Sourant, practicing physician and RAHC faculty member, instructs medical students and residents. (UTHSCSA)
patients at the Family Practice Clinic, which provides health care for 20,000 persons, and at VBMC. Approximately 36 percent of the graduates remain in the region practicing family medicine.
Dr. James Hanley, Director of the RAHC Internal Medicine Residency Program, reviews patient progress with residents.
The Regional Academic Health Center
(UTHSCSA)
The first proposal for a Rio Grande Valley Medical School originated with Senator Rogers Kelly in 1949. Almost 50 years later, the Lower Rio Grande Valley Regional Academic Health Center (RAHC) was established by The University of Texas System Board of Regents. In 2000 the RAHC Medical Education Division campus in Harlingen began coordinating clinical training for third and fourth year medical students of the University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio. Appointed Regional Dean in 2000, Dr. Leonel Vela worked with medical and civic leaders to build a faculty base and community support. The flagship RAHC Medical Education building opened in 2002. Valley Baptist Medical Center became the primary teaching hospital, and Su Clinica Familiar was the primary ambulatory teaching site, although the RAHC has agreements with hospitals and clinics throughout the Rio Grande Valley. From the beginning, the RAHC has provided students with exceptional, one-on-one, hands-on training. A unique volunteer faculty of more than 200 regional physicians trains 48 medical students during clinical rotations and clerkships in Internal Medicine, Surgery, Pediatrics, Obstetrics, Psychiatry, and Family Medicine. The budding doctors observe and work with established doctors who give them their first opportunities to interact and treat patients. A joint MD/MPH program is available. For 10 years, RAHC graduates have been highly ranked nationally and attained top residencies. The RAHC’s fully accredited Internal Medicine Residency Program, directed by Dr. James Hanley, began in 2002. Su Clinic Familiar and the VA Outpatient and Ambulatory Surgery Clinics are partner clinical teaching sites. Approximately half of the residency graduates were practicing medicine in the Valley. In 2009 the UT Board of Regents was authorized by the Legislature to transform the
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Assistant Dean of RAHC Medical Education Dr. Adela Valdez observes a medical student working with a mannequin. (UTHSCSA)
Surgical Technology students at Texas State Technical College Harlingen practice assisting during surgery. (UTHSCSA)
RAHC into the UT Health Science Center – South Texas, with a stand-alone four-year medical school and allied health degree programs. South Texas Medical Foundation was established to lead the consortium of physicians, communities, and patients in working with UT to plan and develop the medical school. Allied Health In 1925 the new Valley Baptist Hospital realized the need to train their own staff and started its first nursing school. Similarly Dr. William Whigham established the nurses’ school at McAllen Municipal Hospital in 1928 and combined classroom and hands-on learning. He taught many of the courses in the living room of the Nurses’ Residence, which had been the original McAllen hospital. Nursing students in McAllen worked six days a week from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. with two hours off. Valley Baptist Medical Center’s Licensed Vocational Nursing School, established in 1957 with a class of 10 women, is the only remaining hospital-based nursing school in the region. Mercy Hospital’s Canales Nursing School, which started in 1956, was taken over by Texas Southmost College in 1966 and became the area’s first college-based nursing program, and now awards an Associate Degree in
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Nursing. In 1995 The University of Texas at Brownsville began offering RNs a fully online, web-based B.S. in Nursing program. Pan American College started its Associate Degree/RN program in 1969. In 1992 The University of Texas-Pan American School of Nursing initiated its BSN program. UTPA’s Physician Assistant program, which began in 1994 with 19 students, now graduates 50 PAs from each 28-month course. Texas A&M University opened the School of Rural Public Health in McAllen in 2000 and grants graduate degrees in social and behavioral health and health policy and management to students who are typically working healthcare professionals. The School of Public Health Brownsville campus of UTHSC-Houston, led by Dr. Joseph McCormick, opened the same year with a faculty that researches regional health disparities and oversees students working on master’s and doctoral degrees. The University of Texas at Brownsville College of Biomedical Sciences and Health Professions, with a focus on research, provides a training ground for students aiming for medical and research careers. The Mario Ramirez Library at the RAHC provides medical journals and reference works as well as online resources.
The Ramiro Casso School of Nursing and Allied Health, established in 1995 at South Texas College, offers Associate Degrees in nursing, emergency medical technology, respiratory therapy, and physical therapy. The curriculum at Texas State Technical College includes AD programs in surgical technology, dental laboratory and vocational nursing.
(UTHSCSA)
Dental Assisting Technology students at TSTC spend hours practicing proper techniques.
An introduction to medicine
(TSTC)
Med High (South Texas High School for Health Professions founded in 1984) and Med Tech (South Texas Academy of Medical Technology, which opened in 2003) are magnet schools that combine rigorous academic coursework with technical and clinical healthcare training. Both have ranked among the top 100 schools in the US. For decades, high school students have been introduced to futures in medicine through health science technology courses and Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA.) Some students, through dual enrollment or cooperative education programs, graduate with certifications as pharmacy technicians or nursing assistants and use them as stepping stones to advanced degrees and medical careers. Dr. Mario Ramirez helped launch the UTHSCSA Med Ed program which nurtures Valley high school students’ interests in medical and healthcare careers through mentors, internships, and community service. About 700 students participate annually, which has led to an increase in health careers and applications to medical and dental schools.
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Research is often a matter of incremental knowledge, finding one more piece of a medical puzzle. In the Rio Grande Valley, much research addresses the critical health problems of the primarily Hispanic population.
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CHAPTER NINE
Medical Research
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
T
hrough scientific research, factors that affect health are identified and studied, leading to the testing of interventions and treatments. Research is often a matter of incremental knowledge, finding one more piece of a medical puzzle. When researchers address the serious diseases in their own region, the community becomes the laboratory. Researchers often have a personal stake in tackling endemic problems because family can be afflicted by those health issues. Since 2000, Valley medical research programs have proliferated, all with the goal of addressing the critical health problems of the primarily Hispanic population.
Opposite. Assistant professor Dr. Sung-Jen Wei is part of the RAHC's Medical Research faculty in Edinburg who are researching chronic diseases prevalent in Texas. (UTB) Biomedical and public health research at The University of Texas at Brownsville focuses on understanding and controlling the diseases prevalent in the Rio Grande Valley. (UTB)
Brownsville The University of Texas School of Public HealthBrownsville Campus has taken a multidisciplinary approach to researching the prevention of infectious and chronic diseases. Through the fields of epidemiology, genetics, immunology and environmental health, researchers are studying tuberculosis, diabetes and pneumonia with the goal of reducing health disparities in the Hispanic population. The Biomedical Research Building at The University of Texas at Brownsville opened in 2011 with multiple laboratories and research facilities. NIH grants have funded research on epilepsy, diabetes interventions, morbid obesity, and using nanoparticles to deliver drugs to tumors. Edinburg The Regional Academic Health Center (RAHC) Medical Research Division, adjacent to the University of Texas - Pan American, opened in 2006 to study the diseases that disproportionately affect border residents, with hopes of reducing chronic diseases in children and adults through FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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Dr. Subramanian Dhandrayuthapani is researching tuberculosis vaccines at the RAHC in Edinburg. (UTHSCSA)
research, nutrition and education. Principal investigators are working, for example, on the mechanisms involved in diabetic patients’ susceptibility to TB. Harlingen The Academic and Clinical Research Building of the RAHC opened in Harlingen in 2007 for clinical and translational studies. Medical researchers, who are UTHSCSA teaching faculty, are able to engage in controlled Phase I-IV clinical research studies. The program works to involve local doctors, who are focused on patient care, in translational studies, which are the application of scientific findings directly to patients. In addition, the doctors observe specific problems in a clinical setting that research investigators can pursue. Research topics can range from studying whether aspirin can minimize dementia to breast cancer prevention through genetic
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testing for high risk women. RAHC Internal Medicine residents participate in research through Kleberg grants that enable them to study issues like the incidences of diseases.
At the RAHC's Medical Research campus in Edinburg, projects follow rigorous protocols to ensure the data is derived from the best science practices.
McAllen At the School of Rural Public Health, the TAMU Health Science Center Border Health facility, the research faculty and graduate students carry out applied research on asthma, diabetes, and obesity. Besides investigating topics in clinical settings, researchers in behavioral health have scripted interventions in schools and homes of asthmatic patients that have resulted in decreased school absences and hospitalizations. At Vannie E. Cook Children’s Cancer Center, the Childhood Cancer Epidemiology and Prevention Program is evaluating the incidence of childhood cancer along the border, in collaboration with Baylor College of Medicine and the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center.
(UTHSCSA)
Across the region, individual physicians, such as oncologist Todd Shenkenberg, arrange for their patients to participate in clinical trials that broaden the treatment options for patients with cancer, diabetes, cardiac problems and other diseases. Rio Grande Valley native Dr. Sara Reyna is conducting reseach on diabetes and insulin resistance. (UTHSCSA)
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In 1942 a physician at the Farm Security Administration Camp Clinic in Weslaco examined a child with a broken arm. A focus on children’s health led to a proliferation of clinics and projects. The McAllen Child Clinic saw 3,000 children in 1958 and distributed 5,000 cans of milk. The Shriners assisted children with disabilities; the Lions took on eye glass recycling. The Hidalgo County Crippled Children’s Society collected funds for LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
research and rehabilitation.
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CHAPTER TEN
Public and Community Health
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
O
ver a three century span, Rio Grande Valley communities have stepped forward to provide medical care for the less fortunate. Poor, homeless yellow fever victims received care in temporary hospitals in the 1800s. Nora Kelly established homes for the aged and blind beginning in 1901. Mexican soldiers wounded in Matamoros were tended in makeshift Brownsville clinics in 1916.
Barrels filled with Rio Grande water were delivered to homes, as shown in this 1910 photograph taken in Brownsville. In the absence of safe water and sanitation, cholera epidemics often raged through border communities. (Brownsville Historical Association)
Mid-century, community leaders such as Leonel Gonzalez and Dr. James Wharton in McAllen and Martha Lewis in Harlingen established children’s clinics to improve pre-natal care and child nutrition, and they helped reduce infant mortality. The McAllen Child Clinic saw 3,000 children in 1958 and distributed 5,000 cans of milk. Other organizations adopted a cause and committed their resources to it: the Shriners assisted children with disabilities; the Lions took on eyeglass recycling; the Hidalgo County Crippled Children’s Society, formed in the late 1940s, collected funds for research and rehabilitation.
US Public Health Service Quarantine officers like Dr. Joe McKinsey could issue or waive travel restrictions at ports of entry. (McAllen Heritage Center)
As the population grew, broader community programs were initiated. In the 1940s, health care professionals started the Brownsville City Clinic to provide free health care to the poor. In 1952 Cameron County joined forces with the city to fund the clinic which was housed in an abandoned Fort Brown barracks. The Brownsville City/County Health Center opened in 1972 and was treating 100 patients daily within five years. Brownsville Community Health Center (BCHC) became an independent entity in 1987 and today is a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) with four locations and 90,000 patient encounters annually. In 1952, during the polio years, Judge J. T. Canales and concerned citizens organized
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Dr. Murdock Cameron, fifth from the left in this photograph taken when he worked with the Public Health Service at the Hidalgo Bridge, died in the 1918 influenza epidemic. (Diane Cameron)
the Brownsville Society for Crippled Children and hired physical therapist Rosita Putegnat to run the Mercy Hospital clinic. After the Moody Foundation funded a separate building in 1968, the nonprofit was called the Moody Clinic. Any child who needed speech, physical, developmental or occupational therapy services received treatment regardless of the ability to pay. The child with disabilities treated today might have autism spectrum disorder, cerebral palsy, spina bifida or Down syndrome. Dr. James Wharton was a familiar face in McAllen, where he was the City Health Officer, the only hospital anesthetist, and the co-founder of the McAllen Child Clinic. (McAllen Heritage Center)
Nora Kelly established a Home for Aged Women and cared for the ill and poverty-stricken.
Established in the 1940s, the Brownsville Community Health Center, a FQHC, includes school-based clinics and the New Horizon Medical Center. The Center provides comprehensive health care for low-income patients and is a clinical rotation site for medical and dental students and other healthcare trainees.
(Mother of Perpetual Help Nursing Home)
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In the 1960s, fourteen Harlingen doctors agreed to provide free primary care services to low-income families. MacPherson’s Pharmacy donated a room, and Sister Marion Strohmeyer organized the clinic. That effort, combined with funding from Catholic Charities, Organizaciones Unidas, and federal sources, led to the 1971 opening of Su Clinica Familiar in Raymondville and Harlingen and later Brownsville to serve migrant workers and their families. In 1980 Su Clinica, staffed by National Health Service Corps physicians, became one of the first migrant clinics to receive accreditation.
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Rosita Putegnat was the first physical therapist for the Brownsville Crippled Children’s clinic which was based in Mercy Hospital. (Moody Clinic) Dr. Hatfield was a co-founder of the McAllen Child Clinic which opened in 1949. (McAllen Public Library)
Now a comprehensive FQHC medical facility operating in Cameron and Willacy Counties, Su Clinica has over 166,000 patient visits annually in Harlingen alone, where it is the primary teaching clinic for RAHC medical students and residents.
The VA’s Ambulatory Surgical Center, which opened in Harlingen in 2011, enables 95 percent of area veterans to receive all their specialty medical care and surgical services in the Rio Grande Valley.
Established in 1971, Nuestra Clinica del Valle is a FQHC which operates 10 clinics in Hidalgo and Starr counties. Hidalgo County launched a mobile health clinic for rural residents in 1989 to provide them with primary care. The van moved between parking lots in Progreso, Alton, Las Milpas, Sullivan City, and Hargill. Community health programs now often employ promotoras, outreach health workers who bridge the gap between the formal healthcare system and low income, Spanish-speaking residents. Promotoras typically live in the community where they help their neighbors access accurate health information.
Brownsville Community Health Center facilities include the New Horizon Medical Center. Serving low-income patients, BCHC provides healthcare services regardless of the ability to pay. The Su Clinica facility in Brownsville, like its sister in Harlingen, offers maternity, dental, pediatric, and other services as a ‘comprehensive, one-stop medical shop.’ (Su Clinica)
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The VA Outpatient Clinic, the Regional Academic Health Center and Clinical Research Building, the RAHC Medical Education campus, the Ronald McDonald House, Su Clinica, and the VA Ambulatory Surgical Center underline the importance of medical care and medical education to the Rio Grande Valley and its economy.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The Future of Medicine in the Valley
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
T
he University of Texas Health Science Center-South Texas symbolizes the future of medicine in the Rio Grande Valley. Developed through the long-term collaboration of the Valley’s people and institutions, the new medical school will represent the community’s determination to create a top-ranked facility in a medically underserved region. Evolved from the Regional Academic Health Center, the new Health Science Center will bring dynamic medical training, more physicians, and relevant medical research to the border area. In addition to fostering a healthier community, the new School of Medicine will expand economic and educational opportunities in the broader community, just as UTHSC-San Antonio has done. In 2014, in addition to the existing RAHC students, UT will begin admitting its first medical students who will graduate in the Rio Grande Valley in 2018. The new medical school will follow the San Antonio model, with students initially spending their first two years at an existing campus followed by two clinical years spent in the Rio Grande Valley. The program will gradually build to
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At The University of Texas - Brownsville, the College of Biomedical Science and Health Professions, the School of Nursing and the School of Public Heath offer pathways to careers in medicine and research. (UTB) The Medical Research campus of the RAHC, adjacent to UTPA, attracts researchers investigating medical conditions that are common along the border.
stand-alone status and full accreditation with a charter class of 50 first-year students beginning in 2018. The medical students will be beneficiaries of an exceptional hands-on, one-on-one teaching environment combined with a solid foundation of didactics, clinical skills, and information technology along with access to top-quality medical research facilities in Edinburg and public health research in Brownsville. Building on the RAHC’s academic, research, clinical, and administrative infrastructure, the new medical school will have the resources to attract stellar faculty to teach, do research and train the next generations of physicians. By 2014, a virtual teaching hospital, the first of its kind, will open at the RAHC Medical Education Division. The ‘smart’ hospital will feature computerized mannequins programmed to exhibit human symptoms and respond to treatments. The high-tech models will prepare South Texas medical and healthcare students for the day they begin treating real patients. While the RAHC has prepared hundreds of medical students, only a handful of new M.D.s currently train in Valley residency programs. The broader foundation for the medical school requires expanding those programs to support at least 120 newly graduated M.D. residents at Valley hospitals. The existing RAHC Internal Medicine Residency program in Harlingen and the Family Medicine Residency in McAllen will expand. The RAHC will add a Psychiatry Residency program followed by residency programs in Surgery, Obstetrics and Gynecology, and Pediatrics. As new models of physician training are being developed, the University of Texas Health Science Center-South Texas has the opportunity to be at the fore of 21st Century medical education, which could involve interdisciplinary education of physicians, nurses and medical technologists. Certainly the future will bring the Rio Grande Valley more physicians, relevant medical research, and better access to health care.
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Milestones
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
1798 - 1858 1798 `
Variolation, a predecessor of the smallpox vaccination, is given to residents in villages south of Roma, reducing smallpox mortality rates.
1846
During the Mexican American War, army surgeons resort to amputation for most limb injuries.
1848
Starr County is named for Dr. J. H. Starr, the Republic of Texas’ Treasury Secretary.
1849
Artist James Audubon and companions are stricken with cholera near Fort Ringgold. The goldfield-bound group is rapidly decimated by death, debilitation and despair. Epidemics ravage Fort Brown and Matamoros.
Until the late 1800s, doctors practiced blood-cupping (thought to promote blood flow) and blood-letting (thought to ‘balance’ fluids in the body).
1850
Brownsville’s first pharmacy, Miller Drug Store, opens in a building still in use 162 years later.
(U.S. Army Medical Department Museum)
1851
Men wounded during a Matamoros battle die of lockjaw, caused by tetanus.
1857
Brownsville druggist Henry Miller is blown through a brick wall when 300 kegs of gunpowder explode on Levee Street. Dr. Watson extracts brick fragments from under his scalp over the next several weeks.
1858
A yellow fever epidemic “rampant and malignant” kills 26 at Fort Brown. A temporary hospital is built for yellow
Opposite. Fort Ringgold, 1852. Seventeen years before the Fort Ringgold hospital was built, the village and army post that grew into Rio Grande City hosted numerous river travelers and suffered through frequent epidemics. (MOSTH)
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Dr. John “Ripâ€? Ford stopped practicing medicine and became a Confederate army oďŹƒcer and later a Brownsville mayor and publisher. Prior to 1900, Army physicians used this type of surgical kit which contained saws for amputating limbs.
fever victims. The new Incarnate Word school closes when three of the four nuns are stricken, but they recover due to “the excellent nursing of the Creole lady who knew how to treat that disorder.� 1861
The New Drug Store opens at 12th and Elizabeth in Brownsville and later becomes the Botica Del Leon run by John and Eliza Putegnat.
1861
Dr. “Rip� Ford, Colonel of the Texas Cavalry, negotiates the Union surrender of Fort Brown to Confederate forces. His nickname comes from his writing of RIP on condolence letters sent to families of fallen soldiers.
1863
The house of Israel Bigelow, first Cameron County judge, is used as a hospital by both Union and Confederate forces, successively.
1864
Mrs. Clark of Clarksville nurses sick Confederate soldiers.
1865
During the Civil War, over 200,000 soldiers die of battle injuries and another 400,000 troops lose their lives to typhoid, diarrhea, measles, cholera. English physician Joseph Lister discovers that cleanliness prevents infections.
1866
Smallpox epidemics kill many black soldiers whose bodies are interred on the island cemetery in the Fort Brown resaca.
1868
The Fort Brown hospital, built under the supervision
(U.S. Army Medical Department Museum)
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The hospital at Fort Brown often filled with patients suffering from malaria, cholera, and yellow fever. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
of Col. Alonzo Wainwright with one million local bricks, is designed with 10-foot wide breezeways, differing from the standard fort architecture of the time. 1881
Folk healer Don Pedro Jaramillo settles in Falfurrias, and Valley ranch families begin travelling by horse and buggy to seek cures from him.
1882
Residents of Brownsville organize to fight yellow fever, although no one realizes that mosquitoes transmit the disease. Quarantines, closure of the border, and burning patients’ bedding and clothing do nothing to stop the deaths of 1,500. Army physician William Gorgas examines cadavers in the morgue building in an attempt to understand the dreaded Yellow Jack.
1891
The Fort Ringgold hospital, modeled on Fort Brown’s, has a central administration building flanked by two 12-bed wards. The post has water works and an ice machine.
1892
Dr. A.J.J. Austin, el doctor Palomo known for his white suits, enforces a quarantine in Camargo during a yellow fever epidemic.
Tea made from cenizo leaves and branches was used by early Valley residents to treat coughs.
Fruit of the Mexican wild olive or anacahuita was made into a cough syrup during the 1800s.
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Dr. Alex Headley, a former British naval surgeon, became deeply involved in violent Hidalgo County politics around 1890 and worked with the short-lived Independent Republic of Hidalgo. His daughter Mary Ann was the first Valley-born physician. (MOSTH)
1893
Botica del Aguila advertises drugs, patent medicines, perfumes, and “prescriptions carefully compounded at all hours of the day or night” by proprietor Emile Kleiber of Brownsville.
1893
Dr. A. J. Wolffe, former Fort Brown surgeon, is the State Quarantine Officer for the Brazos Santiago District and stationed at the Point Isabel lighthouse to prevent ships with cholera and yellow fever victims from docking or discharging passengers.
1896
The Brownsville Matamoros Medical Association meets with Dr.Wolff as Secretary. In Hidalgo County, Dr. Headley, Dr. Benton, Dr. Latham and Dr. West see patients. Practicing physicians in Starr County are Headley, W.I. Kennedy, J. Sheltenburger, Cristoforo Solis and William Jones.
1897
James Dishman, seriously wounded in a shootout with rustlers on his north Cameron County ranch, is treated by Doctors Fred and Joe Combes of Brownsville. The Town of Combes is established on Dishman’s land 30 years later.
1900
The primary causes of death in the United States are pneumonia and influenza, tuberculosis, and diarrhea.
All-stainless steel instruments gradually replaced bone-handled ones in a surgeon’s kit. (U.S. Army Medical Department Museum)
Patent medicines emphasized their botanical roots. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
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1901
Nora Kelly converts a Washington Street house in Brownsville into St. Joseph’s Home for the Aged and Blind. Registered Nurse Fannie Putegnat assists doctors and delivers babies.
Botica de San Jose was a typical border pharmacy in the early 1900s. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
1902
Using Dr. Reed’s and Dr. Findlay’s discovery that mosquitos transmit yellow fever, Dr. William Gorgas is the first person to successfully apply mosquito control methods that eradicate yellow fever in Cuba and later in Panama, enabling the canal to be built.
1904
Eustacia Dabney Hill dies of typhoid fever in Brownsville, leaving her widower Lon to move the family into Harlingen’s first house two months later. The Cameron County Medical Society is founded.
1907
The Texas Medical Practice Act passes, restricting medical practice to licensed M.D.s who have graduated from approved medical schools or have practiced for many years. For a $2 fee, the Hidalgo County Medical Examiner registers doctors with credentials.
1908
Dr. J.B. F. McMillian, 54, drives his horse-drawn buggy to see patients around Chapin (soon to be Edinburg) after practicing briefly in Sam Fordyce and West McAllen. He builds a drug store and the McMillan Building.
1909
The Works brothers – Dr. B.O. (surgeon), Dr. Royale (ENT) and Dr. Bynum (obstetrics) – open a private hospital, the Works Sanitarium, at First and Levee in Brownsville. Other physicians are invited to treat their patients there. In Harlingen, brothers Casper Letzerich, a GP, and Alfred Letzerich, a surgeon, open their practice in a two-story brick
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building at Commerce and Jackson above the drugstore run by a third brother, Hugo.
These nurses and medical aides were photographed along the border during the Mexican Revolution. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
1910 Dr. Mary Ann Headley Edgerton, born in Hidalgo County in 1887, becomes the first Valley native to graduate from medical school. As health officer for Starr, Jim Hogg, and Brooks Counties, she brings a smallpox epidemic under control by vaccinating everyone. Later she opens an office in Rio Grande City. Harlingen has two resident dentists: Brutus Roberts and Mount C. Wild, a Canadian. 1911 Dr. Katherine Clarey Brown moves to Harlingen where, although she does not practice, she offers the first in-patient care, taking patients into her home.
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1912
Dr. Frank Osborn in McAllen responds to white sheets hung on the front porch as a signal that the doctor is needed in pre-telephone days.
1913
General Blanco attacks Matamoros and 225 wounded soldiers are brought to Brownsville. Nora Kelly’s charity home is the receiving station for wounded men who are sent to temporary hospitals set up in saloons and schools.
1914
The Mexican Revolution forces American doctors to flee Mexico. Among them is Dr. A. J. J. Austin who begins seeing patients in Los Ebanos and later in Mission. Dr. William McGee opens his practice inside the Jones and Sons Feed Store, McAllen.
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1915
In response to banditry and World War I in Europe, the U.S. military presence expands in the Valley, bringing army doctors.
1916
The military’s central hospital for border troops occupies the Llano Grande mansion in Weslaco.
1917
After a long fund-raising campaign, Divine Providence Hospital opens in Brownsville at Sixth and Madison. Mother Superior Mary Stanislaus of the Sisters of Mercy arrives from Laredo as administrator and stays for 29 years. Brownsville has the Valley’s first Red Cross chapter.
1918
The Spanish influenza epidemic finally reaches the Rio Grande Valley and kills young adults like Gordon Hill as well as the Red Cross’ Dr. Murdoch Cameron, who previously had led the U.S. Public Health Department at the Hidalgo crossing. By October Southwest Telephone and Telegraph Company service is limited because so many employees are sick.
1919
In Brownsville, Dr. O.V. Lawrence installs a room-sized X-ray machine, the area’s first, which is used until 1957. He later helps build Mercy Hospital and found Brownsville Junior College, underwriting scholarships and teachers’ salaries.
1920
Cayetano Barrera II becomes the first Hispanic to graduate from a Texas medical school (Baylor) and opens his practice in Mission. Dr. Carlos BallĂ is the first Mexican-born doctor to open a McAllen practice at 17th Street and Beaumont. Dr. James Doss opens Doss Surgical Hospital in McAllen on Hackberry. The Mercedes Obstetrical and Surgical Hospital admits its first patients.
1921
The use of business cards by M.D.s is considered unethical. The Women’s Auxiliary of the Hidalgo County Medical Society is formed by the nurses, wives, and daughters of physicians.
1922
“Lantern slides� are used for a presentation at a Hidalgo County Medical Society meeting. Dr. Hunter declares that Hidalgo and Starr Counties have too many doctors: 45 doctors for 30,000 people or a 1:606 ratio.
A dental oďŹƒce from the 1920-30s has been recreated inside Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
Over-the-counter medications began replacing homemade remedies. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
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People came to the Oden Garcia Drugstore in Mercedes not only for medications but for the treats found at the pharmacy soda fountain, a popular destination in the first half of the 20th century. (MOSTH)
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1923
Marie Yeager, R. N., and Ida Gilbert assemble abandoned army barracks on “F” Street to create Harlingen’s first hospital, which includes a primitive operating room and a birthing room. Nina Vigness watches from the hospital’s porch as Dr. Alfred Letzerich performs an appendectomy on her husband. Brownsville’s large new Mercy Hospital, replacing Divine Providence, opens with nuns continuing as nurses and administrators.
1924
The Hidalgo Medical Society hears papers on the use of insulin in treating diabetics.
1925
The 19-room Valley Baptist Hospital opens in Harlingen and in its first year treats 564 patients, 65 of them charity cases. McAllen physicians Osborn and Harrison lead the drive which opens the first municipal hospital.
1926
The community-operated Mercedes General Hospital opens. Dr. Barrera builds an 8-bed hospital in Mission after being prohibited from treating patients at the new McAllen Municipal Hospital because he is Hispanic. Dr. William Whigham performs surgeries in his private hospital in Donna before relocating to McAllen.
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1927
Edinburg’s city hospital, Grandview, opens and accepts county charity patients. The McAllen hospital starts its nurses’ training program.
1928
Students in Valley Baptist Nursing School live in the hospital basement until a two-story wooden building is constructed as their dormitory.
1928
Early vision testing equipment included the still common Snellen chart to measure vision acuity. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
The second McAllen Municipal Hospital opens next to the original, which becomes a nurses’ residence.
1929
Tooth brushing to prevent tooth decay is the topic of a Hidalgo Medical Society presentation. Dr. George Gallaher opens his Harlingen medical offices in the Baxter Building and practices there until his death in 1971.
1930
Licensed surgeon Dr. Octavio Garcia successfully campaigns to gain use of the operating room at McAllen General, initially denied because of his Mexican ethnicity. In Germany, future La Feria physician Heinrich Lamm discovers how to bend light, the revolutionary discovery which leads to fiber optics and gastroscopes.
1931
U.S. Public Health Service issues a “Quarantine Night Pass” for the Hidalgo International Bridge.
1932
After buying a Reynosa radio station, notorious goat-gland rejuvenation quack Dr. John Brinkley establishes a clinic in San Juan for the treatment of rectal problems. Spinal anesthesia and the use of the new rabbit test to determine pregnancy are topics heard at Hidalgo Medical Society presentations.
During the gas rationing of World War II, La Feria physician Annie Lamm frequently rode horseback to visit her pregnant patients. (Michael Lamm)
1933
The Labor Day Hurricane devastates the Valley. Tents used as hospital wards surround Valley Baptist Hospital after relief trains arrive to help care for approximately 500 injured by winds and flooding. Fears of typhoid fever prompt 19,892 to be immunized.
1934
Fifty-five charter members establish the Hidalgo-Starr County Medical Association. Paul Maxwell opens a maternity hospital in Harlingen.
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Dr. George Gallaher opened his office in Harlingen in 1929 using this second-hand equipment. (Harlingen Arts & Heritage Museum)
The Sisters of Mercy continued to operate Mercy Hospital until 1971. (Valley Baptist Health System)
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1935
Dr. J. B. Leisure and Dr. H.A. Lile, surgeons, operate the L & L Clinic at 206 Jackson in Harlingen.
1936
Private duty nurse Myra George is paid five dollars for a 24-hour shift.
1937
Because of the “F” Street hospital’s semi-basement, rains flood it regularly, and patients have to be rescued.
1939
Dr. Clarence Cash realizes he has delivered every single member of San Benito’s football team’s first string, and most of the bench warmers, too.
1940
Public health nurse Martha Susan Lewis, founder of the Well Baby Clinic in Harlingen, is credited with reducing infant mortality rates over the next 10 years. Dr. Octavio Garcia with Dr. Duncan and Dr. McKinsey take the lead in providing medical services to victims of an Alamo train wreck.
1941
Dr. and Mrs. T. J. La Motte of Harlingen are featured in “Ripley’s Believe It or Not.” Each of their children was born on June 3: 1936, 1937, 1939, 1940.
1944
With Valley men away fighting World War II, many local doctors assume the medical care of the wives and children who struggle on minimal income, according to a doctor’s son. The boy’s first puppy and horse had been given to his father in lieu of payment for medical care.
1945
Four Army doctors handle obstetrics for dependents of soldiers stationed at Harlingen Army Airfield, delivering babies at Valley Baptist. Dr. Hesiquio Rodriguez, valedictorian of Harlingen High in 1935, returns from World War II service and becomes the first Hispanic doctor and possibly first Harlingen-born doctor on the Valley Baptist staff. That hospital has its first iron lung.
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A dentist examined a child’s teeth at the Weslaco Farm Security Administration camp in 1942. (Library of Congress)
1946
A smallpox outbreak in Cameron County prompts the Medical Society to lead a vaccination program. Weaver Baker Memorial Tuberculosis Hospital operates at Mission’s Moore Field until the Korean War.
1947
In a mass tuberculosis survey in Hidalgo County by the U.S. Public Health Service, thousands of children are given chest x-rays, including those at the Sunny Glen Home in San Juan.
1948
Dr. Hector Garcia, raised in Mercedes, starts the American G.I. Forum to overcome discrimination against Mexican-American veterans. His crusade ends school segregation of Hispanics. The surgeon is later appointed by President Lyndon Johnson to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and receives the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis recruits Dr. John Welty to oversee the fight against polio, an endemic disease in the Valley.
1949
Dr. James Wharton, the only anesthetist at McAllen Municipal Hospital between 1925 and 1950, is one of the founders of McAllen Child Clinic. His original license was issued in Indian Territory. A polio epidemic in the Valley panics parents who keep their children away from crowds and swimming pools.
1951
Cameron County Administrators divide $50,000 for charity care between three hospitals – Dolly Vinsant, Mercy and Valley Baptist.
1952
At the height of the polio summer terrors, Valley Baptist patients in iron lungs – toddlers, teenagers and adults – are
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housed in the basement. In Texas 4,000 are stricken. Nurse Rosita Putegnat heads the new Brownsville Society for Crippled Children, which she leads until 1973.
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1953
Cameron County has 81 cases of polio. Dr. Clarence Cash, who began making house calls on horseback in 1898, is named Texas General Practitioner of the Year, shortly after a San Benito school is named for him. He has delivered over 5,500 babies in his 55 years in practice.
1954
Mission Hospital opens its 40-bed, $650,000 facility. McAllen’s original 1925 hospital, long used as a nurses’ dormitory, is razed. Cameron County has 49 cases of polio. Valley Diagnostic Center opens under the direction of Dr. Howard Tewell, the region’s first board certified internal medicine specialist.
1955
Actor Fess Parker’s role of a pilot raving about giant flying ants, in the science fiction movie Them! filmed in Brownsville’s Mercy Hospital, leads to his casting as Davy Crockett.
1956
The new Valley Baptist Hospital opens as the region’s largest medical facility. Sister Mary Ambrose starts the LVN program at Mercy Hospital’s Canales
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Pathology lab director Irby Davis checked a slide, 1945. (Valley Baptist Health System)
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School of Nursing with RN Lois del Castillo among the instructors. The first patients are admitted to Harlingen State Tuberculosis Hospital. The 600-bed facility reaches full occupancy in 1957. 1957
1958
Valley Baptist launches a School of Vocational Nursing. Dr. Mario Ramirez opens Roma’s first hospital, the Manuel Ramirez Memorial, named after his grandfather who helped finance his education.
Laboratory work has been a critical element in diagnosing and tracking illnesses. (Valley Baptist Health System)
The cost of surgery and other medical fees of mid-century bills seems miniscule today . (Michael Lamm)
State hospitals, including the Harlingen TB facility, are shaking o the reputation as repositories for unlicensed physicians.
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The McAllen Alien Detention Center provided medical care to detainees in 1955.
1959
Pharmaceutical company Charles Pfizer donates $2,000 worth of penicillin to Frank Ferree Volunteer Border Relief for charity cases. Valley Baptist opens a heliport.
1960
The oral polio vaccine on sugar cubes is handed out in drive-by dispensaries on Jackson Street, Harlingen. On Sunday afternoons, Brownsville nurses volunteer to give the Sabin oral vaccine to community adults. Most children receive their polio vaccine at school.
1961
Ads boast that more doctors smoke Camel cigarettes than other brands.
1962
As Knapp Methodist Hospital opens, 10 board members lend the hospital $1,000 each to pay off a contractor’s bill and avoid a law suit.
1963
The State Adult Mental Health Clinic, one of four in Texas, opens on former Harlingen Air Force Base property. The Auxiliary of McAllen General Hospital rents televisions to patients.
1964
Dr. Enrique Trapp is superintendent of the State TB Hospital which has 578 beds, 10 full-time doctors, 299 other employees and 370 patients.
1965
The Doctor’s Draft Law, in effect between 1950 and 1973, spanning the Korean War and the Vietnam War, brings 30,000 male physicians into the military for two years’ service.
1967
Texas’ first community mental health center, Tropical Texas Center for Mental Health and Mental Retardation, opens in the basement of the Edinburg hospital. Helicopters evacuate 110 patients from the TB hospital during Hurricane Beulah’s flooding. Rio Grande
(McAllen Heritage Center)
The McAllen General Hospital, under various names, kept expanding and adding wings and medical services in this downtown location from 1925 to 1986. (MOSTH)
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City operates a disaster hospital for flood refugees. In Beulah’s aftermath, Dr. John Reeder uses a motorboat to get to Valley Baptist Hospital. 1968
The Brownsville Society for Crippled Children moves into the Moody Clinic and continues providing therapy free of charge to children disabled by cerebral palsy, spina bifida, and other illnesses.
1969
Edinburg General Hospital opens adjacent to Grandview which is repurposed as a Mental Health/Mental Retardation Rehabilitation Center.
1970
Sister Mary Vincelli establishes a clinic for the medically underserved in Pharr and helps instigate a newborn screening program.
1971
With tuberculosis under control, the TB Hospital changes its mission and name to the Harlingen State Chest Hospital for bronchitis and emphysema patients.
1972
Dr. Hjalmer Sybilrud retires after practicing medicine since 1918, the oldest internist in the Valley. The film Instead of El Dorado, produced by the AMA, starring Dr. Mario Ramirez, debuts to illustrate modern medical care applied to a poverty-stricken environment. A 200-bed facility for those with mental retardation opens on the State Chest Hospital campus. In Raymondville, Sister Angela Murdock establishes the region’s first rural birthing center for Su Clinica Familiar.
Refugees arrived in Rio Grande City needing medical attention following Hurricane Beulah. (Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M.D. Library)
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Clinics that immunized children drastically reduced the incidence of diseases such as measles, chickenpox, polio, scarlet fever, diphtheria and tetanus.
1974
The region’s first Newborn and Pediatric ICU opens at Valley Baptist Hospital.
1975
Starr County Memorial Hospital opens in Rio Grande City with the backing of County Judge Dr. Mario Ramirez, who closes his own hospital in Roma.
1976
Marin, Bernard, and Omar Garza, brothers and doctors, practice medicine together in the Valley. In Brownsville, children newly crippled by polio are treated, reportedly victims of a defective vaccine distributed in Matamoros.
1977
Cardiovascular surgeon Marion Lawler Jr. performs the first open heart surgery in the Valley, and the region’s first cardiac catheterization lab opens at Valley Baptist. Rio Grande Cancer Treatment Center opens as a branch of UT M.D. Anderson. Ruben Edelstein secures federal funding for Brownsville Community Health Clinic, which sees 2,400 patients its first year.
1979
Watson Wise Dialysis Center opens for kidney patients.
1980
McAllen gets out of the hospital business, selling McAllen General to Methodist Hospital of Dallas. Dr. Octavio Garcia closes his McAllen office after 50 years.
1981
McAllen General does not have in-house CAT scanners, so patients are wheeled across the street to an imaging center.
1982
The Jesse Crump Diabetes Center starts at Valley Baptist. Rio Grande Regional Hospital opens with 220 beds and specializes in women’s health services and cardiac care.
1983
Good Housekeeping magazine publishes “Letter to a Young Doctor,” written by Dr. Mario Ramirez, who recommends young doctors go where they are most
(Dr. Mario E. Ramirez Collection, Mario E. Ramirez, M. D. Library)
Dr. Cayetano Barrera III, drafted into the army after medical school, served in Vietnam. (Cayetano Barrera, M.D.)
At the Moody Clinic, a therapist worked with a child with disabilities. (Moody Clinic)
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needed and practice in underserved communities to be rewarded with great satisfaction, if long hours.
Intensive Care Unit nurses charted patients’ progress, 1975.
1984
A Valley Baptist cardiologist performs the region’s first balloon angioplasty.
(Valley Baptist Health System)
1986
McAllen Medical Center opens with 330 beds on six floors, replacing McAllen Methodist. The $50 million facility has birthing rooms, electric controls on beds, nursing stations in the center of triangular wings, a morgue, and a “revolutionary� MRI.
1987
The not-for-profit $15 million, 110-bed Mission Hospital opens. The Valley’s first hospice, Sandi Jo Funk, provides end of life care for the terminally ill. Valley Baptist opens a six-story South Tower and a three-story North Tower.
1989
Sister Marian Strohmeyer, with Catholic Diocese support, establishes Comfort House, initially directed at AIDS patients, to care for patients who are terminally ill. The RGV Cancer Center becomes the Vannie Cook Jr. Children’s Cancer Center, named for a Valley philanthropist who organized fundraisers so patients wouldn’t have to leave the Valley for treatment. Texas’ first mobile health clinic for primary care operates in Hidalgo County.
1990
The region’s first cardiac defibrillator is implanted at VBMC.
1991
Within 36 hours, seven babies are born in Brownsville with neural tube defects, which are later linked to lack of folic acid during pregnancy. The rash of anencephalic and neural tube birth defects leads Valley advocates to spur the formation of the Texas State Registry of birth defects to detect and track patterns of epidemiology.
1992
Incubators have helped premature infants get a stronger start. (Valley Baptist Health System)
A cholera outbreak in Mexico triggers fears of outbreaks in Texas colonias with substandard water and sewer connections.
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Valley hospitals continued to add services so residents would not have to leave the Valley to receive specialty care.
1993
Rio Grande City’s five obstetricians announce they will no longer delivers babies, hoping to convince legislators to enact tort reform and protect MDs from frivolous lawsuits. A resurgence of TB – antibiotic resistant strains – has brought Hidalgo County 508 cases over five years while Cameron County has recorded 405 new cases.
1994
Valley Baptist is the first facility to grant certified nursemidwives hospital privileges and allow them to attend their patients there, thanks to efforts by Dr. Stan Fisch, Dr. Ruben Martinez and Dr. Ramiro Munoz.
1995
Hidalgo County has five cases of dengue fever. Valley Air Care provides helicopters to speed patients to hospitals, averaging one flight per day.
1996
McAllen Heart Hospital, a surgeon-cardiologist partnership, becomes the first freestanding cardiology and cardiovascular hospital in the U.S.
1997
Doctors Hospital at Renaissance and Edinburg Regional Hospital open.
1998
Harlingen is selected as the Medical Education site and Edinburg as the Medical Research site for The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio’s Regional Academic Health Center (RAHC.) The Valley’s first Ronald McDonald House opens. VBMC is designated a Joint Replacement Center due to the work of Dr. Rick Basset who holds patents on knee and hip replacement prostheses.
1999
About 50 percent of McAllen nurses are foreign born, reflecting a nursing shortage.
2000
Texas A&M University’s School of Rural Public Health opens its Border Health campus in McAllen. It is one of
(South Texas Health System)
Valley Air Care helicopters brought patients to emergency rooms from distant accident scenes. (Valley Baptist Health System)
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the nation’s top 25 graduate schools in Public Health. The School of Public Health, UTHSC-Houston, opens its Brownsville campus at UTB. Valley native Dr. Leonel Vela is named Regional Dean of the RAHC. 2001
In retirement, Dr. Ramiro Casso founded El Milagro Clinic for indigent patients and established South Texas College's School of Nursing and Allied Health, now named in his honor.
2002
Harlingen Medical Center, organized by community physicians seeking greater administrative control, opens as an acute care hospital. The RAHC Medical Education Division opens to provide third- and fourth-year medical students and Internal Medicine residents with hands-on training. Located on 18.5 acres donated by VBMC, the RAHC draws raves from medical students who receive unprecedented one-on-one training from area doctors who are volunteer faculty. Su Clinica Familiar opens its $6 million facility to serve low income patients as a one-stop health care shop.
2003
Dr. Clay Ross and Dr. Marion Lawler are named Outstanding Faculty by the RAHC’s medical students.
2004
What for many years had been Mercy Hospital and Brownsville Medical Center is acquired by Valley Baptist Health System, giving the Harlingen not-for-profit about 900 beds in Cameron County.
2005
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid announce health care providers can charge the government for emergency care to illegal migrants. In South Texas, ER patients receive $46 million in uncompensated health care, including $9 million for undocumented patients.
2006
Neurologist Victoria Parada tested the responses of a hospitalized patient. (Valley Baptist Health System)
Dr. Francisco Cigarroa, then President of The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio, talked to medical students, Internal Medicine residents, and faculty in the RAHC’s lobby. (UTHSCSA)
The Valley’s first Children’s Hospital opens in Edinburg.
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2009
The Institute of Museums and Library’s Service Award for Community Outreach goes to the RAHC’s Mario Ramirez Library and Greysi Reyna for the program which teaches promotoras how to guide people to the most accurate health information. Researchers at the RAHC-Edinburg announce in Nature Medicine that their study has shown a way to create a more eective TB vaccine.
2010
Med High, the regional magnet school for health professions, is ranked among the nation’s top 100 high schools by Newsweek.
2011
Surgical technicians, vocational and registered nurses, and dental hygienists have completed their academic and hands-on training at Texas State Technical College-Harlingen. (TSTC – Harlingen)
The VA Texas Valley Coastal Bend Health Care Center opens in Harlingen to provide specialty outpatient care and ambulatory surgical services to veterans. Knapp Hospital launches a pharmacy automation system.
2012
The DaVinciÂŽ Robotic system has enabled physicians like Dr. Erin McCormick to perform more minimally invasive surgeries.
The Regional Academic Health Center celebrates its tenth anniversary and announces the first endowed chair.
2014
The UT Health Science Center - San Antonio admits its first 15 medical students into a separate track for the Valley.
2018
The first students in the separate Rio Grande Valley track receive their M.D. degrees in their own Valley graduation ceremony and the charter class of 50 first-year medical students enter the new UTHSC - South Texas Medical School.
(Valley Baptist Health System)
At the tenth anniversary celebration of the RAHC in 2012, speakers forecast the opening of the South Texas Health Science Center School of Medicine within 10 years. (UTHSCSA)
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Profiles
F O R T H E G O O D O F M Y PAT I E N T S : T H E H I S TO RY O F M E D I C I N E I N T H E R I O G R A N D E VA L L E Y
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS PHOTOS
Nurse Houston and Dr. George Stell FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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Back To Action Physical Therapy A
ctive in high school athletics in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Brett Tice enrolled in junior college with no clear goal in mind. After his sisterin-law was hit by a drunk driver in 1993, Brett heard her describe in detail the physical therapy she was receiving. The similarities between rehabilitation and athletic training led him to volunteer with a number of Physical Therapists. Intrigued, he enrolled at Oklahoma University – one of the top ten PT schools in the nation – and graduated in 1996 with a BS in Physical Therapy. Brett Tice’s entrepreneurial spirit and his aptitude for management quickly became evident. On his first job at Brownsville Medical Center, he was promoted to Director of Rehab in less than six months. He then became the director of three outpatient clinics, was subsequently hired as manager for a large, multifaceted PT practice, and went on to earn a doctorate in Physical Therapy. In 2001 Harlingen physicians asked Dr. Tice to open his own physical therapy clinic. Dr. Tice combined his experience and credentials to launch Back to Action which emphasizes the hands-on techniques that lead to pain relief and functional recovery. The Harlingen clinic staff continues to provide therapeutic exercise, functional training, and numerous services not offered by other physical therapists. Back to Action clients are aided by aquatic therapy in heated pools, vestibular/ balance therapy, fall prevention, and the cutting edge Gamercising program which keeps patients engaged and motivated. Dr. Brett Tice has set high standards of professional excellence for himself, his staff, and his clinic. He is committed to give each individual a rehabilitation program designed for their specific needs. He became certified in Functional Capacity Evaluations and is a certified ergonomist. Two other clinic directors hold doctorates in Physical Therapy. In addition, Back to Action created its own Electronic Medical Records program. Observing the need for physical therapy services along the border, Dr. Tice has also established successful Back to Action clinics in McAllen, Eagle Pass and Del Rio. In each location, he is dedicated to providing the best physical therapy experience with the highest quality of care for optimal results. He has served on the TPTA state board and as a delegate to the APTA.
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The Cayetano E. Barrera Family L
ieutenant Santiago Barrera came to Mier on the Rio Grande at its founding in 1753. He was the second Alcalde (Mayor) of Mier and was the surveyor of the Mier porciónes Spanish land grants on both sides of the Rio Grande. In 1895 his descendant Cayetano Barrera, Jr. was born on the family’s land grant, Charco Redondo in Brooks County. In 1898 the family established LaReforma Ranch in northern Starr and Hidalgo Counties. Cayetano attended a private ranch school, Colegio Altamirano, in Hebbronville and the Ateneo Fuentes in Saltillo. The Mexican Revolution cut short his studies at the University of Mexico Medical School in Mexico City. Initially refused entrance to Baylor University in Waco because of his Mexican-American ethnicity, he was eventually admitted to Baylor University in 1914 and then in 1916 to the Baylor University College of Medicine in Dallas. In 1920, he became the first Mexican-American to graduate from a Texas medical school. In 1920 Dr. Barrera established his medical practice in Mission, Texas. In 1925 he opened his second-story office and small hospital on Conway Avenue next to the Barrera Drug Store. The hospital had an operating room where he did minor surgery, a delivery room, laboratory, and six hospital beds. He performed his own laboratory tests and filled his own prescriptions. Dr. Barrera married Josephine Bennet and had six children: Aida, Alma, Anna, Luis, and the adopted twins, Olga and Velia. After a divorce, Dr. Barrera married Simona de la Garza in 1933, and they had three children: Aida, Tula and Cayetano III. Dr. Barrera’s children occasionally accompanied him on house calls to distant ranches. He delighted in his family and made sure the children got a good education. When the children wanted bicycles, their father made them earn the money – picking and selling green beans door to door. Dr. Barrera had wide-ranging interests. He loved classical music, history, ranching, growing fruit trees, and carpentry. Dr. Barrera contracted tuberculosis in 1943 and retired to his San Jose Ranch, where he died in 1947 at age 51. His son Dr. Cayetano Barrera III practiced in McAllen for 43 years. His grandson Dr. Javier Valadez is an Internist in Dallas.
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Boggus Family G
enerations of the Boggus family have shared a commitment to help their communities thrive. At age 20, Lewis Boggus Sr. became the nation’s youngest Ford dealership owner when his Mission agency opened in 1921. He established Ford dealerships in Brownsville, Corpus Christi, Harlingen, McAllen, Raymondville and San Benito. In 1950 Lewis’ son Frank became the Harlingen dealership manager. Running a successful business did not stop Boggus family members from acting on the belief that a hospital is among a community’s most vital assets: each has viewed hospital board service as an important responsibility. Lewis Boggus joined the Valley Baptist Hospital Advisory committee in 1952 and, until his death in 1965, offered the growing medical facility the insights gained from his business experience. Frank Boggus became a Valley Baptist board member in 1966. Since then, he has served on various boards at the hospital, including helping to lead an $8 million capital campaign. In 2008, he was made a Lifetime Director of Valley Baptist Medical Foundation. Frank also helped establish Texas State Technical College, the Boys and Girls Club and has chaired effective charitable organizations such as the Salvation Army and Loaves and Fishes. Frank and Peggy Boggus’ sons Bob and Jack joined the family business and continued the family tradition of contributing to the community. Following Jack’s death in 1992, the Boggus Medical Education Pavilion at Valley Baptist Medical Center was named in his honor. Bob served on the Valley Baptist Health System Board of Directors from 1993 to 2010. In addition, Frank and Bob Boggus served together on the Golden Palms Health and Retirement Center Board. Bob took over the family business from his father in 2001 and is currently president of the Harlingen and McAllen dealerships. Barbara Sue Boggus Tucker, along with her parents Frank and Peggy, championed the establishment of the Valley’s first Ronald McDonald House in 1998. Barbara Sue served as the building chairman for the Ronald McDonald House, and she held several executive positions during her ten years as a Ronald McDonald House board member. She currently serves on the RMH Advisory Board.
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Ramiro Casso, M.D. I
n every aspect of Ramiro Raul Casso’s life, one principle held true: a deep regard, indeed a reverence, for the dignity of every person, particularly the most vulnerable individuals. His life as a doctor, father, civil rights pioneer, educator, and college administrator was a testimony to his commitment and his advocacy on their behalf. From a Laredo colonia, Ramiro Casso went to Texas A&M University and Baylor for degrees in engineering and chemistry. After military service during World War II, he graduated from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School and in 1957 opened his family practice in McAllen. A board certified family physician, Dr. Casso began making house calls, delivering babies, and providing medical care for entire families. Dr. Casso’s vision and compassion led him into the political arena, beginning in 1948 with his work to end school segregation for Hispanics. In the 1960s, he opened a medical clinic for farm workers who lacked access to medical care, and then he co-founded the Hidalgo County Health Care Corp., which set up five outpatient clinics. He publicly stood up for farmworkers abused by Texas Rangers and registered voters at his office. Dr. Casso served on the National Advisory Board for Health Care of the Aged while advocating for the passage of Medicare in 1965. Three Texas governors appointed him to state boards, President Lyndon Johnson appointed him to the National Advisory Board for Health Research Facilities, and Dr. Casso participated in White House Conferences on health and nutrition. In 1994, retirement from medical practice after 37 years freed Dr. Casso to direct his tireless, impassioned efforts to healthcare education and services, including organizing public support for establishing the Regional Academic Health Center and founding El Milagro Clinic for uninsured patients. In 1995, he assumed the task of establishing South Texas College’s nursing and allied health program. In 2000, the new STC campus was named in his honor. Dr. Casso spent eight years at STC securing funding, scholarships, and increasing medical training opportunities in the Valley. Dr. Casso acknowledged that the constant support of his wife Emma enabled him to devote so much time to working for the community. Dr. Ramiro Casso, who died in 2011, was named one of “100 Outstanding Hispanics for the 20th Century” by Latino Monthly.
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Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse D
uring the 1980s, the Rio Grande Valley became a magnet for frivolous lawsuits that ended in windfall awards for plaintiffs. The expense of fighting spurious claims threatened to push some businesses into bankruptcy, while others were forced to close because of skyrocketing liability insurance premiums. In 1990, Sam Sparks told Alan Johnson, chairman of the Rio Grande Valley Chamber of Commerce, that the organization should do something to stop the barrage of lawsuits. The idea was presented to the Chamber’s executive committee, which immediately approved the idea as a chamber project. Bill Summers, Chamber President/CEO, suggested the name Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse, or CALA. Summers became the public face of CALA as the grassroots organization worked on its goals: to educate the public about the costs to consumers of out-of-control litigation, and to advocate for tort reform, changing state laws to make the justice system more reasonable and less costly. “We wanted people to understand what lawsuit abuse means to…Mom-and-Pop businesses, to you and me as consumers,” Summers said. “All we’re talking about is putting back some common sense into our civil justice system.” Courageously, Summers didn’t let vocal opposition stop his CALA advocacy. Letters mailed to every Valley business explained CALA’s twopronged plan. Individuals and small busiensses responded with contributions – $25 to $1,000 – to further CALA’s goals. Through radio interviews, billboards, and bumper stickers, CALA told the story: “When it comes to lawsuit abuse, we all pay - we all lose.” Unwarranted lawsuits resulted in lost jobs and lost businesses. The Valley medical community had been hit hard by unwarranted lawsuits. In fact 86 percent of claims against Texas physicians resulted in no payment to the patient, but financial costs and costs to reputations were devastating. Doctors and hospitals gave enthusiastic financial and vocal support to CALA. In 1995 the Texas Legislature passed civil justice reforms, followed in 2002 by tort reform which addressed medical malpractice issues. Texas emerged as a national model for reform. Bill Summers considered CALA among the most important projects undertaken by the group now known as Rio Grande Valley Partnership.
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Thomas A. Clark, M.D. T
homas A. Clark, M.D., grew up in Jacksonville, Florida, where a family friend, Dr. Horace Anderson, showed the 10-year-old how to cut and sew like a surgeon and influenced his decision to become a doctor. After graduating from the University of Florida, Clark received his medical degree from the University of Miami School of Medicine in 1967. Dr. Clark then entered the U. S. Navy Medical Corps and completed a General Surgery residency at Oakland Naval Hospital. He went on to a Cardiovascular residency at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, where he served on the teaching staff and had an affiliated clinical staff appointment at the George Washington School of Medicine in Washington, D.C. He later served on the teaching staff at San Diego Naval Hospital and the University of California San Diego School of Medicine. In 1976, Dr. Clark took leave from the Navy to participate in a Special Cardiac Fellowship at the University of Alabama School of Medicine with an emphasis on congenital heart surgery. In 1978, after 13 years of active duty, Dr. Clark, who had roots in Texas, moved his family to Harlingen. As a Board Certified General and Thoracic Surgeon, he entered the private practice of cardiac, vascular and general surgery with Dr. Marion Lawler. They were the first group to form a cardiac surgical team in the Rio Grande Valley. In 1993, Dr. Clark retired from the Navy Reserve, after 26 years of combined service. In 2005, Dr. Clark retired from the active practice of cardiac surgery after almost 30 years and began a new practice concentrating on the treatment of venous disease at private clinics in Brownsville, Harlingen and McAllen. He maintains membership in multiple medical societies and remains a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons and a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology. “The practice of surgery in the Rio Grande Valley has been the most rewarding profession, letting me enjoy the service to the community and a relationship with so many wonderful people. This is the best place to live, grow, and raise a family.” Dr. Tom Clark considers his four children and eight grandchildren his greatest legacy.
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Doctors Hospital at Renaissance T
he year was 1995. The place, Edinburg, Texas. Eight forward-thinking physicians, concerned that residents of the Rio Grande Valley lacked access to necessary health services, embarked on a remarkable journey that continues to this day. Working diligently for two years, they laid the groundwork for what would become one of the country’s topranked and largest physician-owned hospitals. What is now Doctors Hospital at Renaissance (DHR) opened its doors in 1997 as an ambulatory surgical center. Today, it is a modern, 506-bed acute care facility that provides a full range of medical services. At DHR, over 500 physicians and more than 1,000 nurses dedicate themselves to offering a full continuum of care in over 50 different sub-specialties. From its earliest days, Doctors Hospital at Renaissance has taken pride in being an innovator. Since 2007, DHR has opened the Cancer Center at Renaissance, Edinburg Conference Center at Renaissance, Renaissance Behavioral Center, Joslin Diabetes Center Affiliate at DHR, Therapy Institute at Renaissance, Renaissance Bariatric and Metabolic Institute (BMI), and Renaissance Laboratories. Moreover, the Women’s Hospital at Renaissance is the first and only facility in South Texas dedicated exclusively to women’s health care. DHR has been ranked among the nation’s 100 Top Hospitals® by Thomson Reuters and as one of the 100 Top Hospitals® for Cardiovascular Care. Becker’s Hospital Review named DHR one of the “50 Physician-Owned Hospitals to Know” for being a highperforming leader in patient care and clinical quality. In addition, U.S. News & World Report named DHR as one of the “Best Hospitals in America” for 2011-2012, with recognition in twelve areas, including cancer, cardiology, diabetes & endocrinology, gastroenterology, gynecology, nephrology, neurosurgery, and orthopedics. U.S. News & World Report also named DHR as the “Best Hospital in McAllen” as well as one of the “Most Connected Hospitals in America” for its electronic medical record (EMR) adoption success. The continued growth of DHR is a reflection of the patient-centered care that is provided by its entire medical team and an affirmation of their ability to work from the bedside to the boardroom to bring quality healthcare to South Texas.
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Family Physicians Clinic W
ith roots deep in the Rio Grande Valley, Dr. Carlos Godinez and Dr. Cayetano Barrera III began practicing medicine together as Family Physicians Clinic in February 1968. Dr. Barrera served as an Army doctor in Vietnam after graduating from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School and completing a family medicine residency. In 1971, they were joined by Dr. Homero Rivas, a Donna native who graduated from T h e U n i ve r s i t y o f Te x a s Medical Branch – Galveston. He then did his residency with the Public Health Service. Dr. Rivas has taught medical students as an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Texas Preceptorship Program. In 1982, the partners opened Valley Night Clinic, the first after-hours clinic south of San Antonio, which has been open every night for 30 years to serve residents of the lower Rio Grande Valley.
In 1983, Dr. Daniel Guerra, a McAllen native, joined the practice. He is a graduate of The University of Texas Health Science Center San Dr. Leonel Moreno, Dr. Homero Rivas, Dr. Cayetano E. Barrera, Dr. Daniel Guerra Antonio and did his family practice residency at John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth. For 19 years, Dr. Guerra hosted “House Calls,” a medical segment of a local newscast. He was also syndicated in a medical program in Spanish that appeared on Univision’s “La Familia de Hoy.” Dr. Leonel Moreno joined Family Physicians Clinic in 1995. He graduated from the University of Nuevo Leon in Monterrey, Mexico, and completed a family practice residency in Wichita Falls through The University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. Dr. Barrera, who was named the Texas Academy of Family Physicians’ 2005 Physician of the Year, retired in 2010. Family Physicians Clinic was one of the first Valley practices with all board certified doctors in Family Medicine. The quality of care, not the location, has attracted patients to the practice for over 44 years. Believing that every patient has the right to be seen by a physician, Family Physicians Clinic and Valley Night Clinic provide quality medical care to every patient who puts their trust in them. FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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Dr. George Gallaher
B
orn in 1899 in Gault, Missouri, George Leo Gallaher served in World War I. He graduated from the University of Iowa in 1925, married Blanche Tudor, and went on to the University of Arkansas Medical School. Blanche worked as a Veterans’ Hospital dietician until her husband received his M.D. in 1929. In September 1929, Blanche and George Gallaher arrived in Harlingen. Dr. Gallaher bought medical books and equipment from the estate of Dr. A. C. McLemore and went into practice with Dr. Noah Davidson in the Baxter Building, the region’s tallest skyscraper. In 1930, Dr. Gallaher opened his own general medical practice in the Baxter Building, the same year the Gallahers’ only child, Julie Ann, was born in Valley Baptist Hospital on “F” Street. Dr. Gallaher kept his office open seven days a week, taking only Thursday and Sunday afternoons off. During the Hurricane of 1933, he stayed three days straight at his office providing medical care for storm refugees. He also developed an expertise in treating individuals poisoned by agricultural insecticides used at that time and gave presentations on the best treatment of those patients. From 1940 until 1958, Dr. Gallaher was a partner and eventually the sole owner of Harlingen Motors, a Dodge and Plymouth dealership. He also owned and operated the 77 Drive-In Theater. He frequently helped finance risky investors with good collateral – which he sometimes got back! In April 1971, while setting a patient’s broken arm at Valley Baptist Hospital, Dr. Gallaher suffered a heart attack and died soon after. His office has been recreated at the Harlingen Arts and Heritage Museum. Julie Gallaher graduated from Northwestern University in 1951 and taught at Stuart Place School before marrying H. M. “Tock” Uhlhorn, formerly of Memphis, in 1952. The family farmed 600 acres that Dr. Gallaher had purchased. Tock ran Harlingen Motors until 1958, when he focused on farming and grew that operation to 2,500 acres. Tock and Julie had three children. Martha earned a B.S. and an MBA from Southern Methodist University and a Master’s from Thunderbird International School of Business. Tudor graduated from Texas A&M University and earned his MBA at SMU. Julie graduated from SMU and received her Master’s from the American Graduate School of International Management.
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Rafael Garza, M.D. B
orn in San Antonio, Rafael Garza always wanted to be a physician. After graduating from medical school in Monterrey in 1950, he completed an internship at St. John’s Hospital in St. Louis, a family practice residency at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Fort Worth and an obstetrics residency at Baptist Memorial in San Antonio. In 1955, Dr. Garza arrived in Roma and served as the only doctor there for two years, and also as Starr County Health Officer and the chief medical officer (U.S. Public Health Service) for the workers building Falcón Dam. In 1957, Dr. Garza moved to McAllen where he and Dr. Jorge Trevino practiced family medicine together for 35 years. The physicians opened a maternity clinic behind their offices, across from McAllen General Hospital. The facility with labor, delivery, and post-partum rooms also held a newborn nursery. As a family physician, Dr. Garza delivered babies at the maternity clinic and hospital and took care of entire families. In 1977, Dr. Garza along with Doctors Barrera, Landrum, Rodriguez, and Fitch brought the Family Practice Residency Program to McAllen General Hospital in order to attract more physicians to the region. He served as president of the Residency Program Governing Board, and to his full schedule added training new M.D.s, supervising them as they delivered babies, saw patients, and performed surgeries. He was appointed to The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio faculty and to its Development Board. A Charter Fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians, Dr. Garza was elected president of the Texas Academy of Family Physicians in 1984. He has been a member of the Texas Medical Association since 1957 and served on various state committees. Although Dr. Garza stopped delivering babies at age 70, he didn’t retire. He trained in Hyperbaric Medicine in San Antonio and then limited his practice to wound care. For the next 12 years, Dr. Garza was Director of the Wound Care Center at Mission Hospital, where he worked with diabetic patients afflicted with arterial occlusive disease and foot ulcers. Dr. Garza continues to see in-patients on referral with medical staff at Mission Hospital. Rafael and Maria Teresa Garza, who were married in 1950, raised five children: Maria Teresa, Patricia, Elena, Rafael G., and Laura.
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Golden Palms I
n 1979, Valley Baptist Hospital CEO Ben McKibbens voiced his dream to create an attractive community where seniors could have an enjoyable quality of life in a safe environment. The name Golden Palms blended the golden years concept with the tropical Valley setting. Over the next five years, a committee composed of Becky Ballenger, Bill McBride, Gretchen Haggerty and Martha Zamora traveled the nation researching the best senior communities. Singer Tennessee Ernie Ford participated in the groundbreaking ceremony on former farm land adjacent to the hospital. Ben McKibbens and the Valley Baptist Board of Trustees were among those who celebrated the opening of Golden Palms Retirement Center in 1986. The eight story, U-shaped building encircling a courtyard with a heated pool promised a continuum of care for the residents who would occupy the 99 independent living apartments and the skilled nursing facility. Golden Palms enabled its residents to age in one place, no matter the state of their health. Twelve apartments were immediately occupied by seniors who had purchased life care contracts. Their contracts and monthly fees let them receive care, if needed, in the on-site skilled rehabilitation center licensed by Medicare. Golden Palms administrators soon realized a chasm existed between independent living and nursing care. With the enactment of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in 1990, Golden Palms shifted to a three-tiered continuum of care. Thirty-eight apartments were adapted and licensed as Palm Suites for assisted living. In 2008, Golden Palms was acquired by Preferred Care Inc., a Planobased company which administers 68 assisted living and skilled rehab communities. Updates to the exterior, grounds, skilled rehab rooms, and apartments followed. What did not change was the quality of life that residents experienced and the focus on health-conscious living. Treated with the highest regard and respect, independent living residents continue to enjoy a complimentary breakfast and a range of services such as housekeeping, chaueurs and an on-site beauty salon. Currently Golden Palms Retirement & Healthcare Center has 38 assisted living apartments where residents can count on sta to help them in multiple activities of daily living. The skilled rehab unit has 60 Medicare-licensed beds and provides physical, occupational and speech therapy.
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Victor M. Gonzalez, M.D. B
y the time he was five years old, Victor M. Gonzalez knew he would be a doctor. Born in Tampico and a graduate of Brownsville High School, he went on to receive his M.D. from La Salle Medical School at the National University of Mexico in 1977. Dr. Gonzalez interned at American-British Cowdray Hospital in Mexico City and practiced briefly in Matamoros. In 1982, he married Elena Orvañanos, and the couple moved to Houston where he completed Baylor College of Medicine’s Family Medicine Residency program. Dr. Gonzalez saw family medicine as an opportunity to treat entire, multigenerational families and a wide spectrum of illnesses. Dr. Gonzalez established Brownsville Family Medicine Associates in 1986. Board certified in Family Medicine, Dr. Gonzalez became Chief of Staff at both Valley Baptist Medical Center-Brownsville and Valley Regional Medical Center. He worked with the Cameron County Health Department and was known as Cameron County’s medical authority because of his involvement with public health issues. He was elected president of the Cameron-Willacy County Medical Society and served on the boards of the Brownville Community Health Center, VRMC, and Texas Medical Association’s Council of Public Health. In 2005, Dr. Gonzalez was ranked as a Super Doctor by Texas Monthly, after being selected by his fellow doctors as the physician they would send their own family to. He made house calls on elderly patients and served as Medical Director of Ebony Lake and Spanish Meadows Nursing Homes. Family was important to Victor Gonzalez, a fact obvious to anyone who saw him dancing with his wife Elena or talking and laughing with their daughters Adriana and Gabriela. He remained close to his siblings, Chester, Yolanda and Paty. He served as role model, inspiring people to pursue professions, not jobs. Friends and family loved to hear Dr. Gonzalez sing. At hospital parties and non-profits galas, he could be talked into singing “New York, New York” and other hits. He served on the Mr. Amigo Association board and became the organization’s president. He was involved in the American Heart Association and American Cancer Society. Victor Gonzalez died in 2007, leaving behind a world that was a better place for those who knew his love, his joy, and his compassionate care.
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Harlingen Medical Center H
arlingen physicians, seeking a community hospital where they would have a positive impact on the services provided to their patients, founded Harlingen Medical Center (HMC) in 2002. Prominent community physicians were among those instrumental in opening the 112-bed hospital. Today, with a team of skilled and compassionate healthcare professionals, Harlingen Medical Center concentrates on delivering patient-focused care. In its first ten years as a privately-owned, general acute care hospital, Harlingen Medical Center became known for its full spectrum of services, including cardiology, orthopedics, gastroenterology, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, and emergency care department. As a Level IV Trauma Center, HMC operates with a highly trained emergency staff who know the difference between a waiting room and an emergency room, each year serving approximately 30,000 patients. HMC has established itself as a premier healthcare facility serving the Rio Grande Valley. Harlingen Medical Center pioneered the region’s first 64-slice CT scanner, which is capable of diagnosing early stages of heart disease non-invasively. The advanced technology of Radiological Services enables physicians and clinical staff to more effectively and accurately determine a diagnosis. The Women’s Center, which handles more than 1,200 deliveries a year, offers the most advanced services in women’s healthcare, with all patients in private rooms in a hotel-style atmosphere. Harlingen Medical Center is an award-winning hospital recognized nationally and at the state level for its achievements in clinical excellence. The performance of the Interventional Cardiology team has twice brought HMC to the ranks of Thomson Reuters 100 Top Hospitals, Cardiovascular Benchmarks Award. HMC areas receiving national accolades include Cardiovascular Care, Orthopedic and Spine services, Women’s Health services, Emergency Medicine, Pulmonary Care, General Surgery and Gastroenterology services. Many of these services are ranked among the top percentage of all U.S. hospitals. Additionally HMC has received the Superior Quality Merit Award, one of four Texas hospitals given this honor. Harlingen Medical Center was acquired by Prime HealthCare in 2011.
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Harlingen Obstetrics and Gynecology Associates
H
ar lingen O bst et r ics an d G y n e col og y Associates was founded in 1981 by Dr. Ruben D. Martinez and Dr. Ramiro Munoz. In 1983 HOGA became the first Valley practice to employ a Certified Nurse Midwife, Nivea Fisch. Dr. Uvaldo Cantu joined the practice in 1987 and Dr. Ruben Torres in 1993. Uvaldo Cantu, a Weslaco native, had his interest in medicine sparked by his Boy Scout leader, Dr. Armando Cuellar. The obstetrician-gynecologist convinced the boy he was smart enough to go to medical school and allowed the teenager to shadow him at work. The young Cantu followed his mentor into medicine, graduating from Texas A&M University and in 1983 from The University of Texas Southwestern Medical School in Dallas. Dr. Uvaldo Cantu Dr. Ruben Torres Dr. Cantu completed his OB/GYN residency at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. Returning to the Valley, Dr. Cantu joined HOGA and convinced the partners to open a Weslaco oďŹƒce, just as Dr. Cuellar was retiring. Ruben Torres, raised in Port Isabel and Brownsville, had no plans to go into medicine. He changed his mind after observing how much physicians interact with people and discovering that helping others is very satisfying. He graduated from The University of Texas at Arlington and the Medical School of Guadalajara Autonomous University. The fact that obstetrics/gynecology deals with all facets of medicine from surgery to internal medicine convinced him to go into that field through a residency at Long Island College Hospital in Brooklyn, New York. Dr. Torres has been instrumental in HOGA’s growth, guiding its expansion into Brownsville. Drs. Martinez and Munoz left the practice, and Certified Nurse Midwife Joanna Imperial, MSN, joined Nivea Fisch at the progressive, well-equipped clinic. HOGA physicians train in the latest procedures, including minimally invasive techniques in robotic surgeries. Minor surgeries are performed in-house as are sonography, bone density scans and related tests. Dr. Cantu, an Eagle Scout, remains involved in scouting, mentoring boys as a scoutmaster, accompanying his troop to the World Jamboree, and serving as president of the Rio Grande Valley Council. Dr. Torres is active in many civic and charitable groups and serves on the boards of economic development and health care organizations. Both physicians are a part of the RAHC Clinical faculty and help train medical students. FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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Harlingen Pediatrics Associates H
arlingen Pediatrics Associates opened in 1982, when Dr. Stan Fisch saw an opportunity to provide a different approach to the care of sick children. His goal was a familycentered, family-oriented practice where pediatricians would care for kids with complex or chronic problems. While a student at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Stan Fisch discovered how much he liked working with kids and helping sick children. After his pediatrics residency, he worked for Su Clinica Familiar for nine years, never intending to go into private practice. But with Harlingen Pediatrics Associates, Dr. Fisch has been able to develop his ideal of pediatric care. HPA expanded its services to better meet the needs of children with complex issues such as autism, cerebral palsy, and other disabilities. In a practice designed for the care of those kids and their families, Harlingen Pediatrics Associates relies on the skills of Dr. Maribelle Garza, Dr. Roland Dominguez, Dr. Erwin Sanchez, Dr. Francisco Padilla, Dr. Michelle Zeager, and Dr. Sally Villarreal, as well as Dr. Fisch. Nurse practitioner Leticia Garcia, social worker Teresa Gallegos, and licensed counselor Joseph LaBeau round out the professional staff. Office manager Dolores Hernandez has been with Harlingen Pediatrics Associates since it opened in 1982. By intention and design, Harlingen Pediatrics Associates’ offices help children feel comfortable and not the least scared. The exterior resembles a pile of giant toy blocks, while inside primary colors and shapes enliven the waiting and exam rooms. HPA nurtures not just bodies but minds as well, with a large library of children’s books in English and Spanish. The Reach Out and Read program inspires families to read to their kids by having numerous books on hand and sending each child home with a book. In 2009, HPA decided to entrust hospitalists, neonatologists and PICU specialists with the care of hospitalized children. That has allowed HPA pediatricians to give their full time and attention to the children who visit their office. Next to HPA, a pharmacy focused on pediatric medications is able to compound children’s dosages in palatable flavors.
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Knapp Medical Center D
etermined to have a community hospital, Weslaco residents established the Mid Valley Hospital Development Corporation, chaired by Raymond Mills, in the mid-1950s. Joined by volunteer fundraisers from Donna, Mercedes, Edcouch-Elsa and Progreso, the group raised $500,000, bolstered by a starting gift of $300,000 from the Knapp family. Backed by those funds and an $800,000 federal matching grant, Knapp Memorial Methodist Hospital opened in Weslaco on January 2, 1962. The 100-bed hospital, operated by the United Methodist Church – McAllen District, brought much needed health care to an underserved population. In 1980, an expansion nearly doubled the number of patient beds, reflecting strong demand. In 1986, after separating amicably from the United Methodist Church, the facility became Knapp Medical Center, a not-for-profit, private, acute care hospital. Explosive growth began in 1990, with a new Emergency Room, space for outpatient services, the addition of a Diabetes Center and Hospice Services, and the acquisition of 15 acres for expansion. A six-story tower became the center of inpatient surgical, medical and obstetrical services in 1995. The beginning of the century launched a new Emergency Department with a Level III Trauma designation and around the clock physician-staffing followed by a new Outpatient Center. As the first decade passed mid-point, patient care focused on a three-prong approach: excellence in clinical care, customer experience, and using technology for patient testing and treatment, efficiency and safety. Additionally, a Cardiac Cath Lab opened, and a pharmacy robot and electronic medication administration record program came on line during 2011. Since 2008, Knapp has been ranked among the top five percent of hospitals in the nation for maternity care and in 2011 among the top ten percent of hospitals in the nation doing joint replacement by HealthGrades. Knapp today has 227 patient beds, including its 16 bed Intensive Care Unit, and a workforce of over 900 plus 230 volunteers. Over 220 independent physicians serve on the Knapp Medical Staff.
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Marion Russell Lawler Jr. W
hen Dr. Marion Lawler Sr. made house calls on his patients in Mercedes in the 1940s and 1950s, his young son sometimes accompanied him. The boy’s firsthand look at medicine – watching surgeries in Dr. Lawler’s clinic and running to the five-and-dime for cotton thread for sutures – determined his future.
In 1963, Dr. Marion Lawler Jr. graduated from Baylor College of Medicine. There he had observed Dr. Michael DeBakey and Dr. Denton Cooley, who were pioneering surgical techniques for vascular and heart disease. Dr. Lawler’s surgical and cardiothoracic residency at Vanderbilt University Hospital included a year as Cardiothoracic Chief Resident. He then served in the U.S. Navy as a thoracic surgeon aboard the hospital ship USS Sanctuary stationed off Vietnam. In 1971, Dr. Lawler established his surgical practice in Harlingen at a time when no cardiac surgery was offered in the region. In 1977, he performed the Valley’s first open heart surgery at Valley Baptist Hospital. He helped establish the region’s first Cardiovascular Intensive Care Unit and Cardiac Rehabilitation Unit and developed the first computer monitoring system in South Texas. Board certified in Surgery and Thoracic Surgery, Dr. Lawler introduced new medical procedures to the Valley and raised the standard of cardiac care. Recognizing the need for a professional ambulance service that would provide emergency care enroute to the hospital, he became a founding board member of the Harlingen Community Emergency Medical Service. Dr. Lawler was Chief of Surgery at Valley Baptist Hospital and later President of the Medical Staff there. He joined other physicians who sought greater participation in the provision of medical care to establish Harlingen Medical Center in 2002 and served on its Governing Board for 10 years. He served as president of five medical societies and published 23 peer-reviewed articles. In 1996, Dr. Lawler was appointed Clinical Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery at the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio. He supported the development of UTHSCSA’s Regional Academic Health Center from its inception and was the RAHC’s first Regional Program Director of Surgery. The RAHC’s third- and fourth-year medical students twice honored him with teaching excellence awards. Although Dr. Lawler closed his practice in 2007, he remains on the faculty, sharing his knowledge with the next generation.
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The Longoria and Marin Families R
aised in Mission, Ramiro Longoria served in the Philippines during World War II. He graduated from Gradwall School of Medical Technology on the GI Bill and later graduated from Pan Am College. While working at a hospital in Sulphur, Oklahoma, he met and married Johnelle Calame, RN, in 1952.
Johnelle Longoria
Settling in Brownsville, Ramiro worked at Serafy Labs, Valley Regional Hospital and the State Lab in San Benito. He took pride in his microscopic acumen, identifying rare and unusual micro-organisms and cell formations under the microscope. He also analyzed local water supplies and worked with rabies identification in South Texas. As an RN, Johnelle’s compassion and quiet, comforting personality positively impacted the lives of many as she went the extra mile to serve her patients’ needs. The couple had three daughters, Yolanda, Elena and Carmen, but Elena was the only one drawn to the sciences and health care field.
After graduating from Texas Southmost College, Elena entered the University of Houston School of Pharmacy. While interning with the Baylor College of Medicine hospital teaching program, she was encouraged by a physician mentor to apply to Dr. Elena Marin medical school. Elena worked her way through medical school as a pharmacist at Massachusetts General Hospital, while her husband Carlos Marin entered the Ph.D. program at Harvard University. Dr. Marin received her M.D. degree from Boston University School of Medicine in 1983 and graduated from the Duke University Pediatric Residency program in 1986. Dr. Marin began her work as a pediatrician at Su Clinica Familiar in 1986 and focused on helping to improve the health of her community. Dr. Marin has served as CEO of Su Clinica Familiar since 1996. In 2011, the Health Center cared for 31,000 people with 166,000 visits. A new 62,000 square foot Brownsville clinic opened in 2012.
Ramiro Longoria
Dr. Marin has served on numerous professional boards and task forces. She is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics for UTHSC San Antonio. She was named a local legend by the American Medical Women’s Association and currently serves on the Governor-appointed Institute of Healthcare Quality and Efficiency. Dr. Marin and her husband, Carlos Marin, Ph.D., have two adult children, Tomas and Rebecca.
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Erin K. McCormick, M.D. B
orn and raised in Southern California, Erin McCormick demonstrated at an early age her interest in medicine. In second grade while classmates drew pictures of flowers, Erin drew a realistic cross-section of a heart. Her interest in medicine was further cultivated as she earned her undergraduate degrees in Biological Science and Social Ecology from the University of California, Irvine. After graduating with honors in Biomedical Research, she completed graduate work at the University of California, Los Angeles in the School of Public Health, with an emphasis on Health Education. She earned her M.D. in 1990 from The George Washington University School of Medicine. Dr. McCormick was the third woman to graduate from a urology residency at GWU which was founded in 1825. Dr. McCormick continued her post-graduate training in general surgery and urologic surgery in Washington, D.C. Dr. McCormick moved to Harlingen, Texas, in 1996 where she is currently in private practice and is certified by the American Board of Urology. With a firm commitment to medical advancement and dedication to first-rate patient care, she is the only full-time urologist in the Rio Grande Valley certified by Intuitive Surgical to perform DaVinci robotic prostatectomies. Currently she serves as the DaVinci Robotic Committee Chairperson at Valley Baptist Medical Center. The Consumer Research Council of America lauded Dr. McCormick in 2010 as one of the nation’s “Most Compassionate Physicians.” She has received service awards from the American Cancer Society and recently received their “Patient’s Choice Award.” She also has received research grants for biomedical studies. In addition to her affinity with robotic surgery and urologic oncology, Dr. McCormick enjoys painting and drawing. Her artwork has been on exhibit in Las Vegas, Nevada, Washington, D.C. and Orange County, California. These days her subject matter is more often flowers than vital organs.
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Medwin Family Medicine & Rehab M
edwin Family Medicine & Rehab brings together two skilled physicians experienced in primary and urgent care in both inpatient and outpatient settings.
Dr. Surya Raguthu, who completed a Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation residency at Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center in Brooklyn, was named to the ranks of the Best Physicians in the United States in 2007. In 2005, he became the first Medical Director of Brownsville’s South Texas Rehabilitation Hospital and i s t h e on l y phy s i a t r i s t a n d physician for the inpatient rehabilitation unit where outcomes have far surpassed standard measures. He opened his private practice, Active Life Rehab Center, in 2008, specializing in musculoskeletal medicine, pain management, workers comp, and industrial medicine. Dr. Surya is board certified by the American Association of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and the American Board of Independent Medical Examiners, and American Board of Pain Management. D r. M a n j u l a R a g u t h u , a Board certified Family Physician, was selected among the Best Family Physicians in the United States in 2004, 2006 and 2009. She completed her Family Practice residency at St. Vincent’s Medical Center in New York in 2001 and started Medwin Family Medicine and Rehabilitation in 2002 in New York. Dr. Manjula arrived in Brownsville in 2006 and worked as an Emergency Physician. She opened her private practice, Medwin Family Medicine and Rehab in Brownsville, which provides family primary care and urgent care and includes the Active Life Rehab Center. She also does disability evaluations. Both Dr. Surya and Dr. Manjula enjoy their profession, helping to optimize medical outcomes. They also enjoy the interaction that they have with the people that they encounter in all walks of life on a day to day basis. Both are actively involved in the community. Dr. Surya served on the board of the Brownsville Chamber of Commerce and Brownsville Housing Authority. Dr. Manjula has served on the Board of the American Heart Association RGV and the Brownsville Chamber. She has volunteered for multiple free health screenings and organized family planning and AIDS awareness camp. Both physicians help in fundraising for nonprofit organizations and are members of medical associations in the United States and in India.
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Carlos Mohamed, M.D. C
arlos Mohamed’s father, Nasser, immigrated to Mexico from Jerusalem in 1920 with only a third grade education. Yet he championed education as the path out of poverty and told his son, “You can lose your land and your gold but nobody can take away what you have in your mind.” Carlos Mohamed graduated from the School of Medicine, University of Nuevo Leon in 1972. After a residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Maryland, he completed a fellowship in gynecologic oncology at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Mohamed and his wife, chemist Maria Teresa, then moved their young family to Monterrey, where Dr. Mohamed was instrumental in opening a women’s hospital in the late 1970s.
In 1983, the Mohamed family relocated to the Rio Grande Valley, and Dr. Mohamed opened his obstetrics/gynecology practice. For the next 25 years, he was the region’s only gynecologic oncologist, Dr. Samira Mohamed and Dr. Carlos Mohamed performing uterine, ovarian, and cervical cancer surgeries and providing care that no one else did. During those years, he delivered approximately 15,000 babies. Dr. Mohamed served as Chief of Medical Staff at Edinburg Hospital and held numerous administrative positions. Committed to tort reform, Dr. Mohamed helped organize the protest walk-out of Hidalgo County physicians who were fighting frivolous lawsuits. He remained very active in local politics. Dr. Mohamed was one of the eight founders of Doctors Hospital at Renaissance, yet throughout his life he dreamed of opening a women’s hospital like the one in Monterrey. Dr. Mohamed worked with builder Alonzo Cantu to establish Women’s Hospital at Renaissance and was deeply involved in the details of the facility, down to selecting hallway colors. Opened in 2007, Women’s Hospital at Renaissance is second only to Parkland Hospital in Dallas in the number of babies delivered: over 8,000 annually. Dr. Mohamed, like his father, impressed on his four children that, “Your education is the greatest inheritance I can give you.” Today, Carlos is a pediatric dentist. Suleima is a lawyer. Yusuf is a student. Dr. Samira Mohamed became an obstetrician/gynecologist like her father and took over his practice when he died of pancreatic cancer in 2008. Dr. Mohamed continues her father’s work with babies and their mothers as Physician Advisor at Women’s Hospital at Renaissance.
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Raul A. Peña, M.D. W
hen Raulito Peña was six years old, his mother took him to a doctor who, with a few questions, diagnosed the boy’s illness. Astounded, the boy born in McAllen decided to become a doctor and, later, a doctor working with his beloved Dallas Cowboys. While studying at the University of Monterrey Medical School, Raul Peña noticed a man who came in for cataract surgery, unable to see or move around independently. Peña assisted his Ophthalmology professor doing cataract surgery on the patient and saw immediate changes: with vision restored, the man regained his independence and got his life back. At that moment Peña realized he wanted to devote himself to correcting people’s vision so each could have a better quality of life and be able to achieve their goals. The new M.D. married his high school sweetheart Suzanne and became a Medical Internist at Scott & White Memorial Hospital. He continued his advanced Ophthalmology training at the Retina Institute of Maryland and was the Chief Ophthalmology Resident at the University of Cincinnati. Dr. Peña returned home in 2000, opened the Peña Eye Institute in McAllen, and began bringing the latest technology in cataract, refractive and vision corrective surgery to the Rio Grande Valley. The eye surgeon stayed true to his dream of performing thousands of medical procedures that enabled people to see better and to achieve their own dreams – whether becoming a Navy SEAL or a Border Patrol Agent – where visual acuity is required. An early advocate and practitioner of LASIK, Dr. Peña has consistently introduced his patients to the field’s latest advances, such as blade-free LASIK. Each procedure eliminates or reduces dependency on glasses and allows the person to resume favorite activities. The Peñas and their children, Suzie, Stephen, Alexandra, and Samantha, attended many Dallas Cowboys games and got to know the players. Dr Pena first performed blade-free Lasik on a Dallas Cowboy player in 2005; the excellent results convinced other players and their families to see Dr. Peña. He became the Valley’s Official Intra LASIK Surgeon for the Dallas Cowboys. From intraocular lens implants to IntraLASIK, the affable Dr. Peña still finds the results of ophthalmic surgery amazing. “It turns people’s lives around. I love giving my patients Pena Vision.”
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Mario Ramirez I
n “A Letter to a Young Doctor,” published in Good Housekeeping in 1983, Dr. Mario Ramirez summed up his 33 years as a country doctor, emphasizing the rewards of practicing medicine in communities where there is great need. The Roma-born physician had provided modern medical care to three generations of families in a poverty-stricken area and watched them become healthier. He had received hugs from children and elderly widows. The essay revealed the compassion, hope and knowledge that benefited his patients. A natural teacher, Dr. Ramirez has never ceased to inspire and mentor young people. Numerous doctors and other professionals say that Dr. Ramirez’s mentoring put them on the path to careers they love. His conversations with a waiter, for example, convinced the teenager to go to medical school. On April 3, 1926, Mario Ramirez was delivered at home by the first Valley-born physician, Dr. Mary Ann Edgerton. Mario grew up wanting to be a doctor, influenced by his pharmacist-uncle and by the death of his seven-year-old brother. In 1942, after completing high school at 16, he enrolled at The University of Texas at Austin, but left early when offered admission to the University of Tennessee College of Medicine. He received his M.D. in 1948 and completed his internship and family medicine residency at Shreveport Charity Hospital. While there, he fell in love with and married Sarah Aycock, a student nurse. Dr. Ramirez returned to Roma in April 1950 and found himself practicing frontier medicine: delivering babies at distant ranches and sterilizing instruments in a pressure cooker. Sarah Ramirez frequently accompanied her husband on house calls. He began immunization programs that halted preventable diseases: diphtheria, tetanus, and whooping cough. In 1953 Dr. Ramirez became a charter member of the Academy of Family Physicians. In 1955 Dr. Ramirez was inducted into the Air Force, and the family moved to Japan for two years. Back in Roma, Dr. Ramirez applied his lab training. He and his team went house to house right after supper, taking blood samples of every adult in Roma. They discovered one of the highest incidences of diabetes in the country. In 1958 Dr. Ramirez opened Starr County’s first hospital, the 15-bed Manuel Ramirez Memorial in a 100-year-old Roma mansion. The autoclave and beds came second-hand from Mercy Hospital. In 1964, Dr. Ramirez’s close friend, Laredo surgeon Dr. Leonides Cigarroa, began For Dr. Ramirez, teaching and encouraging others to enter healthcare performing major surgeries there once a week. professions have been important facets of his life in medicine.
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In 1967, while Dr. Ramirez was Starr County Health Officer, Hurricane Beulah flooded the region. Dr. Ramirez took the lead during the disaster, opening an emergency hospital at Fort Ringgold and overseeing the care of thousands of refugees while coordinating medical teams from the National Guard, San Antonio, and Houston, and local volunteers. His humanitarian efforts resulted in a Surgeon General’s special citation. In 1969, Dr. Ramirez was appointed Starr County Judge, a position he held for nine years. As judge, he obtained funding to build Starr County Memorial Hospital which opened in 1975. As Starr County Health Officer, Dr. Ramirez, an Air Force veteran, coordinated the relief crews that
The professional isolation of practicing in a rural included the Texas National Guard, teams from major Texas hospitals, and local residents. area prompted Dr. Ramirez to serve as the alternateyear program chairman of the annual RGV Medical Surgical Conference for 25 years. In 1975 he became president of the Texas Academy of Family Physicians. In 1977 he received the AMA’s prestigious Benjamin Rush Centennial Award for community service. The American Academy of Family Physicians named Dr. Mario Ramirez the Family Physician of the Year in 1978, with President Jimmy Carter presenting the award. He returned home to a red carpet welcome. That year Dr. Ramirez became the first Hispanic president of the Texas Medical Association. In 1979, Dr. and Mrs. Ramirez organized graduates of UT (and later Texas A&M) to honor high-achieving students of Hidalgo and Starr County high schools at a banquet held annually for 25 years. Dr. Mario Ramirez was appointed to The University of Texas System Board of Regents in 1988 and served with great joy and pride for seven years. Although prostate cancer forced Dr. Ramirez’s retirement from private practice in 1993, he took on the full-time job of vice president for South Texas Programs at The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio. There he and Yvonne Kautsch designed and led the Med-Ed Program, which encouraged thousands of students to consider careers in health care and science and resulted in the doubling of medical school applicants. Amid a lifetime of appointments to state and national boards and well-deserved honors, in 2007 Mario Ramirez and Sarah Ramirez were named Texas Heroes by UTHSCSA and saw the RAHC Medical Library named in Dr. Ramirez’s honor. Sarah and Mario Ramirez raised four children: Mario Jr., Patricia, Norman, and Jaime. Sarah Ramirez died in 2012. FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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Doctor Filiberto Rodriguez-Salinas T
raining with some of the nation’s best cardiac surgeons at the renowned Cleveland Clinic, Dr. Filiberto Rodriguez-Salinas acquired a strong foundation in cardiac surgery and the capability to meet the challenges of the field. A Fellowship in Congenital and Advanced Adult Cardiac surgery at the Mayo Clinic built on his quest for excellence in cardiac patient care. Born in Reynosa, Mexico, where his father was a leading physician, Dr. Rodriguez settled in McAllen and in 1983 performed the first coronary artery bypass in Hidalgo County. In 1986 he established McAllen Heart Surgeons, where he remains Surgeon in Chief. Dr. Rodriguez and a group of cardiologists founded the 60-bed McAllen Heart Hospital in 1996. During his 25-plus years as a board certified thoracic surgeon, Dr. Rodriguez has performed more than 10,000 Dr. Filiberto Rodriguez-Salinas and Dr. Filiberto Rodriguez, Jr. heart operations including atrial fibrillation surgery, coronary bypasses, valve replacement and valve repair surgeries. Despite their complexity, Dr. Rodriguez’s operations result in patient outcomes that are consistently ranked in the highest tier due to the extremely low mortality rates – below one percent. McAllen Heart Hospital has been ranked first for cardiac surgery in Texas due to his excellent patient outcomes. Compassionate concern for his patients’ welfare combined with advanced technical skills have made Dr. Rodriguez a respected leader in his field. Dr. Rodriguez received his M.D. in Monterrey, graduating with his high school sweetheart and medical school classmate, Margarita Trevino. They married in 1972. Dr. Margarita, who obtained a Ph.D. in Nutrition and Public Health from Case Western Reserve University, founded the ongoing Heart of the Valley Health & Wellness Fair in 1983. After she died young of breast cancer, Dr. Rodriguez found solace raising quarter horses on his Edinburg ranch. He is an avid skier, a cyclist who has completed numerous ‘century’ rides, and a runner who enjoys half-marathon competitions. Of the couple’s four children – Filiberto, Kiovanna, Kendrinna, and Gabriel, only Dr. Filiberto Rodriguez Jr. followed in his parents’ footsteps. He graduated from Princeton and the University of Virginia School of Medicine and trained for 10 years in general surgery, cardiothoracic surgery and ultimately plastic surgery at Stanford, UCLA and The Body Sculpting Center. Recently Dr. Rodriguez Jr, a diplomate of the American Board of Surgery, and his wife, Dr. Samira Mohamed, returned to the Valley where he specializes in Cosmetic Plastic Surgery and Varicose Vein Disease at RGV Cosmetic Surgery and Vein Care in McAllen and Brownsville.
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San Benito Medical Associates
A
fter graduating from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School and completing an internship in Baltimore, Dr. Cecil Simmons worked with the U.S. Public Health Service at Indian hospitals in Oklahoma. But the Harlingen native wanted to return home to the Rio Grande Valley. In 1964 Dr. Simmons joined Dr. Bill Ross in his San Benito practice, then a two-room office. Dr. John Tucker became a partner in 1966, and the physicians formed San Benito Medical Associates Inc., known as SBMA. The need for family practitioners drew other physicians to SBMA, which has become the largest medical group in the Valley offering family care and general surgery to patients of all ages. SBMA physicians have worked together with mutual respect and cared for each other’s patients for 48 years. The long-term success of SBMA can be attributed to recruiting and retaining physicians who go above and beyond the call of duty. SBMA physicians, who average over 20 years with the practice, get to know their patients well and develop comprehensive plans of treatment and care. As a result, SBMA has cared for five generations of some families. Through the years, numerous physicians contributed their skills and insight to SBMA as the practice grew to include twelve physicians and four mid-level providers at clinics in Harlingen and San Benito. Dr. Ross left SBMA in 1979 to head the first Department of Family Practice at Southwestern Medical School. Dr. Tucker retired from SBMA in 1998. Dr. Simmons continues to practice medicine alongside his SBMA colleagues: Dr. William Heins, Dr. Eduardo Atkinson, Dr. Tim Bothwell, Dr. Lonnie Stanton, Dr. Rafael Lopez, Dr. Norma Schacherl, Dr. Ann Kanaan, Dr. Frank Torres, Dr. Mary Lynn Scott, Dr. Ferdinand Magno, and Dr. Joy Kroes. Many of the dedicated support staff – nurses, radiology and laboratory technicians, administrative and clerical personnel – have spent a large portion of their careers with SBMA. For the first 30 years, SBMA admitted patients almost exclusively to Dolly Vinsant Hospital. They covered the Emergency Room, assisted in surgery, and delivered babies there. In 2001, Dr. Francisco Loya joined SBMA as their hospitalist. He developed the hospitalist program at Harlingen Medical Center. Today SBMA participates in the hospitalist program there and at Valley Baptist Medical Center.
Dr. Cecil Simmons
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Shah Eye Center A
ll Pankajkumar Shah ever talked about when he was a boy in New Jersey was becoming a doctor and taking care of people. His father and mother encouraged his interest in science and math. He entered Rutgers University and graduated in three years. At Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Pankaj Shah discovered the field of ophthalmology which appealed to him on many levels. By diagnosing and treating eye diseases, he could make a dramatic difference in the daily life of patients who were relatively healthy individuals. In addition, he saw ophthalmology as a constantly changing, hands-on, high technology field, offering challenges to him and better outcomes for his patients. After a Fellowship in Cornea, External Disease and Refractive Surgery at Louisiana State University Eye Center, Dr. Shah practiced in Brownsville for two years. The opening of Shah Eye Center in 1998 in Mission allowed Dr. Shah, a BoardCertified Ophthalmologist, to practice medicine the way he had envisioned: staying on the cutting edge of ophthalmology and applying new techniques and new procedures that resulted in improved vision. Founded on a vision of excellence, Shah Eye Center provides the highest quality eye care in a friendly environment where patients are treated like family members. Dr. Shah’s love of ophthalmology and of learning new ways to help patients from newborns to geriatrics has indeed changed lives. Countless patients have benefited from bladeless, all-laser LASIK surgery and the treatment of their cataract and retinal problems. Dr. Shah is a Fellow of the American Board of Ophthalmology, the American Academy of Ophthalmology and the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery. Diagnostic tools and the mapping of the eye have undergone countless changes with advances that provide a better outcome for the patient. “The advances in the past 10 years in the treatment of cataracts are well beyond what any of us could have foreseen,” says
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Dr. Shah. “We have options available today that will restore a patient’s vision, when, until recently, the only option available to the patient was total loss of vision.” Canaloplasty, a new glaucoma surgery using revolutionary microcatheter technology to enlarge the eye’s natural drainage system, is equivalent to angioplasty for the eye and was first performed in the region by Shah Eye Center physicians. While Dr. Shah focuses on his patients and new techniques to improve their sight, Nora Shah works as her husband’s right hand, managing the administrative and behind-the-scenes tasks of Shah Eye Center. Although the Center initially had only three patients, patients continued to refer their friends to Shah Eye Center, and the practice grew rapidly, eventually outgrowing its original home. At that point, Dr. and Mrs. Shah reflected on their shared values and philosophies, reaffirming their commitment to the highest quality eye care delivered in an honest, caring manner. Determined to have a positive influence on a wider community, they opened a state of the art facility in Mission and added medical specialists and more optical services. Currently Dr. Shah has one General Ophthalmolo gi st , a n O p t om et r i st and a Ret inal Specialist working with him. Shah Eye Center went on to open offices in Laredo, McAllen, and Weslaco, where patients receive full service eye care from optical and contact lens dispensing to cataract, glaucoma and retinal surgery and Lasik surgery. Today Shah Eye Center’s caring environment, with friendly yet highly skilled doctors and staff, is the perfect place that Pankaj Shah dreamed of many years ago. Physicians, Dr. Shah believes, have a responsibility to teach and to share their knowledge and skills with the next generation of doctors while continuing to serve the community with the highest degree of medical care. “Every day is an opportunity to learn something new, something that keeps you fresh. I can’t imagine going through life not having that curiosity about how things work and what comes next.” Dr. Pankaj Shah
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Todd Shenkenberg, M.D. T
odd Shenkenberg wanted be a doctor since age 12, influenced by his family doctor who made house calls. Years later, at Baylor College of Medicine, he began research in endocrinology, hematology and blood cancers. During his Internal Medicine residency at Dallas’ Parkland Hospital, the continual challenges of medical problems to solve, combined with advances in cancer treatments, convinced Dr. Shenkenberg to devote his time to diagnosing and treating cancers. A fellowship in oncology and hematology at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio followed. In 1986, Dr. Shenkenberg helped open a cancer center in Harlingen, becoming one of four oncologists in the Rio Grande Valley. A compassionate, dedicated physician, Dr. Shenkenberg gives his patients the advantage of both time-tested chemotherapies and the newest multipronged treatments that include targeted therapy, stereotactic radiation, and the Nanoknife. He treats each patient as an individual, connecting with them beyond their illness. He supports his patients’ participation in clinical trials that explore new paths of treatment. Dr. Shenkenberg has been on the UTHSCSA clinical faculty for 26 years and on the clinical faculty for Valley Baptist Family Practice Residency for 15 years. A longtime NIH Clinical Investigator, he participates in research on breast cancer, prognostic factors, and tailoring specific treatment for patients. Dr. Shenkenberg’s numerous awards include Phi Beta Kappa, Merck Manual Award, Phi Alpha Theta, American Cancer Society, Texas Division Fellowship Research Grant, Fellow American College of Physicians, and Paul Harris Fellow. Given his interests in hematology, Dr. Shenkenberg started taking care of HIV patients before the Valley AIDS Council was created, served on the Board of Directors of Valley AIDS Council, and has remained active in the field. In 2009, Dr. Shenkenberg, the region’s leading oncologist, formed Valley Cancer Associates with community supporters, opening a state-of-the-art cancer facility in Harlingen with his partners, medical oncologist Dr. Nabeel Sarhill and Dr. Mark Harrison, a radiation oncologist. Equipped with the latest technology and laboratory, the freestanding building enables the physicians to provide comprehensive on-site chemotherapy, immune therapy, PET-CT scans, and radiation treatments. Having all these services under one roof has led to greater patient convenience and quicker access and response to therapy.
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Frank E. Shepard, D.D.S. B
orn in Maryville, Tennessee, in July 1927, Frank E. Shepard graduated from the University of Tennessee and then earned his D.D.S from the University of Tennessee Dental School in Memphis in 1952. He completed his orthodontics training there in 1954.
Dr. Shepard moved to Harlingen in 1954 when his dental school classmate Dr. John Owens invited him to join the Rio Grande Valley’s first orthodontic practice. The next year he married Helen Parker, and they raised four children, Robert, Stephen, Beth and Annette. For many years, orthodontics was directed almost exclusively to adolescent patients. Dr. Frank Shepard had a unique talent for building relationships with young people. He always shared new jokes with his patients, and he took delight in entertaining them. As he worked with children, he looked beyond their teeth and new smiles and enjoyed seeing the changes in their attitudes and outlooks. Dr. Shepard possessed a remarkable memory for remembering all the patients he had treated. He would strike up conversations with former patients years later with a genuine interest in finding out how their lives had turned out. The field of orthodontics changes rapidly, and Dr. Shepard kept up with complex advances in the field and was deeply involved in professional orthodontics organizations. In 1979, his son Steve graduated from Baylor College of Dentistry, joined his father, and learned first-hand the techniques that make a top-notch orthodontist. As Shepard and Shepard, they practiced orthodontics side by side for 30 years. With time, the practice shifted to include more adults, yet Dr. Frank continued to build enduring relationships with his patients. Frank Shepard was an avid hunter and outdoorsman, as well as a long-time Rotarian and dedicated golfer. After getting a pilot’s license, he flew his family on many trips and served on the Harlingen Airport Board. Of course, an orthodontist’s children hear more comments about their father’s profession than most children do. Frank and Helen Shepard’s offspring realized that if they had a dollar for every one of their father’s patients who told them, “I helped put you through college,” they would have fat nest eggs. Frank and Helen Shepard on their wedding day in 1955.
Dr. Frank Shepard died January 9, 2009.
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Dr. Eric Six E
ric Six, born in England, spent his childhood in Tanganyika and Kenya. He graduated from the Godfrey Huggins School of Medicine, University of Rhodesia, in 1972. Internships in general surgery, internal medicine and neurosurgery followed. In 1975, Dr. Six began a neurosurgery residency at North Carolina Baptist Hospital in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. In 1980 Dr. Six entered the U.S. Navy Medical Corps, serving as a staff neurosurgeon at the National Naval Medical Center and as an Assistant Professor of Surgery at the Uniformed Services’ University of Health Science through 1983. That year he became Board certified by the American Board of Neurological Surgery. Dr. Six, his wife Anne and their children moved to Harlingen in 1983, where he joined Neurological Associates, and in 2000, he established Valley Neurosurgeons PLLC. He has been a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons since 1986. He was twice elected Chief of the Department of Surgery at Valley Baptist Medical Center and was the Medical Director at Valley Baptist Medical Center for 17 years. Dr. Six was appointed to the faculty of The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio in 1994. He is a Diplomate of the American Board of Quality Assurance and Utilization Review Physicians. He has contributed to professional journals and publications including the Handbook of Nursing Case Management. Dr. Six attributed 30 successful years in practice to the combined efforts of his dedicated office staff and highly skilled hospital staff, from nurses to operating room technicians, and he commended their hard work, exquisite attention to detail and dedication to high quality patient care. Eric and Anne Six have three adult children: Karen, Sheralee and Tammy. They have two grandchildren, Larson and Taylor Leonard.
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South Texas College S
outh Texas College, formerly known as South Texas Community College, began offering nursing and allied health classes in fall 1995. Because the region previously had no access to a community college, the demand for classes in all programs, especially in the health care field, was high, but space was precious. The first 150 students preparing for nursing and allied health careers at STC were taught at any location available in the district ranging from traditional classrooms to churches, and even to laundromats. As the college grew rapidly, the region’s health care needs kept pace, further demonstrating the need for expanding STC’s learning facilities. After the passage of a bond and in response to the growing need for locally trained professionals, STC opened its Nursing and Allied Health Campus in fall 2000. In 2002, the campus was dedicated in honor of Dr. Ramiro R. Casso, a Rio Grande Valley health care pioneer and humanitarian, who helped found STC’s Nursing and Allied Health Division. By fall 2011 the college reached another important milestone in educating health care professionals when it was accredited to offer its Bachelor of Applied Technology in Medical and Health Services Management. The degree prepares graduates for entry to mid-level management positions at health care or medical facilities to provide valuable expertise in a variety of areas including finance, staffing, reimbursement mechanisms, technology, privacy and legal issues, to name a few. Today, the campus serves more than 1,200 students preparing to take on a variety of health care roles including nursing, emergency medical technology, health and medical administrative services, medical assistant technology, occupational therapy assistance, patient care assistance, pharmacy technology, physical therapy assistance, radiologic technology and respiratory therapy. STC’s Dr. Ramiro R. Casso Nursing and Allied Health Campus is located at 1101 E. Vermont in McAllen, right in the heart of the region’s growing medical district. Students learn and practice their skills at the campus in the college’s state-of-the-art simulated learning classrooms and labs, and go on to hone their skills through preceptorships and internships at businesses right in the campus’ backyard. FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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South Texas Emergency Care Foundation, Inc.
I
n 1975, Harlingen community leaders and physicians formed a committee to study ways to upgrade emergency medical response capabilities. Doctors knew that advanced, pre-hospital emergency care was critical for the survival of many patients with sudden illnesses or traumatic injuries. By upgrading the ambulance system and using trained paramedics, lives could be saved and recovery rates improved. The committee agreed that a stand-alone, medically-driven, nonprofit emergency medical service (EMS) would provide the most reliable, uninterrupted service. Although focused on upgrading the medical response, they realized that an EMS system is more than ambulances. They integrated communications, public education and support, and medical community cooperation into the system. Valley Baptist Medical Center and local physicians agreed to train paramedics and provide advanced equipment and medical direction. After gaining non-profit status in January 1979, South Texas Emergency Care Foundation, Inc., with a few ambulances and a small staff of volunteer and professionals, began responding to L. Nathan Winters, Board President; Gene Campos, Founding Board Member; emergency calls in July. The region’s first EMS had the full Garner Klein, Md., Medical Director; Gerry Fleuriet, Founding Board Member; support of local hospitals. As a stand-alone entity not tied to a Bill Aston, Executive Director; Brendan Hall, Founding Board Member single city, STEC could cross jurisdictional lines and benefit residents of a large region. In 2002, STEC became a nationally accredited EMS and remains one of 18 accredited in Texas. In 32 years, STEC has answered over 402,000 calls for help and currently responds to about 63 calls daily.
Today, STEC provides the highest level of emergency medical care with a staff of 90 and 18 ambulances and first responder vehicles equipped with the most advanced technology. The success of STEC is based on four strengths, the first being its awardwinning leadership team whose members serve on state and regional emergency care task forces. Added to that are STEC’s expertise in advanced life support supplied by Early STECF Emergency Medical Response Vehicles paramedics, EMTs, and nurses, along with STEC’s accredited ground and air emergency transportation services. Finally, STEC’s invaluable community partnerships cover nine communities, multiple hospitals, regional EMT training programs and the Regional Academic Health Center. In addition, STEC donated land to South Texas Medical Foundation to help develop the future medical school. STEC’s community based, multi-jurisdictional system has drawn numerous representatives from throughout Texas to study Harlingen’s acknowledged role model in action.
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South Texas Health System S
outh Texas Health System (STHS) has deep roots in the Rio Grande Valley. Today, STHS is the largest healthcare provider in the area with more than 2,200 employees at seven facilities dedicated to providing high-quality, efficient healthcare in a safe environment – a sharp contrast from healthcare’s humble beginnings here a century ago. McAllen Municipal Hospital, at the current site of McAllen’s City Hall, opened in 1925 and Grandview Hospital. (MOSTH) was expanded significantly in 1928. In 1927, Edinburg residents established the Grandview Hospital. In 1969, adjacent to the Grandview, Edinburg General Hospital was constructed at 333 W. Freddy Gonzalez Drive. It underwent major expansions in the 1970s and 1980s and was sold to Universal Health Services (UHS), Inc., South Texas Health System’s parent company, in 1994. McAllen Medical Center’s full service acute care facility opened in December 1985, as part of UHS, and is the successor to McAllen Municipal Hospital, General Hospital and Methodist Hospital. McAllen Medical Center is home to the Valley’s first neonatal intensive care unit and neonatal surgery center, the designated Level III Trauma Center for Hidalgo County, and the region’s first and only transplant center. Through its affiliation with the McAllen Family Medicine Residency Program, the hospital is committed to training and keeping doctors in South Texas. On August 1, 1997, UHS opened Edinburg Regional Medical Center, the fourth generation of Edinburg hospitals. In 2000, UHS acquired Charter Palms Hospital, which became South Texas Behavioral Health Center. McAllen Heart Hospital, purchased in January 2001, is the first freestanding cardiology and cardiovascular hospital in the nation and continues to garner national accolades for outstanding care. The opening of McAllen Medical Center in 1985. (MOSTH)
In March 2006, Edinburg Children’s Hospital became the first freestanding children’s hospital in the Rio Grande Valley. It is a Certified Asthma Center, the first facility in Texas and the second in the nation to earn this distinction. Later that year, Edinburg Regional Rehab Center opened inside Edinburg Regional Medical Center, providing patients with comprehensive inpatient rehabilitation services never before seen in the Valley. The same year South Texas Behavioral Health Center relocated to Edinburg to service the mental health needs of the entire region. It is the first private behavioral health inpatient treatment center for children, adolescents and adults.
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South Texas Medical Foundation I
n June 2002, the Regional Academic Health Center Medical Education Division welcomed its first 24 third-year medical students from The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio and its first group of Internal Medicine resident physicians. Two physicians who graduated with the class of 2004 epitomize the RAHC experience.
Todd Worley opted for the adventure associated with a startup program. “It ended up being incredible. I felt like I was doing an apprenticeship of sorts. The hands-on experience was great with so much one-on-one attention.” The RAHC surgery rotation – “very technical, very clinical” – set him on his life’s path, greatly influenced by Dr. Ashraf Hilmy, RAHC faculty member and surgeon. When Dr. Worley began his five-year surgical residency at St. Joseph Hospital in Chicago, he found, “From an academic standpoint, I was on par with my colleagues. In terms of experience, I felt I was ahead of the curve.” Dr. Worley completed a fellowship in minimally invasive surgery at Houston’s Hermann Hospital and today is a Houston surgeon performing minimally invasive, robotic, general and bariatric surgery at Methodist Willowbrook Hospital. The first University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio medical students to attend the Regional Academic Health Center were
Jennifer Almonte, an El Paso native, believed a third-year medical presented commemorative medals by Dr. Leonel Vela, Dean, at the student at the RAHC would have excellent opportunities for hands-on dedication of the new campus in June 2002. training in small learning groups. “Much of the time I worked one-onone with the attending physician. They were excellent physicians who were very enthusiastic about teaching medical students and offered me a lot of hands-on experience.” The obstetrician-gynecologists’ passion for their work inspired her to enter that field. Dr. Almonte began an Ob-Gyn residency at University Hospital in San Antonio. “Because of the RAHC, I had done a few things that fellow residents had not. I had a better understanding of what an ob-gyn practice is like for community physicians.” As a resident, Dr. Almonte recommended the RAHC experience to medical students. Dr. Almonte practices today in McAllen with Landrum-Chester OB-GYN Associates. The South Texas Medical Foundation promotes and supports medical education in the Rio Grande Valley including the RAHC expansion and the development of a full four-year medical school and health science center. The Foundation’s Board of Trustees honors those first RAHC students and residents who have led the way. Among them is Dr. Nolan Perez, a Valley native, UTHSCSA graduate, RAHC Internal Medicine resident, local physician, and a charter member of the Foundation board.
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SpawGlass Contractors, Inc. I
n 2007 SpawGlass Contractors constructed the Academic and Clinical Research Building for the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio’s Regional Academic Health Center (RAHC) Harlingen campus. The 75,000 square-foot facility houses a full-service VA Outpatient Clinic on the first floor with exam and procedure rooms and ancillary services. RAHC medical students have a dedicated laboratory. The second floor is designed for health science research and academic space. Established in 1953, SpawGlass Contractors is a 100 percent employee-owned construction company which has been recognized as one of the best places to work in Texas. In the Valley since 1992, SpawGlass has changed the visual and architectural horizon with its award-winning medical, academic, and medical education buildings erected with the highest standards of quality and service. The company prides itself on building its people, too, in an innovative, safe, and happy environment, developing and recognizing skills and talents.
SpawGlass is a LEED-Certified builder and a certified Green Builder, working to minimize the environmental impact of all its projects. SpawGlass is committed to building long-term relations with clients, architects, and specialty contractors, according to Rene Capistran, SpawGlass President for South Texas. At The University of Texas at Brownsville, SpawGlass completed the UTB Biomedical Research and Health Professions Buildings. Here are first-class research labs, specialized microscope rooms, classrooms, sleep study labs, and quarantine rooms. Biotechnology, biology and medical research, focusing on health problems which impact the Hispanic population, are positioned to be a catalyst for additional research funding. Adjacent to The University of Texas-Pan American, SpawGlass built the RAHC’s Medical Research Division facility, which includes Biosafety Level-3 labs, an automated environmental monitoring system along with chemical fume hoods and radioisotope hoods. The New Horizon Medical Center in Brownsville and the Mission Regional Medical Center Neonatal ICU expansion are other successful SpawGlass projects. The South Texas College Starr County Campus in Rio Grande City, UTPA’s Computer Center and classroom complex, the University Center at TSTC, and the McAllen Convention Center are likewise SpawGlass endeavors. Community involvement is a given on all levels. In 2008 SpawGlass led contractors and suppliers in constructing the $350,000 Sunny Glen Children’s Home administration building, free of charge to the non-profit. FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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Su Clínica I
n the late 1960s, 14 Harlingen doctors, working after-hours in a room donated by a pharmacy, provided free primary care services to migrant and low-income families. That community concern to meet basic healthcare needs of an underserved population, combined with federal funding and support from Catholic Charities, Inc., and Organizaciones Unidas, resulted in the 1971 opening of Su Clínica Familiar in Raymondville and Harlingen. Maternity and dental services were soon added as the National Health Service Corps funneled medical professionals to the clinics. The transformation of Su Clínica Familiar from a migrant clinic into the region’s leading community health center has been marked by excellence in healthcare delivery and clinical education based on affiliation Su Clínica opened its new expanded Brownsville facility in June, 2012. with leading hospitals and universities. Fulfilling its commitment to being a one-stop medical home, Su Clínica offers pediatrics, internal medicine, family practice, OB/GYN, minor surgery and podiatry backed by a comprehensive lab, pharmacy, x-ray, and programs of dental services, health education, nutrition, outreach and case management. With a local board of directors, the nonprofit institution anticipates and responds to the healthcare needs of its clients. In 1980, Su Clínica Familiar was incorporated and became one of the first migrant clinics to be accredited by the Joint Commission of Healthcare Organizations. Dan Hawkins Jr., the first director of Su Clínica, was succeeded by Francisco Gonzalez in May 1980. In 1995 Dr. Elena Marin, Su Clínica Familiar’s Medical Director, became Executive Director. Fifteen years later, Su Clínica was handling over 166,700 patient visits annually, thanks to the credentialed, caring staff at the Harlingen, Raymondville, Santa Rosa, and Brownsville facilities. In 1998, Su Clínica became the clinical partner of the Regional Academic Health Center of The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio. It has provided medical students and residents essential hands-on experience treating patients, building on Su Clínica’s existing training programs for dental and allied health students.
Su Clinica Familiar began providing healthcare services in 1971 using this mobile unit.
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Responding to growing demand, Su Clínica in October 2002 opened a 62,000 square foot Harlingen facility – a primary care clinic with four specialty clinics: dental, women’s health, pediatrics and internal medicine. In 2012, Su Clínica replicated that multi-specialty, one-stop clinic in Brownsville to serve 17,000 patients and continues to create healthy futures for the next generation.
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Tavárez Medical Center A
lthough Marvin Tavárez was born in Mexico City, his grade school and high school years were spent at the Holding Institute in Laredo, Texas. Those formative years gave him the necessary background to earn his B.S. in Chemistry and Bacteriology at The University of Texas at Austin. He then attended medical school at the University of Nuevo Léon, Monterrey, Mexico. After graduation, Dr. Tavárez did a one-year rotating internship at Sioux Valley Hospital in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. There he met and married Alice E. Mills, a hospital pharmacist. Dr. Tavárez then completed a four-year Internal Medicine residency at Scott and White Memorial Hospital in Temple, Texas. The couple settled in McAllen in 1962, and Dr. Tavárez opened his practice in a small rented office.
Hiram, Vicente,Jr. and Marvin Tavárez
The practice grew, and in 1965 Dr. Tavárez’s younger brother Hiram, who also had graduated from the University of Nuevo Leon School of Medicine, joined the practice after completing his Internal Medicine Residency at Scott and White. That same year, the doctors’ eldest brother, Dr. Vicente Tavárez, came to McAllen after completing a five-year pyramid surgical residency in Norfolk, Virginia.
Parents, Vicente & Margarita Tavárez
In 1968, the three brothers formed the clinic today known as Tavárez Medical Center. The practice has grown over the years, although only a few original patients remain. The physicians see their long-established patients, new patients, and those referred for consultations by surgeons and family practice doctors.
Dr. Vicente died in 1996. Dr. Marvin and Dr. Hiram continue to practice medicine in a straightforward and honest fashion. One of the two brothers is always on call. Both doctors have been Assistant Professors of Medicine for the Medical Residency program in McAllen. Dr. Marvin has served on the McAllen Medical Center board and Rio Grande Regional Hospital board where he was the chairman of the board for two years. Dr Hiram was also chairman of the board for Rio Grande Regional Hospital and currently serves as the medical director of the UTPA Physician Assistant Program. FOR THE GOOD OF MY PATIENTS
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Texas Oncology A
t Texas Oncology, we help patients fight cancer in a state-of-the-art, supportive environment. We’re motivated, moved, and inspired by the Rio GrandeValley patients we serve and commit ourselves to providing compassionate and local cancer care. More than 80 percent of all cancer treatment is now delivered at the community level. The Rio GrandeValley is no exception and to meet those needs, community-based clinics like Texas Oncology offer advanced, comprehensive cancer care previously found only in the largest metropolitan areas. We opened our first office here in 1986, and since establishing the first comprehensive cancer center in the Valley in 1994, we have delivered treatment services with a level of personalized care and convenience. We currently have locations in Brownsville, Harlingen, McAllen, and Weslaco. In 2011, Texas Urology Specialists–Brownsville opened and the medical team works in conjunction with our oncologists to provide collaborative, high quality treatment. Our acclaimed staff of medical professionals includes 15 oncologists and an urologist and provides patients with the most advanced, patient-friendly cancer care available. Our oncologists are specialists in medical oncology, radiation oncology, gynecologic oncology, hematology, and urology. We treat all types of cancer, from the most prevalent forms such as breast cancer, prostate cancer, skin cancer, and lung cancer to any of the more than 200 forms of cancer identified by the medical community. Our patients have access to advanced technologies, treatments, and services, including diagnostic imaging, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, laboratory services, and an on-site pharmacy. We also offer genetic testing through the Hereditary Cancer Risk Assessment Program. Patients of Texas Oncology also benefit from our participation in innovative research programs, including clinical trials that evaluate new cancer prevention and treatment options. Texas Oncology has more than 345 physicians and more than 135 sites of service throughout Texas and southeastern Oklahoma. Texas Breast Specialists and Texas Urology Specialists, which focus on all areas of breast and urologic care, are a part of Texas Oncology. Texas Oncology’s approach enables patients to receive industry-leading treatment without leaving home and the critical support of family and friends.
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Texas State Technical College Harlingen T
exas State Technical College (TSTC) Harlingen opened its Allied Health Division (AHD) in 1997 to meet the growing healthcare needs and medical employment demands of the Rio Grande Valley, a medically underserved region.
“ We are proud of the accreditation standard met, and often exceeded, by our programs. Each instructor has a wealth of experience to share with the students since they must have completed at least three years of professional experience before they teach,” AHD Director Bob Bennett said. “Students benefit from the cooperation of hospitals, medical clinics, and dental offices across the Rio Grande Valley that help us produce graduates prepared for entry‐level careers or higher education. The near-perfect job placement rate for graduates is testimony to The University Center at Texas State Technical College. the success of our college community.” The Dental Laboratory Technology Program became the first health program at TSTC in 1968, followed by the Surgical Technology Program in 1974. Today the Allied Health Division has a total of 11 programs, including Biology, Culinary Arts, Dental Assistant, Dental Hygiene, Health Information Technology, Medical Assistant, Medical Information Specialist/Transcriptionist, and Vocational Nursing. In the fall of 2012, TSTC added a Registered Nursing program. The AHD also offers Associate of Science degrees in Biology, Health Professions and Nursing Preparatory for students who want to continue their medical studies at a four-year university. The AHD represents a rapidly growing segment of TSTC’s student population. Enrollment at the two‐year technical college rose to more than 6,000 students for the fall semester 2011 with approximately 1,200 students majoring in AHD areas of study. According to job placement studies, approximately 90 percent of all Allied Health graduates end up working in South Texas. TSTC is a state‐wide system, with campuses in Harlingen, Waco, Marshall and West Texas, which emphasizes courses of study in technical education and in emerging technology careers which are in demand in Texas. Harlingen is the only college in the TSTC system offering a full complement of both technical and academic programs.
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Thurmond Eye Associates J
ack Thurmond grew up in Virginia, joined the Navy during World War II, and served in European and Pacific waters. Using the GI Bill, he graduated from Roanoke College and in 1953 from the Medical College of South Carolina. Dr. Thurmond completed an Eye, Ear, Nose, and Throat residency in Virginia and an ophthalmology residency in Arkansas, and then practiced ophthalmology in South Carolina. In 1962, Dr. Thurmond and his wife Lois moved to Weslaco where he opened the Mid-Valley Eye Clinic. Carefully selected ophthalmologists who shared his philosophy of excellent patient care and who were community-oriented family men were invited to work with him. Cornea specialist Dr. Rodolfo E. Margo joined Dr. Thurmond in 1967. Retina specialist Dr. Rodolfo Perez joined the group in 1977, followed in 1978 by Dr. William Gillum, an oculoplastic surgeon. The four ophthalmologists built the Eye Surgery Center in Weslaco in 1987. The practice opened a McAllen office in 1984 and added Dr. Stephen Hook in 1988.
Dr. Thurmond’s kindness and quiet generosity were legendary. A new clinic employee, a single mother who could not afford to bring her college daughter home for Thanksgiving, found round trip tickets on her desk and the advice: “Be with your family.” Boys with no father figures found Dr. Thurmond accompanying them to father-son events. For his own family, Jack Thurmond was the sports-loving father of five – Thomas, Nancy, Ted, Walter, and Ben – who served as a Boy Scout leader, Little League mediator and Elder in Weslaco First Presbyterian Church. On Dr. Thurmond’s retirement in 1992, his partners honored him by renaming the practice Thurmond Eye Associates and adding locations in Rio Grande City and Mission. More Board certified ophthalmologists joined Thurmond Eye Associates: Dr. Wade Graham and Dr. Deborah Alexander in 2008, Dr. Joel George in 2009, and Dr. Karl Bentley in 2011, as well as optometrists Dr. Yvonne Diaz and Dr. Sonia Silva. Jack and Lois Thurmond volunteered 20 times as medical missionaries to Central and South America and continued their weekend border missions through I (Eye) Care until Dr. Thurmond died in 2011.
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William Torkildsen, M.D. W
illiam Torkildsen knew he wanted to be a doctor by the time he reached eighth grade. When other Houston kids were outside playing, he was inside studying. After attending Tulane University on an academic scholarship, he went to The University of Texas-San Antonio Medical School. Several years as an Emergency Room physician convinced him to complete a residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Texas in 1982. In 1983 Dr. Torkildsen opened his practice in Harlingen with his wife Suzanne, an R.N. An abiding interest in critical care medicine prompted Dr. Torkildsen to become Board Certified in Critical Care Medicine by 1991 and later Testamur with the National Board of Echocardiography. When he realized that many ICU patients had preventable illnesses, his medical practice, Rio Grande Medicine, became the first to oer stress echocardiography in the Valley. Detecting coronary artery disease early prevented many heart attacks. Dr. Torkildsen expected his patients to participate in their wellness, working with him to manage hypertension and diabetes. Realizing the importance of preventative health care, Dr. Torkildsen opened a series of rural health clinics to reach an underserved population. He became the medical director of the first Rio Hondo Clinic, which improved access for many patients and reduced the costs to patients and the government. The rural clinic achieved such success that the concept was expanded to Port Isabel, Mercedes, Los Fresnos, Santa Rosa, and Sebastian. Through Rio Grande Medicine, Dr. Torkildsen brought the first electronic medical records to Harlingen in 1993 and provided the EMR system to the rural clinics. Years ahead of other Texas practices, Rio Grande Medicine was paperless by 1999. Dr. Torkildsen, along with Dr. Hugo Blake and others, established Harlingen Medical Center in 2002 to give physicians more input into medical care. The physicians also established Solara Hospital as a long-term care facility. In 2009, Dr. Torkildsen sold Rio Grande Medicine to Dr. Julio Savinon, although he still sees patients in Harlingen and works with the rural clinics. Today he is a hospitalist at St. Marks Medical Center in La Grange,Texas, and serves on the hospital board, giving 110 percent of his attention and time to medicine. He and Suzanne raise Quarter Horses and Texas Longhorn cattle on their ranch.
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The University of Texas at Brownsville T
he University of Texas at Brownsville has been a member of The University of Texas System since 1991. Defined in large part by its unique intersection of culture and languages, guided by its mission and aligned with the strategic plan of the UT System, the University’s goals of research, excellence, accessibility and affordability all focus on the development of student success.
Toward that end, the University biomedical research component of the College of Biomedical Sciences and Health Professions has made remarkable strides in the 20 years of the University’s existence. Faculty and students strive to unlock medical mysteries that will help solve conditions such as diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease and epilepsy. Diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease disproportionately affect the Hispanic population of South Texas, and epilepsy cases are on the rise nationwide due to recent increases of traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic epilepsy associated with a decade of warfare. Greatly facilitating research at UTB is the 60,000-square foot Biomedical Research and Health Professions Building, which opened in fall 2011, with four classrooms, 12 laboratories, three technology labs, eight faculty research facilities, 12 science research facilities and an outreach space. The building also has a designated tissue culture room, an expanded laboratory animal area and two hot and cold storage rooms. Funding for the building was provided by $33.8 million in Texas tuition revenue bonds issued by the state Legislature. Equipment was purchased from a portion of a $495,000 grant the University received from the Health Resources and Services Administration. In anticipation of laboratories soon reaching capacity, $3.9 million in funding from the National Institutes of Health has been granted to construct a complementary 8,452square foot structure in 2012. The building will also have Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification. Funding for biomedical research at UTB increases annually, indicating what lies ahead for this blossoming university.
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Valley Baptist Family Practice Residency B
ecause medical residents often establish their practices where they train, Valley Baptist Medical Center in 1996 launched the Valley Baptist Family Practice Residency program to bring more physicians to the region. Dr. Bruce Leibert leads the fully accredited residency program which provides one-on-one clinical experiences in a Christian, apprentice-style curriculum. Local physicians serve as faculty of the residency program. Residents see patients at the Family Practice Clinic and at the hospital, developing relationships that are satisfying for both the patient and the physician. The residency program’s community outreach brings Christcentered medicine to weekly free clinics in poor colonias, as well as to the month-long Summer Medical Institute. Over one-third of the program’s residents, including Dr. Ricardo Alaniz, now practice in the region.
Faculty member Dr. Claudia Aguero-Vazquez shows Valley Baptist Family Practice residents Dr. Lincoln Peixto, Dr. Samuel Landero and Dr. Ayodeji Adowle how to examine a patient's corneal abrasion.
Dr. Juan Maldonado, a graduate of The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, began his Valley Baptist Family Practice residency the year the program opened, at a time when it had no buildings and few patients. He recalled that the faculty – local doctors who were respected cardiologists, cardiovascular surgeons and internal medicine specialists – took residents under their wings. “They devoted time to us, opened their doors to us. That access would have been difficult in a large city. We had hands-on experiences that residents elsewhere only hope to have. You felt comfortable not only dealing with patients but also interacting with the attending physician. You got an idea of how to treat patients and of what specialists could do.” Now in private practice in Harlingen, Dr. Maldonado has been on the RAHC faculty since 2002. Dr. Robert Holder, a graduate of UT Medical Branch Galveston, was attracted to Valley Baptist’s residency program because of its size, the faculty of local, practicing physicians, and its location on the border, where he intended to practice. “I had the opportunity to learn things that I had not expected. It prepared me very well – I saw the same types of patients that I am seeing now. The volunteer faculty, like Dr. Mild and all the specialists, were very involved in our training and available to the residents.” The program gave residents a true sense of practicing in the community. In private practice in Harlingen, Dr. Holder often refers his patients to the specialists he worked with during his residency.
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The University of Texas-Pan American S
ince 1927, The University of Texas-Pan American has been building communities, changing lives, and inspiring the future. A dynamic and evolving higher education institution, UTPA has a long history of responding to the changing needs of a rapidly growing, international and multicultural region that is rich in culture and history.
To ensure that South Texas residents have greater access to higher education and health care, UTPA has been diligent in providing its students with an abundance of options in health care related majors that lead to careers as medical practitioners, nurses, physician assistants, rehab services, and much more. UTPA’s medical-related programs are innovative, rigorous and highly successful in producing medical professionals who give back to their communities in the Rio Grande Valley, which is one of the fastest growing areas in the state. To better serve the area, the University developed the Premedical Honors College (PHC) Program in 1994. The program is a collaborative effort with the Baylor College of Medicine to improve the matriculation of underrepresented students to medical school and increase the number of physicians practicing in the South Texas region. Today, 87 percent of PHC graduates have been admitted to medical school since the program's inception and in the past three years 98 percent have been accepted into medical school, compared to the 35 percent of all applicants in Texas who are admitted. Quite a few of the 102 program graduates have returned to the area to make a major impact in the delivery of health care. UTPA is also helping develop future physicians through partnerships with the UT System Joint Admission Medical Program ( JAMP) and the Early Medical School Acceptance Program, a collaboration between UTMB-Galveston and the University. JAMP provides guaranteed admission to one of the state's nine medical schools, and financial and academic support for highly qualified Texas students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. The UTMB-UTPA partnership was also designed to help fill the need for physicians in South Texas. Another innovative program the University is partnered with is the UT System’s TIME (Transformation in Medical Education) Initiative. This initiative is a multi-institutional collaboration with UTPA, UT Brownsville, UT El Paso, UT Medical Branch at Galveston, and UT Health Science Center in Houston, to assist incoming freshmen interested in pursuing medical degrees graduate in six years, rather than the eight years it usually takes to become a physician. The University is also producing pharmacists through its Cooperative Pharmacy Program (CPP) with The University of Texas at Austin College of Pharmacy. This program was specifically developed to encourage students from the Rio Grande Valley and the
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Laredo area to pursue doctorate degrees in pharmacy. The University also boasts the only Physician Assistant Program outside a medical school and the only Bridge Program for bachelor’s to master’s degrees for previous undergraduate physician a s s i s t a n t s t u d e n t s i n Te x a s . Additionally, the University is proud to help foster the next generation of scientists and medical professionals through its Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), which focuses on improving access to bioscience careers for students throughout the Valley and enhancing the undergraduate experience for bioscience students at UTPA. The University has also become a leader in the study of diabetes and obesity along the U.S.-Mexico border and across the state. Through its programs – Border Health Office (BHO) and the South Texas Border Health Disparities Center – the University investigates and addresses health issues that affect the Hispanic population. Through the BHO program with 11 Texas Education Agency Education Service Center Regions, BHO annually screens more than 1.2 million children for Acanthosis Nigricans (AN), which is a skin condition that signals high insulin levels in the body and is a possible sign for developing diabetes in the future. In addition, BHO developed a Diabetes Registry to reduce the number of diabetes cases through community education and outreach activities related to prevention and control of the disease. To enhance its current programs, and in collaboration with the UT System’s $30 million Rio Grande Valley Initiative, the University is also creating biomedical research clusters composed of world-class faculty members focused on the high incidence of obesity (48.5%) and progressive diabetes (30.7%) among adults in the Rio Grande Valley. UTPA is committed to developing the best graduates in the areas of the health sciences, who are determined to make their mark and enhance the health and environment of citizens everywhere, especially in their own backyards – the Rio Grande Valley.
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Valley Baptist Medical Center - Brownsville
T
he first community hospital in Brownsville traces its history back to 1917, when the Sisters of Mercy opened Divine Providence Hospital. In 1923, the nuns established Mercy Hospital at West Jefferson and Central Boulevard. Mercy grew with the city, in 1952 adding a new wing and in 1963 adding 52 more beds, a labor and delivery area, surgical suites and a radiology department. In 1983, part of the original 1923 building was demolished and replaced with the current three-story patient tower. In 1999, the third floor of the Women’s Center and Emergency Department three-story tower opened. The addition included ten Labor/Delivery/Recovery Suites, four Women’s Surgery Suites and an expanded 34-bed neonatal intensive care nursery. By 2004, when the hospital was purchased by Valley Baptist Health System, it had grown to 243 beds, and had long been a major contributor to the local economy, employing more than 800. Since then, Valley Baptist-Brownsville has expanded beyond the main hospital campus by opening an ambulatory surgery center and imaging center – featuring an open MRI – at the North Brownsville Medical Plaza off Expressway 77. The hospital’s East Brownsville campus has the region’s first inpatient behavioral health facility, along with outpatient mental health and seniors’ programs. In 2008, Valley Baptist-Brownsville, the largest hospital in the city, became the first Cameron County hospital to offer a new type of computerguided knee surgery. The surgery, performed by Dr. Jose A. Bossolo, resulted in smaller incisions and quicker healing times for many patients. Also that year, a Foot Care Institute opened at Valley Baptist-Brownsville, offering specialized care for diabetes and other patients under the direction of Dr. Jose Ayala. The Sisters of Mercy opened Mercy Hospital off West Jefferson Street in 1923. (Robert Runyon Photograph Collection)
In 2011, Valley Baptist-Brownsville constructed new surgery suites which benefit patients needing a wide variety of surgeries, including laparoscopic and other minimally-invasive surgeries.
Valley Baptist-Brownsville physicians and staff have received many national awards for their quality service and clinical excellence. In 2011, Valley Baptist-Brownsville became the first hospital in Texas to receive a “Target Stroke Honor Roll” award for fast response in treating patients with symptoms of stroke.
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Valley Baptist Medical Center - Harlingen I
t all began January 22, 1925 on “F” Street in Harlingen, when Valley Baptist Hospital opened as a 36-bed community hospital. The faith-based hospital grew with the community, lending its strength after the devastating hurricane of 1933 and during the polio epidemics of the 1940 and 1950s. By 1956 it had expanded to 152 beds. Also in 1956, Valley Baptist Hospital moved to Ed Carey Drive where it has pioneered heart and orthopedic procedures. The Valley’s first open heart surgery and cardiac catheterization were performed at Valley Baptist in 1977. A six-story South Tower was built in the 1980s, followed by the four-story East Tower in 1998 and a six-story Medical Arts Pavilion in 2001. The East Tower, which features a 38-bed Emergency Department, is capped by a roof-top heliport and has the only Pediatric ICU in Cameron County. In 1998 Valley Baptist Medical Center was chosen as the main teaching hospital for third- and fourth-year medical students at the Regional Academic Health Center, which was built on land donated by the hospital. Valley Baptist-Harlingen received three Gold awards for care of heart and stroke patients, including a Gold Plus award for care of stroke patients, along with a Gold award for care of heart failure patients, from the American Heart Association. In 2008, Valley Baptist became the first Valley hospital to offer robotic surgery with credentialed staff on site. The more precise surgery with Valley Baptist’s da Vinci® robotic system means smaller incisions, less pain, and faster recoveries in many cases. Patients from across the country come to Valley Baptist for orthopedic surgery. In 2011, Valley Baptist-Harlingen became the first hospital south of San Antonio to be certified specifically for knee and hip replacement surgeries by the national accrediting organization.
The original Valley Baptist Hospital opened on “F” Street in Harlingen in 1925.
With 586 beds and more than 2,000 dedicated employees, Valley Baptist is the largest hospital in Cameron County and the area’s Lead Level III Trauma Center.
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Valley Regional Medical Center V
alley Community Hospital was founded in 1975 to provide Brownsville area residents with a modern, responsive medical facility. It has evolved into Valley Regional Medical Center, a trusted healthcare provider which is affiliated with HCA, the largest hospital company in the world. In 1998, Valley Regional moved to its state-of-the-art, aesthetically pleasing 214-bed facility located at the corner of Expressway 77 and Alton Gloor. Valley Regional has been ranked among the top five percent in the nation for clinical excellence by HealthGrades and is known for its high-tech, high-touch services. As a designated Level III Trauma Center, the hospital treats a large range of emergency care needs 24 hours a day. With more than 200 physicians representing over 25 specialties, Valley Regional provides a broad range of high-quality programs including state-of-the-art diagnostic imaging, cardiac care, emergency medicine, general surgery, obstetrics, neurology, therapy, wound healing and hyperbaric, among others. The hospital also has dedicated units – Intensive Care, Neonatal Intensive Care, and Pediatric Progressive Care – that are renowned for their level of care. The heart of Valley Regional Medical Center is the staff. VRMC leads the Rio Grande Valley in the number of nurses who have obtained advanced certifications. VRMC’s unwavering commitment to patient care, anchored by compassion, technical skills and innovation makes patient feel like they are part of an extended family. VRMC has led in the adoption of nationwide patient safety initiatives. Robot R-x and e-MAR bar code technologies helps make patients safer. Using cutting edge technologies, physicians at Valley Regional can offer the best, most up-to date care. Howard H. Roberts, M.D., received a Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his unwavering dedication to his patients, the Brownsville community and Valley Regional Medical Center for the past 50 years.
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For two years in a row, VRMC has been honored with the Brownville Herald Readers’ Choice Award for “Best Hospital.” From emergency medicine and heart surgery to caring for tiny babies, Valley Regional has become the hospital that families count on throughout the Rio Grande Valley.
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Index Army Medical Corps.............................7,13,16-25 Audubon, James .............................................27,81 Austin, A. J. ..............................................65,83,86 Back To Action Physical Therapy .....................102 Balli, Dr. Carlos .............................................42,87 Barrera, Dr. Cayetano II & III...42,43,66,87-8,103 Berlandier, Jean Louis .........................................12 Beulah ..............................................2,31,32-33,95 Bigelow, Israel .................................18,19,55,60,82 Boggus Family ..................................................104 Bohmfalk, Dr. Stanley.........................................50 Brownsville ...........................................27-30,54-5 Brownsville Community Health Center ....75-7,96 Cabeza de Vaca .................................................8-9 Camp Llano Grande ..................................21-5,87 Cash, Dr. Clarence ...............................41,43,90,92 Casso, Dr. Ramiro ..............................36,69,99,105 Chapman, Helen..................................14,18,26,27 Cholera ...............................5,11,14,18-9,26-28,81 Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse.......................106 Civil War ...................................13,15,18-20,55,82 Clark, Dr. Thomas A. ........................................107 Curanderos................................................10,12,43 Del Castillo, Lois ...........................................49,93 Diabetes.................................................39,43,71-3 Divine Providence .........................5,35,57,60,87-8 Doctors Hospital at Renaissance........59,63,98,108 Dolly Vinsant............................................59,62,91 Doss Sanitarium...................................43,57,87,60 Edgerton, Dr. Mary Ann Headley .......38,40,43,86 Edinburg Children’s Hospital ...................59,63,99
Edinburg Regional Hospital .....................59,63,98 Escandon, Jose de .......................................10,85-6 Ex-votos................................................................9 Family Practice Medicine Residency.....52-3,66,79 Family Medicine Residency...........................52,79 Family Physicians Clinic...................................109 Farm Security Admin ...............................44,74,91 Ferris, Dr. John...............................................35,49 Ford, John (Rip).............................................19,82 Fort Brown.................13,16-25,27,29,55,60,81-83 Fort Ringgold ......................2,19,27,55,60,80-1,83 Gallaher, Dr. George ..........................43,89,90,110 Garcia, Dr. Hector .........................................25,91 Garcia, Dr. Octavio ......................5,43,58,89,90,96 Garza, Dr. Rafael .........................................49,111 Gilbert, Ida ....................................................57,88 Golden Palms ...................................................112 Gonzalez, Dr. Victor M. ..................................113 Gorgas, Dr. William.......5,17,21-2,29-30,34,83,85 Grandview.......................................29,32,58,61,89 Harlingen Hospital ...................................57,61,88 Harlingen Medical Center.................59,63,99,114 Harlingen military ....................................18,25,90 Harlingen Obstetrics & Gynecology Associates ..115 Harlingen Pediatrics Associates ........................116 Harlingen TB hospital ....................32,59,62,93,95 Headley, Dr. Alex ......................................38,40,84 Herbalists.......................................................10,39 Hidalgo County Crippled Children’s Society..74-5 Hurricane 1933 .........................................30,32,89 Incarnate Word ..............................................28,82
Influenza ..............................................27,30,84,87 Internal Medicine Residency ..........52,67,73,79,99 Jaramillo, Don Pedro......................................11,83 Kelly, Nora.........................5,35,56-7,60,74-5,85-6 Knapp Medical Center..................50,59,62,94,117 Lamm, Drs. Heinrich and Annie ......4,35,36,89,93 Landrum, Dr. Kenneth .......................................66 Lawler, Dr. Marion Sr. &.Jr. .....43,51,59,96,99,118 Lawrence, Dr. O.V ....................................40,41,87 Lazo, Dr. Francisco .............................................50 Letzerich, Drs. Casper and Alfred .......41,57,85,88 Longoria Marin Family ....................................119 Malaria ..........................................5,14-5,19,22,83 McAllen Child Clinic ...........................74-5,77,91 McAllen General Hospital ............................36,43,51,52,57,61,65-6,68,88,89 McAllen Heart Hospital......................52,59,63,98 McAllen Medical Center ................53,59,63,66,97 McCallip-Ivy Hospital..............................43,59,62 McCormick, Dr. Erin K. ...........................100,120 McGee, Dr. William ......................................41,86 McMillan, Dr. J.B.F. ...............5,39,40,42,64,65,85 Medwin Family Medicine & Rehab .................121 Mercedes hospitals........................57,58,60-1,87-8 Mercy Hospital ....35,49,50,57,61,68,76,87-8,91-2 Midwives.........................................10,39,40,49,98 Miller-Webb Drugstore .................................14,81 Mission hospitals .................................59,62,92,97 Mohamed, Dr. Carlos ..................................53,122 Moody Clinic.......................................49,76,92,95 Murray, Dr. Robert.........................................29,30
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Neural tube defects .............................................32 Operation Lone Star...........................................25 Osborn, Dr. Frank .....................................41,86,88 Packard, Dr. John ...........................................46,58 Palo Alto ...................................................13,17,55 Parada, Dr. Victoria ............................................99 Parker, Fess..........................................................92 Pena, Dr. Raul A. .............................................123 Point Isabel ................................17,19,21,39,55,84 Polio .................................................29,32,91-2,94 Ramirez, Dr. Mario..2,31,33,37,59,69,93,95,124-5 Regional Academic Health Center .....................36,52-3,66, 67,71-73,78-9,98,99,100 Resaca de la Palma .........................................17,55 Rio Grande City .......................................27,32,37 Rio Grande Regional Hospital ......................59,63 Rodriguez-Salinas, Dr. Filiberto Sr. ..52,53,59,126 Rodriguez, Dr. Hesiquio ................................35,90 San Benito Medical Associates .........................127 San Benito Well Baby Clinic ..............................47 Schlaben, Dr. Henry ...........................................41 School of Public Health.................................69,71 School of Rural Public Health.......................73,98 Shah Eye Center ...........................................128-9 Shenkenberg, Dr. Todd ................................73,130 Shepard, Dr. Frank E. ......................................131 Six, Dr. Eric ......................................................132 Smallpox .............................19,26-8,30,38,81-2,91 South Texas College School of Nursing ..36,68-9,133 South Texas Emergency Care ...........................134 South Texas Health System .........................59,135 South Texas Medical Foundation .............5,68,136 SpawGlass Contractors, Inc. ............................137
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St. Joseph College ...............................................28 Starr County Memorial ............................59,63,96 Strohmeyer, Sr. Marian ....................................5,97 Su Clinica ..................................67,76-7,95,99,138 Tavarez Medical Center....................................139 Texas Oncology ................................................140 Texas State Technical College-Harlingen....68,141 Thurmond Eye Associates.................................142 Toland, Dr. George .............................................50 Torkildsen, Dr. William ....................................143 Torney, Dr. George.........................................16,22 Tuberculosis ...............5,19,32,45,59,71-2,84,91,95 Tucker, Dr. John..................................................50 Twedten, Hilda and Ida ......................................22 UTHSCSA...............................................37,66,78 UTHSC South Texas...........................5,68,78,100 University of Texas at Brownsville......69,71,79,144 University of Texas-Pan American ......69,79,146-7 Valley Baptist Family Practice Residency..........145 Valley Baptist Medical Center 29,30,32,46,51-3, ..................58-9,61-2,66,68,88-9,91-3,96-8,148-9 Valley Regional Medical Center .............59,63,150 Vannie Cook Children’s Cancer Center.........73,97 Vela, Dr. Leonel......................................67,99-100 VA Center....................................................77,100 Wainwright, Alonzo ...........................................20 Wharton, Dr. James..................................73-76,91 Whigham, Dr. William..................................68,88 Wolffe, Dr. A.J. .............................................21, 84 Works, Drs. ................................42,56,85,60,cover Yellow fever .................5,11-2,21,27-8,30,34,55,81 Yaeger, Marie .................................................57,88 Zavaleta, Antonio Ph.D. ...............................10,11
Bibliography Audubon, John W. Audubon’s Western Journal: 1849-1850. Barrera, Dr. Cayetano. “Medical History of the Lower Rio Grande Valley.” 1988. Beller, Susan Provost. Medical Practices in the Civil War. 1993. Berlandier, Jean Louis. Journey to Mexico During the Years 1826-1834. 1980. Brownsville Market Square Archives. Caleb Coker, editor. The News from Brownsville: Helen Chapman’s Letters from the Texas Military Frontier, 1848-1852. 1992. Chatfield, Lt. William H. The Twin Cities of the Border. 1893. Garcia, Octavio. Otros Dias. 1984. Haecker, Charles, and Jeffery G. Mauck. On the Prairie of Palo Alto. 2009. Hunt, Jeffry Wm. The Last Battle of the Civil WarPalmetto Ranch. 2002. Johnson, Marjorie. History of the Rio Grande Valley. 2001. Jones, Camille Johnston. Thank Heaven for Laughter. Krieger, Alex D. We Came Naked and Barefoot: The Journey of Cabeza de Vaca across North America. 2002. Murray, Betty. Harlingen’s Historic Hospital Interviews. Oshinksy, David. Polio: An American Story. 2005. Ramirez, Emilia Schunior Ramirez. Ranch Life in Hidalgo County after 1850. 1971. Rodriguez, S. P. Midwife of Paso Real and other Ranches 1900-1920. Rozeff, Norman. Sugarcane and the Development of the LRGV 1875-1922. 2007. Sides, Joseph. Fort Brown Historical. 1942. Torres, Eliseo. Healing with Herbs and Rituals: A Mexican Tradition. 2006. Valley Byliners. Roots by the River. 1978. Wooten, Heather Green. The Polio Years in Texas. 2009. Zavaleta, Antonio, Ph.D. Medicinal Plants of the Borderlands. 2012.
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