June 22, marks 10 years since Sentara RMH Medical Center moved from its former location in downtown Harrisonburg to the present, state-of-the-art hospital and health campus off Port Republic and Stone Spring Roads. On this day in 2010, the hospital safely moved 95 inpatients, one by one, with the assistance of 21 emergency service agencies from Harrisonburg, Rockingham County and surrounding counties. The move took just under seven hours.

Although the current facility is just 10 years old, the hospital has been providing health care to the community since 1912. Sentara RMH has always prided itself on being a community hospital.

“Sentara RMH has a proud tradition stretching back for more than a century of providing compassionate, high quality healthcare to this community, and time and again over the decades the hospital has benefitted greatly from generous community support,” said Doug Moyer, president of Sentara RMH. “That was especially true in how our community rallied to help RMH build its new hospital and health campus. This current facility and campus put Sentara RMH in a stable position to continue providing excellent healthcare for a second century of service.”

The opening of the new hospital was the first of many innovative milestones for Sentara RMH throughout the past decade. Shortly after moving, Sentara RMH launched its cardiac electrophysiology program, a new service that it brought to the community to treat irregular heart rhythms. In 2011, RMH merged with Sentara Healthcare, becoming part of a large, innovative healthcare system spread across Virginia and northern North Carolina. The Sentara RMH Funkhouser Women’s Center opened in 2013 to provide women’s health services, the Sentara Wound Healing Center in 2014 to treat chronic and hard-to-heal wounds, and the Sentara RMH Orthopedic Center in 2015 to provide orthopedic, joint and spine, sports medicine and advanced imaging services. Sentara RMH launched its structural heart program in 2016 to treat defective heart valves and other structural problems of the heart.

“Our greatest priority has always been to provide the best possible health care to our community,” said Steward Pollock, MD, with Sentara Cardiology Specialists. “To achieve that, we embrace and invest in new technologies and medical advances. The past decade illustrates this commitment well, and Sentara RMH will continue to do so in coming decades.”

Sentara RMH achieved another important milestone in December 2014 when its nursing program achieved Magnet® recognition for sustained excellence in nursing care from the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC). Magnet recognition is the highest nursing designation that can be granted to a healthcare facility, and only 8% of U.S. hospitals have achieved that recognition to date. Magnet designation is awarded for four years, during which time the ANCC monitors facilities to ensure high standards of care remain intact. In 2019, the ANCC awarded Sentara RMH its second Magnet designation for another four years.

“Magnet designation validates the superior quality of nursing care at Sentara RMH and the positive impact that care has on our patients and their families,” said Donna Hahn, DNP, RN, NEA-BC, vice president of acute care and chief nurse executive for Sentara RMH. “For members of our community, Magnet designation means they can feel confident that when they come to Sentara RMH they will receive the best care available.”

Sentara RMH thanks the community for its generous, decades-long support, and for placing its trust in us for its healthcare needs.

Thumbnail: Sentara website

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