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Southern Maine Health Care is a health care organization in York County.
June 6, 2024
Maine Med, Southern Maine Health Care combine staff, licensing
Photo / Courtesy, Maine Medical Center
Maine Medical Center, in Portland, and Southern Maine Health Care have completed their medical staff and hospital license integration.
Maine Medical Center and Southern Maine Health Care have combined their hospital licenses and medical staffs, forming a medical center with three campuses that together will be branded as MaineHealth Maine Medical Center.
Maine Med, in Portland, and Southern Maine Health Care, in Biddeford and Sanford, are both part of the MaineHealth system. The two providers already have a long history of collaboration, often transferring patients from one care setting to another. Many doctors and professionals are credentialed to practice medicine at each hospital. And the two often share resources and clinical expertise.
But by working together under one hospital license and as one medical staff, the new medical center will make better use of resources in order to enhance care, share clinical expertise, provide a more consistent patient experience, and add new slots for physician training, according to MaineHealth.
“Bringing Maine Medical Center and Southern Maine Health Care together allows our care team to serve patients more effectively and efficiently. Right now, timely access to inpatient health services is a challenge and we have taken this important action to help address that,” said Britt Crewse, president of MaineHealth’s southern region, in a news release.
“Not only will this allow us to better care for patients, but it also supports another dimension of our not-for-profit mission: educating tomorrow’s caregivers.”
The Southern Maine Health Care brand will be retired, and the three primary locations will be called:
- MaineHealth Maine Medical Center Portland
- MaineHealth Maine Medical Center Biddeford
- MaineHealth Maine Medical Center Sanford.
More training
MaineHealth Maine Medical Center has plans to add 62 new residency and fellowship slots.
The programs and the number of new slots would include nine each for internal medicine and general surgery; seven for neurosurgery, six for cardiology; five each for diagnostic radiology and gastroenterology; four each for ob gyn, neurology and endocrinology; three for family medicine; and two each for hospice and palliative care, critical care and vascular surgery.
The plan is to start to fill the additional positions in July and continue through 2027. The gastrointestinal, vascular surgery, neurosurgery and endocrinology residency/fellowship programs will all be new while the other slots represent expansion of existing training programs.
“Like many states, Maine has a significant need for additional providers in a variety of medical disciplines, and that need is particularly acute in rural areas,” said Dr. Doug Sawyer, chief academic officer at MaineHealth.
“National data and our own experience as an academic medical center with more than 300 current residents and fellows show that physicians often go on to practice in the communities where they complete their training.”
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