ATLANTA – Critical care patients at Memorial Hospital and Manor in Bainbridge, Georgia, and Coffee Regional Medical Center in Douglas, Georgia, are receiving access to additional care and remote monitoring through Emory Healthcare’s eICU (electronic Intensive Care Unit) services, based in Atlanta. The Georgia Department of Community Health awarded each regional/community hospital $450,000 to support this initiative and to purchase needed equipment and set-up eICU services between each hospital and Emory.

From the Emory eICU Center, located at Emory Saint Joseph’s Hospital campus in Atlanta, Emory eICU physicians and nurses monitor ICU patients at Memorial Hospital and Manor and Coffee Regional Medical Center remotely, while providing consultation and expertise. The services are a form of telemedicine, using state-of-the-art technology to provide an additional layer of critical care for ICU patients. The continuous, 24/7 monitoring and access to intensivist or critical care physicians and other support staff, particularly on night and weekend shifts, are crucial to smaller regional and community hospitals.

“During night and weekend shifts at smaller outlying hospitals, intensivists may not always be present to assist onsite physicians and providers, so additional resources are often needed to care for some of the sickest patients in a hospital,” says Cheryl Hiddleson, MSN, RN, Emory Healthcare Director of eICU Operations. “Our services provide consult via a video and audio platform to onsite physicians, staff and patients, where we can see and communicate bi-directionally between the regional or community hospital and the Emory eICU Center in Atlanta.”

Dean Burke, MD, former Georgia State Senator from District 11 and former chief medical officer at Memorial Hospital and Manor states, “This collaboration between Emory and rural hospitals is critical to providing needed intensive care services in these rural communities. The recent pandemic showed policy makers the importance of high-level critical care services being provided locally when regional systems were filled beyond capacity. This eICU grant program will support the rural hospital in a sound fiscal manner while providing needed high-level critical care access close to home.”

Memorial Hospital and Manor has six medical/surgical ICU beds that are being monitored remotely by Emory’s eICU Center, while Coffee Regional Medical Center has 10 medical/surgical ICU beds being monitored remotely.

“We are excited to be collaborating with Emory Healthcare for their remote ICU monitoring service funded by a grant through the Department of Community Health,” says Jim Lambert, CEO of Memorial Hospital and Manor. “We feel this service will complement the great care our team provides every day and will allow us to keep more critical patients close to home and family.”

“As an affiliate of Emory Healthcare, we are happy to be part of the Emory eICU network,” says Vicki Lewis, CEO of Coffee Regional Medical Center.

Memorial Hospital and Manor in Bainbridge, Georgia, has served the health care needs of Decatur County and surrounding communities for almost 60 years. The 80-bed community hospital and 107-bed long-term care facility, along with Willow Ridge, a 22-bed personal care facility, is owned and operated by the Hospital Authority of the City of Bainbridge and Decatur County. The service area includes Decatur, Seminole, Miller, Grady and Mitchell counties with a service area of over 50,000 residents. The mission of Memorial Hospital and Manor is to deliver courteous, respectful, safe and quality care to every patient, every time. Throughout its history Memorial Hospital has been committed to improving the health of the community through services such as Primary Care, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Pediatrics, Ophthalmology, Optometry, General Surgery, along with Orthopedic Surgery. We have a nine-bed Emergency Department staffed 24 hours per day with dedicated physicians, which see over 12,000 visits per year, and a 10-bed ICU department. The hospital employs approximately 450 employees to provide these services and is one of the largest employers in the county.

Coffee Regional Medical Center, Inc., is a non-profit, acute care 98-bed hospital, in Douglas, Georgia. The current facility opened in July 1998, replacing the original building constructed in 1953. The 200,000 square foot hospital is designed with inpatient adult and pediatric beds, expanded outpatient service areas, including interventional cardiology and hematology and oncology infusion services to assure exceptional care and wellness close to home. The Medical Staff membership includes anesthesiology, bariatrics, cardiology, emergency medicine, ENT, family practice, general surgery, GI, hematology, internal medicine, interventional cardiology, nephrology, neurology, OB/GYN, oncology/hematology, ophthalmology, orthopedics, pain management, pathology, pediatrics, podiatry, pulmonology, radiology, urology and wound care. Serving Coffee and surrounding counties since 1953, we have become an integral part of the fabric of our community as well as a major contributor to the economic health of Douglas, Georgia. To learn more, visit www.coffeeregional.org/

Emory Healthcare, with nearly 24,000 employees and 11 hospitals, is the most comprehensive academic health system in Georgia. System-wide, it has 2,796 licensed patient beds, more than 3,300 physicians practicing in more than 70 specialties, serving metro Atlanta with 250 locations. It also provides services to greater Georgia through a joint venture at St. Francis–Emory Healthcare Hospital in Columbus, 10 regional affiliate hospitals, and its clinically integrated physician network.