This year marks four decades since the Sebastian River Medical Center opened its doors as a community hospital, and a great many changes have taken place during those 40 years. The highly regarded 154-bed facility – serving the community with more than 100 physicians, 500 nurses and staff and 200-plus volunteers – began as the dream of Dr. Kip Kelso, and his fortuitous visit to the 1964 New York World’s Fair.
Kelso, a Roseland resident, had long dreamed of bringing a first-class hospital to Sebastian, and was fascinated by the futuristic medical clinic built to serve the fair’s 80 million visitors. It was a prototype built by the Atomedic Foundation: a fully operational local healthcare facility which could be built in months, not years, easily configured to meet special local needs, while costing only a fraction of a traditional hospital, and still providing the best of care and cutting-edge technology. The windowless structure was framed primarily with lightweight steel. Interior and exterior walls were aluminum “sandwiched” with polystyrene foam panels.
So intrigued was Kelso that he purchased it, and had it disassembled and shipped, by barge, to Sebastian. After a long battle with the Florida State Board of Health, a temporary permit was finally granted, but, before the scheduled Grand Opening, fire destroyed what would have been Sebastian’s first hospital. Undaunted, Kelso assembled a group of consultants and developers and, at last, in February, 1974, the 103-bed hospital opened its doors. A management agreement was signed with American Medicorp later that year.
In 1978, Humana purchased the hospital and added 30 beds. Two years later the hospital would bring on board an employee who would soon become one of its most valuable assets and who, 34 years later, has been called, by those with whom she works, “the glue that holds our hospital together.”
Sharon Mick is a pleasant, pretty, energetic RN, currently SRMC’s Director of Nursing Supervision. (When she casually mentions that she is a great-grandmother, one is tempted to demand some sort of proof.) Since coming to SRMC in 1980, Mick has served the hospital in many positions, and watched it change and grow to meet the needs of a changing, growing community.
She received her initial nurse’s training in the three-year diploma program at Community Hospital in Springfield, OH, doing her three-month pediatric rotation at Children’s Hospital in Cincinnati and her psychiatric rotation at the state mental hospital in Dayton.
“Unlike the current bachelor’s programs,” she remembers, “we never had summers off, we attended school year round.” Mick’s ability to focus and stay on track – and multi-task – never wavered, as the couple’s first child, John, now 43, arrived when she was in her third quarter at nursing school. “I gave birth and returned to school three weeks later,” she says. Daughter Michelle, now 37, was born while Mick was running the Vascular Progressive Care Unit at Biscayne Medical Center in Miami.
In 1980, when South Florida got too crowded and “too crazy,” the family moved to Sebastian, both Sharon and John transferring from one Humana hospital to another. John was brought on as Director of Engineering, Sharon as Director of the Medical/Surgical Unit.
She likes to tell the story about their first visit to Sebastian, when they came to interview. “We came up on the Turnpike and got off at Fort Pierce,” she recalls. “We’d heard about Sebastian, because my husband’s a surfer, but I’d never been up here. We drove up U.S. 1, then stopped at a filling station to ask directions. “Sir, can you tell me where Sebastian is?” I asked the man. ‘Ma’m,” he said, “yer standing in the middle of it!”
“Back then, Capt. Hiram’s was a mom-and-pop little place. You could pull your boat right up the ramp. Where the hotel is, across the street, was a canvas shop. When KFC first came to town, I said to my husband, ‘Oh my gosh, they’ve found us!
“Then,” she continued, “the hospital only had two nursing units – Med/Surg with 89 beds, and ICU with 14.” After about a year, Mick was chosen to run the new Chemical Dependency and Food Addiction Unit, which operated for about eight years. “It used to be a 30-day program, which you rarely find any more (largely due to increasing insurance costs),” Mick explained. “Now patients just go in and detox for a week, But an alcoholic cannot not drink if he goes back into the same situation. That’s why we had a controlled environment here.”
Following that, Mick was named Director of Supervision (essentially, supervising the supervisors.)
In the early years there were 33 doctors on staff. “There were not as many complicated, major surgeries performed back then. Today there are more surgeons on staff, and their skills are such that they can perform far more complicated surgeries. We are very blessed with the quality of our staff physicians.”
As the hospital continued to grow, Mick’s skills were put to use in a variety of areas. “I was interim ER Director three times, for nine months each time. I covered the ICU for a month and a half, and I even got to be Chief of Nursing once, for a week,” she grins. “Let’s just say I, at some point, ran every department except for surgery and obstetrics.” She explained that the hospital no longer has an OB unit – “haven’t had one for at least 18 years.”
In 1993, the hospital was purchased by Health Management Associates, and facility and service upgrades followed.
“In 1984 our second story was built, which increased us by 37 beds for each floor. There was a lot of other construction, as well. What are now hallways were both surgical wings.” Initially, there were eight beds in the PCU (Progressive Care Unit), and now there are 60.
In 2001, she continued, “I was approached by administration and asked if I could open a wound care center. Although all my experience had been in-patient, not out-patient, I gathered the right people around me and, together we opened an extremely successful wound care center, the first in Indian River County. We grew to the point that we had to move to a separate building, off-site. We brought in a hyperbaric therapy unit, as an adjunct to the wound care center.
“We also opened an out-patient nutrition center. Nutrition is a very important piece of the healing process. Here on campus we have a registered dietician. “
Mick mentions the growth in patient population over the past 34 years: “On my first day on the job – that was September 1980 – we had 33 patients in house, compared to the floor where I worked in Miami, which had 25 patients on the one floor alone. And, yesterday, here, we had more than 30 admissions! In one day!”
That, she noted, is rather unusual, around twice what might be expected at this time of year. “Today, I came in and we have 83 patients, plus 15 in the transitional care unit. We have seen about a 25-30 percent growth in admissions this year over last year.
“We’re not tiny little Sebastian Hospital anymore.”
In Mick’s world, a typical work day begins as she walks through the door at 6:15 a.m. “Today, with all the regulations we have to follow, it’s important to keep the flow going. For instance, I’ll get a call in the morning from the recovery room – ‘Sharon, I need beds.’ So I’ll work with the Charge Nurse. ER might call with heavy admissions. One of our goals is that the patients not sit in there (the ER.) We want to get them treated, continue their care. Part of my job is to get those beds assigned and sometimes it becomes a challenge. Like today, when we’re full, with space at a premium, we need to get all patients in in a timely manner.
“Another piece of the puzzle is to assure we have appropriate staff available. If someone on staff calls out, I work diligently to get that employee replaced so we have the appropriate skills to meet the patients’ needs. “
At any given time, Mick can and does do “anything and everything.” If it is too early for a particular area to be open, she’ll obtain supplies or meds for staff. “We have satellite pharmacies in the building I can pull from. I probably walk an average of three miles a day. The most I walked in a day was eight miles.”
“And,” adds Community Relations Director Angela Dickens, “she doesn’t walk slowly. You just see this blur and you know that’s Sharon.”
“One of the things I like most about my job is that I can teach the younger nurses, just coming out of school, and help them grow professionally. Someday I’m going to need them to take care of me. Because of my nursing background, I’m able to share my knowledge. They’ll say, ‘I need this or this,’ and I try to get them to start doing their own critical thinking, and I say, ‘have you done this? Have you tried this first?’ to help them start thinking about the steps they need to take.
When I interact with them on the floors, if they have experience, I can utilize their knowledge and grow from that. And I try to share mine. I don’t profess to know everything, and medicine is changing so rapidly today. It takes a team, no question. As busy as we are, one person can’t provide all the care. It’s the team that heals the patient and takes care of the family as well – the family is another vital piece to the patient getting well.”
The hospital’s growth has continued to meet the community’s needs in the 21st Century. A $25 million expansion project was completed in 2010, adding 42 private patient rooms, a 16-bed ICU and a state-of-the-art $3 million cardiac cath lab. The following year saw the acquisition of the daVinci Surgical System and, in 2012, the Sebastian Certified Stroke Center entered into partnership with UF Health. Then, in 2013, a second cardiac cath lab was added, as was a MAKOplasty partial knee resurfacing and total hip replacement system.
From two nursing units in 1980, Sebastian River Medical Center today offers a broad range of specialties and services including neurosurgery, thoracic oncology and weight loss surgery.
“This is a good place to work,” says Chief Nursing Officer Anna Brooks, who has also seen significant changes during her nine years with SRMC. “There is a lot of longevity on staff, several nurses have been here more than 20 years. We’ve seen our patient census grow year after year – because we have great outcomes, great programs and a broad range of service lines.
Mick agrees. “The first day I took our son to school – that building is now the museum – I looked down Main Street at the sun coming up – it was so beautiful. And the people are so friendly. It’s still a piece of heaven here. I wouldn’t want to live or work anywhere else. “