- May 5, 2024
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Officials hope to improve local health ranking.
Representatives of Halifax Health met with members of the marketing and advertising community on Nov. 18 to discuss the state of the hospital and plans for 2015.
“We hope to engage you and your media property in our mission of providing quality healthcare for everyone in our community regardless of their ability to pay,” Communications Director John Guthrie said. “We need you as a partner.”
Health care is changing, Guthrie said. People are living longer and the baby boom generation is getting older. Also, the government is putting more requirements on health care.
Guthrie said Volusia County has a problem, because it is ranked 43rd out of 67 counties in Florida in health.
“A couple of years ago it was 42,” he said. “This isn’t good.”
He asked for the media’s help in communicating the ways to better health.
“How do we get people engaged,” he said. “Bring us your concepts and ideas.”
He said the areas that need improvement are chronic diseases, promotion of health and wellness, health access and infant and maternal health.
“This area is starved for getting the word out on how important prenatal care is,” he said.
He said the hospital is working on redesigning its website, to make it easier for people to find what they are looking for.
They are also working on social media, and ways to help people know how they should approach a doctor’s visit.
“You need to have your questions ready, and your prescriptions written down,” he said.
They also plan to service the Deltona area more, which now has a population of 80,000 people.
Another initiative by Halifax Health is the Live Your Life Well campaign, which includes foot races, events and speakers.
The new neighborhood Care Centers have been another step toward improving health care, he said. Over the past few years they have established centers in Ormond Beach, Deltona and Port Orange.
“We have to educate people. You don’t have to go to an emergency room. We have Care Now,” he said.
Ann Martorano, chief operating officer, said Halifax has been the community’s hospital since 1928, when a group of women decided that a community hospital was needed so the area could grow. They traveled to Tallahassee and asked the legislature to create the Halifax Hospital Taxing District.
The money allowed them to build a foundation for a hospital, and the tax is still levied today, because Halifax Health is charged with caring for all regardless of ability to pay.
“What that means is that we have a geographic boundary that we serve,” she said. The district includes Ormond Beach, New Smyrna Beach, West Volusia and east to the ocean.
“I’m proud they kept the legacy going,” she said.
The hospital was built on the highest point in Volusia County, so people could see it, and also to protect it flooding.
“We have the same principles and values,” she said. “We call ourselves a safety net hospital.”
Improvements in recent years have been the addition of the France Tower, which opened in 2009, and a remodeled emergency room.
“You’ll find the emergency room is very quiet,” she said. It was noisy with people waiting when there were 50 beds, and now there are 100 beds.
Because of their mandate to be the community hospital, they cover 46 medical specialties.
“The only thing we don’t do is burns,” she said.
