Shands Jacksonville Medical Center - History

History

Originally known as Shands Jacksonville Medical Center, the hospital was created in 1999 when Gainesville-based Shands HealthCare purchased two adjacent medical facilities in Jacksonville - University Medical Center and Methodist Medical Center. The lineage of the hospital can be traced back to 1870 when Jacksonville's first hospital and Florida's first non-military hospital, Duval Hospital and Asylum, was established at the corner of Jessie and Franklin Streets in downtown Jacksonville.

• 1901 - George A. Brewster Hospital and School of Nurse Training, which later became Methodist Hospital, opened to care for victims of the Great Fire of 1901
• 1926 - Duval Hospital and Asylum renamed to Duval County Hospital
• 1948 - Duval County Hospital became Duval Medical Center (DMC), called the "nation's oldest publicly supported hospital"
• 1963 - Florida Legislature created the Duval County Hospital Authority to facilitate the construction of a new hospital and manage DMC
• 1964 - Duval County medical and governmental leaders successfully lobbied for the passage of a $20 million dollar bond issue. Planning began for a new hospital to double the existing facility
• 1966 - Brewster Hospital and School of Nurse Training closed
• 1967 - Brewster Hospital moved to Jefferson and Eighth Street, the current location of Shands Jacksonville, and reopened as the not-for-profit Methodist Hospital
• 1971 - DMC moved to a new eight-story, $27 million, 485-bed, state-of-the-art medical facility across the street from Methodist Hospital and changed its name to University Hospital
• 1982 - University Hospital became a private, not-for-profit facility and contracted with the city of Jacksonville to provide care for the uninsured
• 1983 - University Hospital opened the first Level I trauma center in Florida
• 1985 – University Hospital was designated an affiliate of the University of Florida. TraumaOne, their helicopter ambulance service, began operations
• 1988 – Methodist Hospital was renamed Methodist Medical Center(MMC) - University Hospital was designated the Jacksonville campus for the UF Health Science Center
• 1989 – University Hospital was renamed University Medical Center (UMC)
• 1999 - UMC and MMC were purchased by Shands HealthCare and merged to become Shands Jacksonville Medical Center
• 2006 - The University of Florida opened the UF Proton Therapy Institute on the Shands Jacksonville campus
• 2011 - Shands Jacksonville received Magnet® recognition by the American Nurses Credentialing Center
• 2013 - Shands Jacksonville Medical Center was renamed UF Health Jacksonville