Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center history

1918 Beth Israel opens its nursing school.

1920 The social services department is created.

On August 7, 1922, Joslin oversaw the first administration of insulin in the United States by his assistant Howard Root, MD. The recipient was a 42-year-old former nurse, Elizabeth Mudge, who lived another 25 years.

1927 NEDH’s Palmer Memorial Hospital offers care for patients with cancer, one of the largest programs in the area dedicated to the treatment and research of cancer and other diseases thought to be incurable at the time.

1928 Beth Israel moves to the Longwood area of Boston.

1933 At NEDH, Richard Overholt, MD, (right) performs the world’s first successful removal of a right lung on a patient with cancer.

Less than a quarter century later, townspeople again recognized the urgent need for modernization and expansion, raising funds and breaking ground in October 1939.

1941-45 During World War II, many BIH and NEDH physicians, nurses and other staff take leave to serve the country, while junior staff assume major roles.

In 1944, the third and current site of BID Milton on Highland Street was purchased from the Pierce Estate.

1945 Following the atomic bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, NEDH pathologist Shields Warren, MD, (right) heads the first comprehensive study of radioactive fallout on humans.

A newly constructed, modern hospital building opened in 1950.

1951 The Cancer Research Institute is established at NEDH, the first research facility in New England devoted solely to the study of cancer.

1952 The transthoracic pacer, a noninvasive method for jump-starting the heart, is developed by Paul Zoll, MD, and his team at BIH. Zoll becomes known as the father of modern cardiac therapy.

1955 Grete Bibring, MD, (right) is named psychiatrist-in-chief at BIH, and is later appointed the first female full clinical professor at Harvard Medical School.

1959 Led by hematologist James Tullis, MD, (right) and his research team, NEDH becomes the first hospital in the nation to bank blood platelets for immediate transfusion.

1968 BIH joins forces with The Dimock Center to address maternal and child health issues while improving the health of low-income, underserved populations.

The addition, now known as the “East Wing,” was completed in 1972.

1973 NEDH joins Harvard Surgical Service, establishing the hospital as an official member of the Harvard Medical School community.

1974 Research by NEDH physicians George Blackburn, MD, (far right) and Bruce Bistrian, MD, PhD, (near right) leads to the development of nutritionally complete medical “foods” administered intravenously.

1975 BIH launches a primary nursing model under Chief Nurse Joyce Clifford, RN, PhD. The model is among the first in the United States at a large teaching hospital, and Clifford gains national recognition as an innovative nursing leader.

1976 One of the first academic gerontology programs in the United States is formally established at BIH, in partnership with Hebrew Rehabilitation Center for the Aged.

1979 BIH’s Interpreter Services opens with the hiring of a Russian-speaking interpreter, one of the first such services to be established in New England.

1983 An NEDH team led by Roger Jenkins, MD, performs the first successful liver transplant in New England.

1984 The work of BIH physicians and scientists results in the first baby successfully conceived by in-vitro fertilization (IVF) in Massachusetts, born at the hospital on July 23.

In 1987, the hospital constructed a patient service wing and a new main entrance.

The Birthplace opened in 1991, and births reached 987 babies per year.

A new wing to the medical office building was built in 1993.

A building project completed in 1994 yielded a new emergency department, rehabilitation services center, diagnostic imaging, patient admitting area, medical record department, patient billing/accounting department, and information systems computer area.

Beth Israel Hospital opens the Medical Care Center in Lexington, its first community-based outpatient facility for specialty care, followed in 1995 by the Medical Care Center North in Chelsea.

1996 The Carl J. Shapiro Clinical Center opens on the former site of Massachusetts College of Art, offering state-of-the-art ambulatory patient care services.

1997 Research by Alvaro Pascual-Leone, MD, PhD, (right), helps to establish the field of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) and other forms of therapeutic noninvasive brain stimulation to treat neurological conditions and gain novel insights into the human brain.

1998 The first adult-to-adult living-donor liver transplant in New England is performed at BIDMC

To make BID Milton's services more accessible to Randolph residents, the hospital opened the Community Physicians Office in Randolph Square in September 2000.

The Samuel S. Dennis 3d and Lillian W. Dennis Critical Care Center opened in January of 2001.

In August 2002, the hospital debuted a $3.5 million renovation of its two inpatient floors.

In 2003, BIDMC researchers identified the source of preeclampsia, a life-threatening complication of pregnancy.

2005 BIDMC opens the first multidisciplinary center in New England to treat adults with celiac disease and other gluten-related disorders.

2008 BIDMC forms the first Patient Family Advisory Council (PFAC) in adult critical care, a group that offers unique patient perspectives that previously were common only in pediatrics.

In 2009, BID Milton expanded its relationship with Atrius Health to establish a new model of health care delivery.

August 9, 2010 (http://www.bidmc.org/AboutBIDMC/TheHistoryofBIDMC.aspx)

2011 BIDMC’s Program in Placebo Studies launches the world’s first interdisciplinary center for research into placebos.

2012 Milton Hospital officially becomes Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital-Milton, solidifying a relationship that began nearly a decade before.

2015 The 114-year-old Jordan Hospital is renamed Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital-Plymouth, extending the BID system of integrated care into southeastern Massachusetts.

2016 Complete protection against Zika virus in rhesus monkeys is achieved with two vaccine candidates through research led by Dan Barouch, MD, (far right) in collaboration with scientists at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and at the University of São Paulo, Brazil.

In January 2017, The Boston Globe reported of a letter of intent for a merger between Beth Israel Deaconess and Lahey Hospital & Medical Center with this partnership creating the largest hospital merger in more than 20 years.

Continued expansion in 2018 led to the addition of 12 new private rooms and the opening of a seventh operating room.