Bon Secours Community Hospital history

By 1909, convents were established in Washington, D.C. and in Detroit, Michigan.

St Edmond’s Home for Crippled Children, established in 1916 in Darby, PA, was the first Catholic home for the physically challenged.

Our history began in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1919 when the Sisters of Bon Secours established their first hospital.

The Sisters cared for hundreds of poor patients, especially during the economic depression that followed the stock market crash of 1929.

According to archived annual reports, in 1932 the Sisters--without financial help from city or state--gave hospital care to 420 nonpaying patients and distributed 98,945 lunches to unemployed men.

Furthermore, even during these hard times, in 1933 the Sisters opened a three-story wing to the hospital in order to enlarge the hospital's maternity department, which at that time could accommodate only about 10 patients.

An obstetrical clinic opened in 1934 continued to serve the needy: poor mothers were "taken in freely in this department and given the best of care together with their newborn," according to the minutes of a 1934 meeting of the hospital's board of trustees.

Nutting, M. Adelaide, and Lavinia L. Dock, A History of Nursing: The Evolution of Nursing Systems from the Earliest Times to the Foundation of the First English and American Training Schools for Nurses, New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1935, vol.

Bon Secours Memorial College of Nursing’s rich history began at Richmond Memorial Hospital School of Nursing, which opened in 1961.

In 1979 all the Bon Secours facilities were formally incorporated into one system: the Sisters of Bon Secours Health Corporation.

By 1980, the Sisters had established and/or managed several Catholic hospitals, long-term care facilities and other health care services.

After a few years it became obvious that still more centralization of management was needed and Bon Secours Health System, Inc. was established for that purpose in 1983.

Bon Secours-St Joseph Health Care Group in 1993 introduced the Care A Van program in southwest Florida.

Participants in this 1997 program transformed 30 abandoned row houses into 60 apartments for low-income families.

By year-end 1998, more than 4,500 immunizations had been given to children in the city's low-income neighborhoods.

On September 1, 2018, Bon Secours Health System and Mercy Health combined to become the United States’ fifth-largest Catholic health care ministry and one of the nation’s 20 largest health care systems.

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