2004 Hartford Hospital Annual Report

“The types of surgeries I do can’t be done
in a community hospital,” Jimenez says.
FFrom its earliest days, Hartford Hospital has been distinguished by the quality of its medical
staff. Today’s staff includes doctors who are recognized experts in their fields, and this is helping
the hospital attract some of the finest new doctors in the country.
Ramon Jimenez, M.D., came to Hartford Hospital in the summer of 2003 after completing
a fellowship at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. He is a general surgeon specializing in
surgical treatment of upper-gastrointestinal cancers.
“The types of surgeries I do can’t be done in a community hospital,” Jimenez says.
“They require extensive resources. Hartford Hospital has all the personnel and equipment
I need to perform these surgeries in a way that is comfortable and safe for the patient.”
Jimenez believes that minimally invasive, laparoscopic surgical procedures will play
a growing role in the future of surgery and that genetic analysis of tumors will eventually enable
physicians to better tailor therapies to specific cancer cells.
Another recent addition to Hartford Hospital’s medical staff is gastroenterologist
Michelle Smedley, M.D. After completing her fellowship at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New
York City, she chose Hartford Hospital because “it’s a real gem—providing wonderful tertiary
care in a comfortable, livable community.”
Smedley, who directs Hartford Hospital’s Center for Inflammatory Bowel Disease,
commends the hospital for creating numerous centers of excellence for subspecialty care.
“Through these centers, Hartford Hospital is giving area patients access to a level of
care that had previously been available only in larger cities,” Smedley says.
As Medical Staff President and a seasoned physician, Arthur Tarantino, M.D., has
a unique perspective on the future of the hospital and of health care. He believes the hospital
will continue to attract the best doctors for a number of reasons, including the diversity and
complexity of the medical problems it treats and its education and research components.
But he is concerned about the effects of economic pressures on health care.
“The citizens of the United States have to decide how much they value health and health
care,” Tarantino says. “We must either put a high value on it and pay the price or put a minimal
value on it and provide minimal access to everybody. Science will always expand, but access to
care may be greatly altered because of economics.”
Doctors
HARTFORD HOSPITAL