Notable New Orleanians: A Tricentennial Tribute

Through many years and name changes,
one thing has remained the same—Ochsner
Baptist and its dedicated staff have cared for
the heart of New Orleans.
Established by the Southern Baptist
Convention in 1926 as Southern Baptist
Hospital and located in the city’s center,
Ochsner Baptist—a campus of Ochsner
Medical Center—has provided quality healthcare
to generations of families for nearly
a century. It is a hospital with a legacy
of top-notch staff, community involvement
and civic leadership, as well as many
medical firsts.
In fact, the region’s first balloon angioplasty
was performed by hospital cardiologists
during the 1970s and, in 1992, a new musclesparing
microsurgical breast reconstruction
procedure was pioneered by a plastic surgeon
on staff.
“Our goal at Ochsner Baptist is to continuously
reach out to the community we serve
and to become the model of what a twentyfirst
century healthcare system should be,”
said Dawn Anuszkiewicz, CEO, Ochsner
Baptist, adding that it is the people who make
the hospital truly special.
Ochsner Baptist’s more than 1,300 employees
and 700 physicians serving in more
than 58 specialties—many of whom have
served and practiced at the hospital for
decades—are like family. This could not have
been more evident than during and after
Hurricane Katrina.
“Changing our city and our lives forever,
the people of Ochsner Baptist and from
every Ochsner location practiced incredible
courage that has carried us forward,” said
Anuszkiewicz of the facility, which closed
temporarily due to Katrina’s devastating
floods, but soon re-opened as a part of the
Ochsner Health System in 2006.
“Working tirelessly to care for anyone who
needed it—first responders, the military, stranded
residents—the team at Ochsner Baptist
demonstrated phenomenal teamwork during an
unthinkable situation,” she continued.
Over the past twelve years, the facility has
invested more than $200 million to transform
and become the Gulf South’s premier women’s
center and destination of choice for elective
care including surgical and interventional
services. Today, Ochsner Baptist features all
private in-patient rooms, an expanded intensive
care unit, state-of-the-art operating
rooms, two cardiac catheterization labs, and
an ultramodern imaging center and laser
vision center. In 2013, they relocated women’s
services and invested $45 million to create
the unique Women’s Pavilion; and, in 2017,
they expanded their third floor inpatient unit
by twenty-nine private patient rooms for surgical
and antepartum patients.
Since opening The Women’s Pavilion,
patients have access to the most advanced
care for women specialty services including:
general gynecological care, labor and delivery,
maternal fetal medicine, specialized pelvic
floor care, women’s wellness and survivorship
and gynecologic robotic surgery.
The Perkin Alternative Birthing Center
located within the Women’s Pavilion is
staffed by Certified Nurse Midwives who
provide mothers with a natural, holistic
birth experience in a home-like environment
with comfortable beds and birthing tubs. It
is the first hospital-based alternative birthing
center in the region. Ochsner Baptist’s
fifty-four-bed, Level III Regional Neonatal
Intensive Care Unit—the highest level designation
awarded by the state of Louisiana–
cares for the tiniest patients, and most recently,
the hospital began developing the state’s
very first human milk bank.
Ochsner Baptist is also home to a
health center with physician offices specializing
in primary care, urology, orthopedics,
back and spine services, reconstructive plastic
surgery, pediatrics, pain management and
much more, with additional clinics in Mid-
City and Old Metairie that offer same-day and
next-day appointments for primary care and
women’s services.
Ochsner Baptist continues to achieve
celebratory milestones, from delivering more
than 10,000 babies and achieving the prestigious
Baby-Friendly birth facility designation,
to being nationally-recognized for quality
excellence by U.S. News and World Report,
Healthgrades, Truven Health Analytics and
Leapfrog. For more information, visit
www.ochsner.org/baptist.
OCHSNER
BAPTIST
Ochsner Health System.
STEPHEN LEGENDRE, PHOTOGRAPHER.
QUALITY OF LIFE
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