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Aerial view of UVA Health System campus in Charlottesville, Virginia.

The University of Virginia Health System is a nationally renowned healthcare provider based in Charlottesville, Virginia. The health system includes a medical center, school of medicine and health sciences library. The health system provides inpatient and outpatient care, patient education and medical research and education in Charlottesville and at satellite care locations throughout Virginia, including Albemarle County, Amherst County, Augusta County, Campbell County, Fluvanna County, Louisa County, Nelson County and Orange County.

With a history dating back more than 180 years to the founding of the nation’s 10th medical school, the UVA Health System’s patient care, research and medical education are routinely ranked among the best in the country by U.S. News & World Report and other independent sources.

Part of the University of Virginia, the University of Virginia Health System consists of five components:

• The University of Virginia Medical Center provides primary, specialty and emergency care throughout Central Virginia through a network of clinics as well as a main hospital that has more than 500 beds. The hospital serves as a Level 1 trauma center for the region and is accessible by ambulance as well as Pegasus, UVA Health System’s air and ground transport service for critically ill and injured patients. As an academic medical center, patients at UVA are treated by physicians who also serve as faculty members at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, providing access to state-of-the-art treatments researched by the faculty physicians. In the 2006 fiscal year, the UVA Medical Center treated 29,477 inpatients and had a total of 653,357 outpatient visits.

• The University of Virginia School of Medicine has more than 1,000 faculty members who perform three main tasks: provide care to patients at the UVA Medical Center, educate medical students and residents and perform scientific medical research that may lead to improved care for patients at UVA and elsewhere. Leading research areas include cancer, cardiovascular disease, neurodegenerative diseases and vaccine development.

• The University of Virginia School of Nursing has 94 faculty members who educate student nurses and perform research that will improve patient care at UVA and elsewhere. Leading research areas include rural healthcare, the history of nursing, complementary and alternative therapies, geriatrics and oncology.

• The Claude Moore Health Sciences Library provides access to printed and online medical information, medical news and the history of healthcare to faculty, students and staff as well as the public.

• The UVA Health Services Foundation is the physician group practice that processes billing for UVA physician services.

Awards

U.S. News & World Report

Several UVA Medical Center departments are regularly ranked among the top 50 in the country by U.S. News & World Report. These are the departments that made the magazine’s 2007 rankings:

Department	Ranking
Endocrinology	8th
Gynecology	22nd
Cancer	27th
Neurology and Neurosurgery	29th
Respiratory Disorders	39th
Digestive Disorders	47th
Urology	49th

UVA’s School of Medicine and School of Nursing have also been highly ranked by U.S. News & World Report. In the 2007 rankings, the School of Medicine was ranked 23rd among medical schools for research and 38th among medical schools for primary care.

The School of Nursing’s master’s degree program was ranked 19th in 2007 by U.S. News & World Report, while the magazine ranked two of the school’s specialty programs in the top 10. The School of Nursing’s Clinical Health Specialist program in psychiatric/mental health ranked 5th, while its Clinical Health Specialist program in adult/medical-surgical ranked 6th.

Magnet Recognition for Nurses

In 2006, UVA Medical Center received Magnet Recognition status for its nurses from the American Nurses Credentialing Center. About 4.45 percent of all healthcare organizations in the U.S. have received magnet status. Criteria for the award include quality of nursing care, measures for quality improvement and quality of nursing leadership.

America’s Top Doctors

Fifty doctors from UVA Health System were chosen for inclusion in 2006 for the sixth edition of Castle Connolly’s “America’s Top Doctors.” Nineteen UVA Health System physicians were chosen for a companion listing, “America’s Top Doctors For Cancer.”

History

The UVA Health System’s history can be traced to the founding of the University of Virginia in 1819. At the first meeting of the university’s Board of Visitors in 1819, a School of Medicine was authorized. The School of Medicine – the 10th medical school in the U.S. – officially opened in March 1825 with a single professor, Dr. Robley Dunglison, recruited by Thomas Jefferson to UVA from London.

More than 75 years later, UVA opened its first hospital in March 1901 with 25 beds and three operating rooms. A few months after its opening, the hospital established a training program for nurses. That training program would grow into the UVA School of Nursing, which was formally established in 1956.

Just as medical education has been a part of UVA since its founding, so too has medical literature – the 8,000 books purchased by Jefferson to create the University Library included 710 books on the medical sciences. UVA’s medical literature moved to the UVA Medical School building in 1929. Its current home was dedicated in April 1976. The UVA Health Services Foundation was founded in 1979 to handle billing as well as provide benefits and administrative support to UVA physicians.

External links

• University of Virginia Health System
• UVA School of Medicine
• UVA School of Nursing
• Claude Moore Health Sciences Library
• UVA Health Services Foundation