As one of the first private hospitals established in Atlanta, Atlanta Medical Center began its service to the community on Thanksgiving Day in 1901. Located in a downtown five-room cottage, the infirmary had two patients, one doctor and a few local church women who served as nurses.

Today, the Atlanta Medical Center campus comprises a 460-bed acute care facility sprawled across two city blocks. Accredited by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, Atlanta Medical Center includes a 30-bed level III neonatal unit; a level II trauma center; a comprehensive cancer center; Sheffield HealthCare, a neighborhood community health center; Atlanta Rehabilitation Center, a comprehensive rehabilitation and psychiatric facility; three medical office buildings; and the Wellness Center which houses the Highland Athletic Club, Atlanta Pain Center, Occupational Medicine, Outpatient Rehabilitation and an outpatient cardiac rehabilitation program. Off-site facilities include Morrow Physical Therapy and Fayette Cardiac Rehabilitation.

A Tenet HealthSystem Facility

In 1997, Tenet HealthSystem acquired the Atlanta Medical Center (then Georgia Baptist Medical Center).
Tenet Healthcare, through its subsidiaries, owns and operates 100 acute care hospitals with 24,918 beds and numerous related health care services. The company employs approximately 108,625 people serving communities in 14 states and services its hospitals from a Dallas-based operations center. Tenet=s name reflects its core business philosophy: the importance of shared values among partners - including employees, physicians, insurers and communities - in providing a full spectrum of health care. Tenet can be found on the World Wide Web at www.tenethealth.com.

Operations

Areas of Medical Center excellence include advanced surgery, cardiology, neurology, oncology, women's health, orthopaedics, trauma and rehabilitation. We are firmly committed to maintaining a tradition of excellence in teaching - combining knowledge, technique and technology in every area of modern medicine. Together with our affiliation with the Medical College of Georgia we have trained nearly 1,300 physicians at Atlanta Medical Center. In 1997 alone, we had more than 450 applications for our 37 first year residency openings, making us one of the most sought-after residency programs in Georgia. Graduate Medical Education programs include orthopaedics, family practice, surgery, internal medicine, OB/GYN and a first-year transitional residency program. We also provide a Fellowship in vascular surgery. Through the organization's telemedicine program, our teaching reaches into Russia, Greece, Brazil, Italy and other countries.

Technology

Our tradition of medical excellence has earned us a distinctive reputation for high tech facilities. More often than not, Atlanta Medical Center is among the first to offer new technology and procedures. We were one of the first hospitals to offer endoscopic and laser procedures. We were one of the first facilities to introduce the use of lithotripsy for the removal of kidney stones and laser angioplasty for the treatment of heart disease. Our nationally renowned cardiac rehabilitation program was one of the first programs established in the Southeast and one of the few to be established in the nation. In 1934, we opened one of the first cancer clinics in Georgia for indigent patients. Atlanta Medical Center was selected as one of five national sites to inaugurate a new treatment for tennis elbow and heel spurs. The OssaTron orthpaedic lithotripter provides a non-surgical, non-invasive treatment for patients with these conditions. Our Nuclear Medicine department is certified to provide monoclonal antibody imaging to reveal the location and size of cancer, aiming to detect it earlier than CT scans and other detection methods.

Through the telemedicine program, Atlanta Medical Center was chosen as the health care provider for the 1994 Goodwill Games held in St. Petersburg, Russia. In 1996, Atlanta Medical Center was chosen as one of the receiving hospitals for the Centennial Olympic Games held in Atlanta. We are the hospital for Atlanta Motor Speedway, providing trauma service for NASCAR and INDY racing each year.