Peterson Health celebrates 75 years with tour of innovations

Dr. Sylvester Ramirez is all smiles when he’s asked about Peterson Health’s new Amanda and J. David Williams Surgery Center, the centerpiece of the health system’s 75th anniversary celebration on Wednesday.

Ramirez, who practices otorhinolaryngology (ear, nose and throat), was one a handful of medical staff on hand to answer questions about the state-of-the-art surgery center.

“It’s amazing,” Ramirez said. “It’s up-to-date. It’s beautiful. I think all of the patients will enjoy it.”

Wednesday’s event, highlighted by speeches and proclamations, celebrated the hospital’s foundation, led by Hal and Charlie Peterson. They wanted a world-class hospital to honor their father. Dedicated in 1949, Sid Peterson Hospital was a revolutionary facility for a post-World War II community with limited access to care. Thanks to the visionary leadership of the Peterson family and the foundation they formed, generations of Kerr County and Hill Country residents benefited from the care offered in the then-state-of-the-art hospital.

Fast forward 75 years, and Peterson Health President and CEO Cory Edmondson frequently draws upon that history to move the medical center forward.

“Today, we exhibit that same sentiment,” Edmondson said. “I’d say that we have that same entrepreneurial spirit that this family delivered this hospital to the community.”

The surgery center is part of an ambitious range of plans to expand the hospital campus. Its opening clears the way for renovations of the former Pevehouse Ambulatory Care Center, which will become a rehabilitation center. However, the tour also showed some of the significant technological investments made by the medical center, including robotic surgery units.

Back at the surgery center, dozens of people walked through the building, which is still incomplete outside the first floor. The second floor hosts medical offices, and the third floor is a shell for future expansion. On the first floor, pre-operative patients have their own rooms versus the previous arrangement of a curtain divider between beds. The surgery suites are all on the ground floor, and the waiting room features several impressive features, including complimentary coffee and other amenities.

“This is probably the most modern place in the whole Hill Country,” Ramirez said. “It’s an enjoyable atmosphere.”

And those words probably matter most to Peterson officials — it’s enjoyable. It is not something you hear much about in health care, but if there was one thing present Wednesday, it was pride in a health system aiming to accomplish big things.