CARIBOU, Maine — Cary Medical Center is just five years shy of its centennial, and Community Relations Director Bill Flagg says the hospital has a great deal to be proud of through 95 years of serving the area.
Doctor Jefferson Cary, who was known as both an outstanding practitioner and citizen, left his estate to Caribou after his death in hopes that the community would create a hospital. Supporters honored his wishes and built a hospital on Lyndon Street in 1924 with the first patient admitted on Sept. 5 that year.
As Caribou’s population and economy continued to grow, the the community incorporating as a city in 1968, hospital administrators determined they needed to expand beyond the Lyndon Street location. In July of 1978, the hospital moved to a new facility on the Van Buren Road in Caribou, where it still stands today.
“The new hospital was unique in a number of ways,” said Flagg, who was hired one year later in 1979. “They had all private rooms, which was a real benefit for the patients. They also expanded the lab, and people who did the design and planning for the hospital saw that hospitals were shifting to outpatient services, and expanded all of those services when the new hospital was built. The people who established the new hospital were visionary.”
In the early 1980s, the facility lost Doctor Frank Chan, a well known orthopedic surgeon, to hepatitis. Flagg said Chan was so beloved by the community that his death inspired a local fundraising project to build the Chan Center, a part of the hospital that houses a great deal of community events to this day.
After that, the hospital gained a one day surgery unit, expanded physicians office, and added a women and children’s health center.
Another major milestone involved the addition of the Maine Veterans Home and residential care facility on campus which contains 40 beds for long-term care and 30 for residential care of veterans.
Flagg said that facility came about after Jack McCormack, who was the hospital CEO at the time, read an article in the local paper detailing a meeting of local veterans hoping to establish a VA clinic in the city.
“He asked me to go to their meeting,” Flagg said, “and tell them that we’re here to help, and said, ‘Who knows, Caribou may be the center of veterans’ care in northern Maine?’ which was kind of visionary.”
Flagg said the veterans group worked diligently toward this goal despite many frustrations. At one point, the Togus Veterans Administration director even told supporters that “the chances of a veterans hospital in Caribou were zero in his opinion.”
But members of the local group persisted and their hard work ultimately paid off as they established the first VA clinic on the campus of a community hospital in the nation.
“That was quite extraordinary,” said Flagg. “Ever since that time in the early 1980s, we have continued to develop our relationship with veterans in Aroostook County. We have expanded the VA clinic several times. Later, the 40-bed Maine Veterans Home was built on the campus and connected to the hospital as well as the 30-bed residential care facility. It has been an honor and our privilege to serve veterans in Aroostook County.”
Among the other milestones, Flagg said, Cary’s relationship with Pines Health Services is “one of the most substantial” throughout his career at the hospital. “The relationship that exists between Cary and Pines has been called a ‘model for the nation,’” he said.
Pines is a federally qualified health center, meaning the organization has the ability to see patients regardless of their ability to pay. It now provides primary and specialty care services through several satellite locations in and out of Caribou. Many Pines providers also are part of Cary’s medical staff, meaning both facilities work together to provide health services to the community.
The community, whether through individual, business or group donations, also has contributed a great deal to the facility over the years, and Flagg says Cary is one of few hospitals in the state to have maintained an active auxiliary group.
“Cary’s auxiliary has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the hospital in the past 50 years,” he said. “In addition, they decorate the hospital for holidays, conduct fundraising events, auxiliary volunteers operate our gift shop, and auxiliary members are always spreading good news to the community about the hospital. They’ve been a very strong advocate for the hospital over the years, along with hundreds of other hospital volunteers who have dedicated thousands of hours.”
Flagg said future plans at Cary include the potential for a medical office building that would bring a number of physicians to the facility and meet other space needs. The project is currently under review.
Flagg’s office is on Hatch Drive, over a mile away from the hospital. “The hospital has other real growth needs,” he said, “which is why our business office and public relations department are now in a downtown office location. We have been in this space for about seven years. It is a nice location and we enjoy being part of the downtown to help revitalize the area, but we would prefer to be working at the hospital to more fully engage with patients and staff.”
Cary’s staying power, to Flagg, also has a great deal to do with an atmosphere cultivated by the staff to make patients feel at home while visiting. He said current Cary CEO Kris Doody, who began working at the hospital as a nurse and was actually born in the facility, has made this a “cornerstone of her career.” Over Cary’s history, the hospital has worked hard to maintain a culture that sees every patient as an individual and seeks to provide service excellence.
“Patients often make assumptions,” he said, “that the healthcare professionals taking care of them are qualified and are providing quality services. We have been recognized for high quality clinical care and patient safety.
“But If I were a patient,” he said, “I probably would not know the difference between one treatment or another, between one medication or another. But what I would know is how I am being treated by staff. Are they compassionate? Is my privacy respected? Is the staff communicating with me effectively? How are my family members and visitors being treated?
“We put a lot of emphasis on these issues and overall patient satisfaction. Thousands of men and women over the years have helped to build our caring culture that lives on to this day and, we owe so much to our staff for their ongoing efforts to preserve this tradition.”
