By Tim Bonfield
Enquirer staff writer

Shannon Engram waits with her dad, Joseph Engram, and mom, Jennifer Pumphrey (rear), at the Pediatric Urgent Care Center. The Enquirer/MEGGAN BOOKER

Robin Gonding, 50, the first girl born at St. Luke East, says the only downfall is that, "Everybody knows my age." The Enquirer/TONY JONES

In 1954, Campbell County was a small-but-growing community that needed a small-but-growing hospital.

For 50 years, St. Luke Hospital in Fort Thomas has filled that need, growing with the rising population of Northern Kentucky and adding services with the explosive growth of medical technology.

"It really has been a success story," says Dr. Donald Saelinger, chief executive of Northern Kentucky's Patient First Physicians Group who also served for two decades on St. Luke's board of trustees. "St. Luke started modestly but has been very innovative over the years. "

St. Luke East officially turns 50 on Wednesday. It plans to celebrate its golden anniversary with several events next weekend.

St. Luke East opened its doors as a 128-bed hospital built for about $2.5 million.

Its surgeons performed 130 operations during that first year. Its emergency department treated 223 patients.

Now, there are two St. Luke hospitals, in Fort Thomas and Florence, with a combined 487 licensed beds, more than 1,100 full-time jobs, and 659 doctors treating nearly 250,000 people a year. Combined, the St. Luke emergency departments treat about 70,000 patients a year.

A history of growth

Despite its religious-sounding name - evoking the biblical physician from Syria who became a disciple of Christ - St. Luke Hospital was launched as a county-owned hospital with no religious affiliation. It was built to replace the older Spears Hospital in Dayton, which was about to close.

Dr. Marcellus Schwegman, 88, was among the doctors who helped launched St. Luke. He retired in 2002 from a longtime general family practice but still lives in Fort Thomas.

"It has grown quite a bit," Schwegman said. "It has all the new diagnostic equipment and all the new drugs. The staff can do almost everything."

Schwegman delivered the first baby girl born at St. Luke - Robin Gonding, born July 15, 1954. Gonding still lives in Fort Thomas. Her two daughters, Lauren, 20, and Amanda, 16, also were born at St. Luke East.

"When I was younger, I remember going to banquets on the anniversaries and things like that," Gonding said.

She marvels at how much she and St. Luke have changed in the past 50 years - a milestone she wasn't exactly looking forward to.

"That's the one downfall to all of this. Everybody knows my age," Gonding said.

Over the years, St. Luke has added increasingly sophisticated services and become a deeper part of the community.

It launched Northern Kentucky's first chemotherapy service in 1975. Staff members were leaders in responding to the Beverly Hills Supper Club fire in 1977. Its alcohol and drug treatment center, launched in 1980 in Falmouth, remains one of the only freestanding inpatient programs in the region.

St. Luke made waves in maternity care in 1986 by becoming the first hospital in Greater Cincinnati to offer single-room labor, delivery and recovery. And it reacted to exploding growth in Boone County by acquiring the former Booth Memorial Hospital in Florence - now St. Luke West - in 1989.

Still the smaller system

Yet despite its growth, St. Luke remains the smaller of two hospital groups in Northern Kentucky.

INFOGRAPHIC

• Northern Kentucky Hospitals • St. Luke v. St. Elizabeth

St. Elizabeth Medical Center, with hospitals in Edgewood, Covington and Williamstown, outpaces St. Luke on several levels. St. Elizabeth, founded in Covington in 1861, is much older, much bigger and still independent.

In fact, St. Elizabeth South by itself is bigger than St. Luke East and West combined in terms of jobs, patients served, babies born and several other measures, according to figures from the Greater Cincinnati Health Council and the Kentucky Department for Public Health.

St. Elizabeth also provides a key service that St. Luke does not - heart surgery. St. Elizabeth has successfully marketed its heart services, not just to help people with heart problems, but as a symbol of leadership in high-tech care.

"Most of the people you talk to will say that St. Elizabeth is the hospital of choice in Northern Kentucky," said Roger Rolfes, Edgewood city administrator.

With a statewide moratorium in place for new cardiac services, St. Luke isn't likely to expand into heart surgery anytime soon, officials say. But it concedes little else to its cross-town rival.

St. Luke became a much bigger competitor when it added maternity services in 1991 at St. Luke West in Florence. Now, St. Luke West and St. Elizabeth South battle intensely for the loyalty of patients in rapidly growing Boone County.

"Finally doing that was a plus, especially for people in areas south of Florence," Rolfes said.

The Health Alliance factor

One of the most recent major changes for the St. Luke system - joining the Health Alliance of Greater Cincinnati in 1995 - was seen by some in Northern Kentucky as a mixed blessing.

Some, including top administrators, say that St. Luke gained access to expert doctors and high-tech medical services that it could not afford otherwise by joining the Health Alliance. Others say St. Luke also gave up its independence in the process - to a Cincinnati-based organization.

Saelinger recalls that initial plans for new signs at the St. Luke hospitals called for the Health Alliance to be printed in big letters with St. Luke shown below in little letters. After an internal uproar, those plans were reversed. But the incident was a symbol of deeper concerns people had about the Health Alliance taking over St. Luke.

"One of the important reasons why St. Elizabeth is ahead in the market is that it recognized from day one that health care is a local mission. (In the mid-1990s) St. Luke did not understand this, so they've had to overcome that barrier for the past seven or eight years," Saelinger said.

In the past few years, those concerns have largely evaporated, Saelinger says, thanks largely to new management from Nancy Kremer, appointed in 2002 as St. Luke's top administrator.

"She is strong and very loyal to St. Luke. She's a home-grown leader," Saelinger said.

Under Kremer's leadership, St. Luke has launched a flurry of expanded services - including programs for vascular surgery, wound care, gastric bypass and house calls for shut-in seniors.

"When the hospitals were new, there were more people crossing the river for care. Now, the vast majority of Northern Kentucky residents get care in Northern Kentucky. In fact, some people from Cincinnati come here," Kremer said.

Future plans

Unlike St. Elizabeth, where there has been a gradual shift of resources from the older Covington hospital to the newer Edgewood campus, St. Luke officials forecast growth at its Florence and Fort Thomas hospitals.

Future plans include expanding St. Luke East's cancer center and installing upgraded radiation treatment equipment next year. Plans also include a new medical office building for St. Luke West.

Anniversary events

Saturday at St. Luke East in Fort Thomas

• 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the St. Luke East lobby, tours and historical displays

• 2 p.m. anniversary ceremony and time capsule presentation at the fountain outside the main entrance. Speakers to include radio personality Dusty Rhodes; Nancy Kremer, Senior Vice President of the St. Luke hospitals; Jeff Earlywine, Fort Thomas city planner; and Dan McGinley, mayor of Alexandria.

• 2:30 p.m. 1950's style swing dance contest at the outpatient pavilion July 18 at St. Luke West in Florence

• 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the St. Luke West lobby, tours and historical displays

• 1 p.m. Florence Community Band to perform near the Turfway Professional Building

• 2 p.m. anniversary ceremony and time capsule presentation outside the hospital main entrance. Speakers include Steve Cauthen, Hall of Fame jockey; Nancy Kremer, Senior Vice President, of the St. Luke Hospitals; and Dianne Whalen, Mayor of Florence

• 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Country Cruisers car show behind the Community Outreach Building

E-mail tbonfield@enquirer.com