Butler Memorial Hospital is well into its second century and the hospital's future looks strong based on a foundation of continual expansion and modernization.

In the 19th century, medicine in Butler County pretty much consisted of superstition and herbal remedies such as elm bark and flax seed. The blood of a black cat figured into many a “cure.”

Midwives handled childbirth and physicians were thin on the ground. And those doctors were often no more trained or educated than their rural patients.

But the seeds for today's medical facilities were planted in the late 19th century.

They were planted deep enough that today, the Butler Health System has two major campuses, a number of various satellite sites, and advancements such as doctors who work on a heart team caring for patients.

Dr. John Reefer, chief operations officer for Butler Health System and medical director of the Office of Organizational Excellence at Butler Memorial Hospital, said there are no plans for the health system to stop expanding in the 21st century.

Women's work

In was in the 19th century that the first hospital building in Butler County was completed — in 1898 with money raised from a fund drive by the Ladies' Hospital Association.

According to Jean Purvis' book, “The History of Medicine in Butler County,” in the first full year of operation the old Butler hospital cared for 94 patients.

Purvis of Butler, who had written an oral history of Butler County, was asked to produce a book for the hospital's 100th anniversary.

“It was supposed to be published in 1998,” the author said. “The hospital contracted with me to do the book. They wanted it for the centennial.”

She was, Purvis said, ideally situated to write the history of the hospital. She sat on the hospital foundation board and her husband, Dr. Joseph Purvis, was an internist at the hospital.

But she said researching and writing the book took longer than planned.

“I thought I was going to go blind from looking at all the old microfilm,” she said.

The tale told in the ancient newspaper clippings was one of growth.

Purvis said, “I've been so close but I can't say there was anything that really surprised me about the hospital.”

“But, well I thought one thing that was interesting was the number of female doctors early on in Butler County,” she said. With the need for more trained staff growing, the hospital added the nurses training school in 1901.

Butler County Memorial Hospital

By 1920, the hospital's board of directors and the Chamber of Commerce, according to Purvis, had established a committee to raise $500,000 for a new building. The hospital board of trustees bought 10 acres on the summit of a hill within city limits and started a second fundraising campaign.

The new Butler County Memorial Hospital officially opened Feb. 18, 1925, with the old hospital remaining open until all patients could be transferred to the new facility.

The new hospital was called the X Building because of its shape.

The hospital faced closing in May 1931 during the Great Depression because of an ongoing deficit of $2,000 a month brought on by increased charity patients and inadequate state funding.

The board of directors started a campaign that raised more than $25,000 to cover the hospital's deficit.

That was enough so that in 1938, the hospital built Sarver Hall to house nursing students and their classes.

In 1948, the hospital began a building fund to expand and renovate the original X Building.

Purvis wrote that, once completed, the expansion included a new wing (the T Building) that opened in 1954; Nixon Hall, a 64-room nurses' dormitory; an outpatient clinic; an X-ray department; and a four-bed emergency room.

Spring board 1968

By 1968, the hospital was raising funds to add another wing and more beds. A north wing opened in 1972 and increased the number of hospital beds to 356.

In 1970, the hospital added a nuclear medicine camera and an intensive care unit.

As the decade wore on, the hospital added a 22-bed unit to cope with a growing number of alcohol and drug addiction cases.

Sarver Hall was host to the last nursing class to graduate from the Butler Hospital's nurses' training program in 1974, a victim of economic problems in the 1970s.

In the 1980s, new medical technology led to the creation of a new main wing.

For the first time in the hospital's expansion, the project didn't include new beds but actually reduced the number of beds. This was a reflection of the changing face of health care. Spacious laboratory and X-ray areas were featured in the renovations.

The outpatient department was enlarged and renovated, wrote Purvis, and the emergency department was expanded.

In 1985, the hospital added angiography and neurosurgery services and introduced laser surgery a year later.

Managed care changes

In the 1990s with its emphasis on managed care and the bottom line, the hospital took over the county's Parent-Infant Care Center and expanded it with a Family First Resource Center on North Washington Street and satellite resource centers in Slippery Rock, Moniteau and Karns City.

In 1991, the hospital established the Transitional Care Facility, a 25-bed unit that provides skilled nursing care for patients ready for hospital discharge but not yet ready to go home.

In 1992, the hospital opened a cardiac catheterization lab and created Butler Medical Associates, a multi-physician practice specializing in family and general internal medicine, as an extension to the hospital.

The Pain Management Center opened in 1993, and the hospital also began a geriatric psychiatry program. It opened its Sleep Center in 1994.

In 1998, the hospital opened its Heart Center.

A year later, the Women's Imaging Center opened, offering mammography and other breast cancer tests.

Another milestone

“It was in 2007 that we began building what is the East Campus at Routes 422 and 68,” said Reefer.

“In 2008, we started an adult hospitalist program for the care of patients in the hospital,” Reefer said.

Reefer explained hospitalists are doctors who specialize in caring for complicated hospitalized patients, are more available to meet with family members and able to follow-up on tests, answer nurses' questions, and simply to deal with problems that may arise.

In 2010, the hospital's Tower section opened, containing an intensive care unit and three new operating rooms.

“Butler Memorial Hospital opened its electrophysiology laboratory in 2011 and began to offer advanced treatment for heart beat irregularities and arrhythmias including atrial fibrillation,” Reefer said.

Butler Memorial Hospital in 2013 became one of the few hospitals in Western Pennsylvania to offer endovascular neurosurgery, a subspecialty within neurosurgery using catheters and radiology to diagnose and treat various conditions and diseases of the central nervous system.

Reefer said in 2015, the hospital began offering palliative care medicine, followed in 2016 by the introduction of TAVR program — transcatheter aortic valve replacement as an alternative to open-heart surgery — and by robotic surgery in 2017.

Looking ahead

Today, as Butler Health System's flagship, Butler Memorial Hospital has maintained its independence and has continued to grow to meet the needs of a seven-county region.

The 296-bed hospital, along with numerous outpatient locations for lab, imaging, cardiology testing and more than 50 primary and specialty physician offices throughout Butler, Armstrong, Clarion, Indiana, Lawrence, Mercer and Venango counties comprise Butler Health System.

Butler Health System and its flagship Butler Memorial Hospital sees its mission not only to save lives but to educate the community and restore and maintain health.

This has lead the health system to open outpatient service centers close to patients' homes in Saxonburg, Slippery Rock and Zelienople.

In addition, there are counselors and psychiatrists affiliated with the hospital who serve the Family First Resource Center on North Washington Street, Family Services of Butler Memorial, which provides treatment programs to those suffering sexual, physical or mental abuse, and the Family Service Corps, which provides child development programs to parents.

Reefer said, “I think the future is bright.”