CITY FOCUS:Hospital celebrates 40 years

Doctors, nurses, employees and even City Council members gathered in front of Huntington Beach Hospital this week to celebrate 40 years caring for patients in the city.

At a program Monday that included a mayoral commendation, an anniversary cake and a history presentation, hospital officials outlined the past and future of an institution open since 1967.

“This shows we’re really committed to the community,” said hospital administrator Sofia Abrina at the event. “We value residents, and we’re here for them. This is their hospital.”

The 131-bed, 500-employee hospital has not stopped looking to the future, said hospital spokeswoman Debra Culver.

It is already building a new cardiac catheterization and peripheral vascular lab, which would allow more diagnostic tests on the heart and cardiovascular system.

“Ground was broken in December, and the lab should be finished in the fall,” she said. “That’s a really big thing. It supports the emergency department very well.”

For Councilwoman Cathy Green, a trained nurse who keeps active in health care organizations, the hospital has meant a lot of things.

She is a board member who keeps up with its many developments, but like many Huntington Beach residents she also knows it as a patient.

“That’s where we go to the hospital,” she said. “Both our kids were born there. My husband had his knee surgery there. I had my gall bladder surgery there.”

As the city’s one community hospital, Huntington Beach Hospital gives the city many benefits, particularly because of its emergency room, Green said.

“It’s always good to have a hospital in your city, particularly one that takes all the EMS calls for emergencies,” she said. “If there’s something going on in the field, they call [the hospital] to coordinate.”

One striking moment of the celebration was the cutting of the anniversary cake, done by two employees who had been working there almost since the hospital’s opening on April 2, 1967.

“I’m very proud,” Abrina said. “We have a lot of long-term employees here at Huntington Beach Hospital, and that’s unusual. At other facilities I’ve seen, people often only last five or 10 years.”

Mayor Gil Coerper smiled with administrators and handed them a letter of commendation.

“Thank you to the hospital,” he said. “Thank you for all 40 years. Keep doing a good job.”