Sanford Orthopedic Hospital, Sioux Falls, South Dakota
As the largest rural health system in the U.S., Sanford Health (Sioux Falls, S.D.) serves patients across a 320,000-square-mile region.
Although dozens of medical centers and hundreds of clinics across this footprint support Sanford’s goal of providing care close to home, many patients have to travel to Sanford USD Medical Center in Sioux Falls, S.D., for complex orthopedic and neurologic procedures that require specialized equipment. Roughly half of the patients who visit this main campus reside outside the city—often traveling several hundred miles, even across state borders, to seek care.
“When patients are coming to Sioux Falls, it’s for a significant event,” says Andy Munce, president and CEO of Sanford Health’s Sioux Falls region. “They’re dealing with a lot of stress, so we wanted to make it easier for patients by taking one additional stress point out of the equation and not only providing all-inclusive care but also providing a place to stay.”…