Southampton Hospital Officially Merges With Stony Brook Medicine

SOUTHAMPTON, NY — It's official. As of Tuesday, Southampton Hospital has officially merged with Stony Brook Medicine.

Stony Brook University welcomed Southampton Hospital, which will now be known as Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, as a member of the Stony Brook Medicine health system, Samuel L. Stanley Jr., MD, president, and Ken Kaushansky, MD, senior vice president for the health sciences and dean of the school of medicine, said.

Moving forward, Stony Brook Southampton Hospital will now provide care under Stony Brook University Hospital’s New York State operating license.

“Today we celebrate a unique opportunity in which academic medicine and community medicine can come together to benefit our entire region,” said Dr. Stanley. “As a result of the state's comprehensive review process, we can now move confidently forward, taking what started as an alliance between two successful institutions, to the next level, as we welcome Stony Brook Southampton Hospital officially into the Stony Brook University family."

He added, “We will continue to build on successful collaborations achieved over the past ten years, which have already brought many new programs to the East End, including a robust number of internship and residency programs at Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, and where students enrolled in graduate programs in the health sciences on the Stony Brook Southampton campus, can put their training to good use as the next generation of allied health professionals to help address the shortage of providers on the East end and beyond.”

In the time that it has taken to finalize the agreement, the two hospitals have successfully collaborated on bringing new services to the community, including a new cardiac catheterization laboratory, part of the Audrey and Martin Gruss Heart & Stroke Center, which will be the first on Long Island to open east of Route 112, and where clinical operations are scheduled to begin on September 5.

Also expected in late 2018 is the new Phillips Family Cancer Center, a facility that promises to make top-level cancer care more easily available to East End residents, a release said.

Other programs and services Stony Brook Southampton Hospital now offers as a result of the ongoing relationship include: a provisional Level 3 trauma center, with 24-hour coverage by emergency medicine doctors and a trauma surgeon available within 30 minutes; a hybrid operating room with sophisticated imaging capabilities; graduate medical education programs a new cardiology practice in Southampton with Stony Brook cardiologists Travis Bench, MD, and Dhaval Patel, MD; a vascular program offered at the Audrey and Martin Gruss Heart & Stroke Center led by Stony Brook vascular surgeons; access to genetic counseling for East End patients and their families; and a Stony Brook directorship of laboratory and pathology.

“The future of medicine on Long Island will evolve and advance as we bring Stony Brook Medicine to Southampton, with access to specialty care, research and technology that otherwise would not have been available,” said Dr. Kaushansky.

Those benefits include access to the latest clinical trials and "cutting-edge medicine that Stony Brook provides," he said. "And in some cases, it means faster access to lifesaving services when time is critical and patients need to be quickly transferred to a higher level of care.”

The finalized merger enables the two hospitals to improve healthcare quality and access, coordinate care and improve efficiency for patients through shared resources and managing the flow of patients between the two facilities, hospital representatives said.

“By joining Stony Brook Medicine, the new Stony Brook Southampton Hospital has strengthened its ability to fulfill its 100-plus year mission of providing access to the highest quality healthcare for the communities it serves,” said Robert Chaloner, Chief Administrative Officer for Stony Brook Southampton Hospital.

“Building a regional healthcare delivery system will ensure the continued growth and strength of both Stony Brook University Hospital and our community hospitals throughout the area,” added New York State Senator Ken LaValle, chairman of the New York State Senate higher education committee.

Assemblyman Fred Thiele agreed. "The East End is already seeing the benefits from this affiliation with Stony Brook University Hospital in better and more accessible health care. The future is even brighter with this final agreement," he said.