There is safety in numbers. Or so we are told. Perhaps that is why and how the South Florida Hospital & Healthcare Association (SFHHA) is now a party to two legal challenges.

The first is an initiative to have the federal court review and declare Florida’s “Amendment 7” unconstitutional. It is not that members of the SFHHA would prohibit patients from obtaining information pertinent to their care, but rather that the constitutional amendment as approved by referendum is onerous, overreaching and counter productive. Hospitals and doctors must remain free to identify, discuss and correct mistakes in a private, non-punitive, non-adversarial environment.

Second is also related to patient safety. SFHHA is supporting the Florida Chamber of Commerce and the Retail Federation is their effort to have the “Guns at Work” legislation. Here is South Florida most of the hospitals have policies and practices aimed at keeping the campuses free of firearms. Not only does the recently passed legislation contradict those policies, it challenges the hospital owner’s rights to set policies form their own property.

By serving as a conduit for group action, forming our own coalition and joining others in a common pursuit, the Association is doing all it can to represent the membership’s concerns in these arenas. Of course, court cases are the exception, not the rule for SFHHA. Legislative advocacy at the state and federal levels also takes teamwork and coalition building. Educational programs, like the very successful “South Florida Healthcare Summit” held May 8-9, demonstrated extraordinary effort of a creative planning committee, generous sponsors and dedicated staff.

The American Society of Association Executives says that a distinguishing feature of “associations” is the fact that membership is “voluntary.” As SFHHA reaches the halfway mark in this calendar year we are fortunate that so many talented people volunteer their time to the service of the committees and task forces, and Board of Directors of the Association. If you are not one of them, please go to www.sfhha.com to get membership information. We need you to count among our numbers!



Hospice by the Sea’s roots run deep in Palm Beach and Broward counties. Started back in 1978 by a small group of citizens in Boca Raton offering hospice care to 17 families, today Hospice by the Sea’s team of 460 employees and 398 volunteers provide hospice care, palliative care and caregiver, bereavement and home health agency services to more than 5,000 patients each year in Palm Beach and Broward counties.

The volunteers that founded Hospice by the Sea, Florida’s second-oldest hospice organization, believed that all of those dying should be afforded the simple gifts of comfort and dignity. This belief has not changed: Hospice by the Sea’s mission today is to bring patients and families throughout Broward and Palm Beach counties the most skilled, compassionate, and culturally-sensitive care and support possible. Its doors are open to people of all ages, all illnesses, and all walks of life. Everyone seeking services is welcomed, regardless of their ability to pay.

This year, as Medicare, Medicaid and health insurance reimbursement for services has become challenging, and as our struggling economy has forced more families into the ranks of the uninsured, Hospice by the Sea has not wavered in its dedication to serve everyone in need of end-of-life care. To insure this goal, Hospice by the Sea Foundation was created solely to support the mission of Hospice by the Sea. The foundation’s efforts will focus on funding non-reimbursable programs and on a capital campaign.

As Hospice by the Sea faces the financial challenges of the economy, the quality of patient care has remained excellent, even while the patient census dramatically increased. The September 2008 census of 458 hospice care patients was 22 percent higher than September 2007.

In a proclamation issued from the Florida capitol, Governor Charlie Christ declared November 2008 as Hospice Month in Florida. In the proclamation, he recognized hospices for helping to “meet the medical, emotional, social and spiritual needs of more than 98,619 patients throughout Florida last year; and” for continuing “its focus on the family and those close to the patient, serving hundreds of thousands of Florida’s citizens with bereavement and caregiving assistance.”

Many people do not realize that 90 percent of Hospice by the Sea’s patients are at the place they call home, not a hospice inpatient care center. Each year, Hospice by the Sea’s nurses, CNAs, psychosocial and spiritual care staff and volunteers care for thousands of home-care patients scattered from Tequesta, Fla. in Northern Palm Beach County to Hallandale, Fla. in Southern Broward County – a distance of 75 miles. Just as impressive, the area served by Hospice by the Sea’s home care teams – Palm Beach and Broward counties – is larger than the states of Delaware and Rhode Island combined.

As the quality of Hospice by the Sea’s service continues to increase, so has the breadth of its programs which continue to expand and evolve to meet the dynamic needs of the community they serve. In 2008, Hospice by the Sea added holistic, complementary therapies (Reiki, Healing Touch, and music therapy) to help patients, family caregivers and staff re-energize and avoid compassion fatigue. They have also packaged years of home care knowledge in an instructional DVD for ALL family caregivers to boost their self confidence and keep them safe while working with a bed-bound or infirm loved one. Plus, they have committed staff, training, and educational resources to lay the foundation for hospice care for AIDS patients in Ghana through the Matthew 25 Project. (matthew25houseghana.org).

This November, National Hospice and Palliative Care Month, Hospice by the Sea remembers the handful of volunteers, nurses and physicians who brought compassionate hospice care to Palm Beach and Broward counties 30 years ago, and salutes the staff and volunteers who continue its founders’ mission.



Health care is an ever-evolving industry, which means that change is not just normal, it’s constant.

That was especially true for Martin Memorial Health Systems in 2008. In September, the health system announced that Mark E. Robitaille, senior vice president and chief operating officer since 1991, would replace retiring president and chief executive officer Richmond M. Harman, who had served in that role for 19 years and had been with Martin Memorial since 1975.

“I am excited and honored to be taking on this new role,” Robitaille said. “Martin Memorial holds a special place in this community and I am dedicated to continuing that legacy of care.”

Robitaille, a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives, has more than 30 years of experience helping healthcare providers deliver care to communities. As chief operating officer at Martin Memorial, he was responsible for oversight of the health system’s two acute-care inpatient hospitals, as well as outpatient services, ambulatory care, the human resources divisions and other healthcare-related services.

Christina Cullinane, R.N., B.S.N., O.C.N., Total Cancer Care clinical research coordinator, educates physicians and patients about the Total Cancer Care Program.

For years, Robitaille has been heavily involved in working with the burgeoning life sciences industry that is emerging on the Treasure Coast. The Robert and Carol Weissman Cancer Center at Martin Memorial, which is affiliated with the esteemed Moffitt Cancer Center, has been a leader in the area for cancer clinical trials.

In January, Martin Memorial and Moffitt Cancer Center announced a joint collaboration in an exciting new program that features state-of-the-art cancer research between Moffitt and affiliated healthcare providers.

This collaboration will develop a new research initiative to improve cancer prevention and treatment by using molecular technology to enhance the ability to diagnose and treat patients. Tumor tissues from patients at Martin Memorial will be collected and the biological markers unique to each tumor identified. Researchers will then analyze patients’ responses to specific treatments.

In its second year, Martin Memorial’s Frances Langford Heart Center continued to provide life-saving care to residents of the Treasure Coast. In October, the heart center performed its 500th heart surgery since opening in August 2006. More than a thousand others have received angioplasty – providing critical heart care close to home.

With cancer and heart disease so prevalent in our community, Martin Memorial decided to eliminate one of the leading contributors of both illnesses on its campuses – tobacco use.

Beginning on Oct. 1, each of Martin Memorial’s 12 locations became completely tobacco free – inside facilities and out. It included not just Associates, but patients, visitors, physicians and anyone else who comes to a Martin Memorial facility.

Martin Memorial also continued its battle to build a new hospital in western St. Lucie County. The health system received a certificate of need from the state in 2007, but that was challenged by two HCA Inc.-owned facilities in the county. An administrative hearing took place in November 2008 but results were not available by press time.

In the meantime, Martin Memorial announced in April that it will be building an off-site emergency department at the health system’s current facility in St. Lucie West. The emergency center will be open seven days a week, 24 hours a day, but will not provide inpatient beds. It will be staffed and equipped to handle many of the same emergencies a hospital would, though patients with more severe injuries or ailments will be taken to appropriate facilities.

Finally, the Martin Memorial Foundation celebrated its 25th anniversary, highlighted by the 14th-annual Chrysanthemum Ball on Nov. 1. The event raised $1 million, with half of the funds going toward a digital mammography unit, and the other establishing the Chrysanthemum Ball Endowment Fund, which will fund projects for the next generation of patient care.



Isador H. Lieberman, M.D.

Isador H. Lieberman, M.D., is chairman of the Medical, Interventional and Surgical Spine Center at Cleveland Clinic in Florida. Dr. Lieberman oversees multi-disciplinary spine care, emphasizing collaboration between surgical and non-surgical teams to ensure patients receive the most appropriate and least invasive treatment options.

Dr. Lieberman’s clinical interests include minimally invasive spinal surgery; adolescent and adult scoliosis; deformity reconstruction; cervical and lumbar degenerative disorders; spinal tumors; infections; and trauma. He has a special interest in the treatment of osteoporotic compression fractures and musculoskeletal manifestations of multiple myeloma.

A nationally and internationally recognized minimally invasive spine surgeon, Dr. Lieberman has earned a reputation of offering new hope to patients who have exhausted other treatment options. That reputation led to a recent invitation for Dr. Lieberman to perform extensive spine reconstruction to repair multiple level vertebral compression fractures on spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef in Jerusalem, Israel.

Dr. Lieberman is no stranger to traveling abroad for patients. For the past three years he’s led an annual medical mission to Uganda, organized through Health Volunteers Overseas. Despite substandard medical conditions, the team is able to treat patients with major spinal deformities, congenital birth defects, and spinal infections.

Prior to joining Cleveland Clinic in Florida in 2007, Dr. Lieberman served as director of Cleveland Clinic’s Minimally Invasive Surgery Center in Cleveland, Ohio, and served a four-year term on Cleveland Clinic’s Board of Governors.

Dr. Lieberman is board certified in orthopaedic surgery by the American Board of Orthopaedic Surgery and holds specialist certification from the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. He completed medical school and subsequent residency at the University of Toronto, followed by spine surgery and trauma surgery fellowships at the Toronto Hospital in Canada and at Queen’s Medical Center in Nottingham, England. He holds an MBA from Cleveland State University.

Lester Rosen, M.D.

Board-certified colorectal surgeon Lester Rosen, M.D., is with Cleveland Clinic Florida Health and Wellness Center in West Palm Beach. A past president of the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons (2006-2007), Dr. Rosen was tapped in the 1990s to help the U.S. government establish national guidelines for colorectal cancer screenings, today’s standard of care.

With more than 25 years experience, Dr. Rosen specializes in the treatment of hemorrhoids, fissure, fistula, incontinence, ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s Disease, and colorectal cancer. He spent most of his career in private practice in Allentown, Penn., where he served as chief of surgery at Westfield Hospital and attending surgeon at Lehigh Valley Hospital, before moving with his wife to Boca Raton to join Cleveland Clinic in 2008.

Dr. Rosen is a dedicated medical educator, having spent 12 years as a professor of clinical surgery at Pennsylvania State University’s Hershey Medical Center. He serves as a senior board examiner for the American Board of Colorectal Surgery, a position he’s held for 15 years. He also previously served as an associate editor of the specialty journal Diseases of the Colon and Rectum.

Dr. Rosen is most proud of his role in promoting evidence-based quality in surgery and in educating the next generation of colorectal surgeons. He continues to pursue both passions at Cleveland Clinic in Florida.

A graduate of Adelphi University in Garden City, NY, Dr. Rosen earned his medical degree from Universidad Autónoma Guadalajara in Guadalajara, Mexico. He completed a surgical residency at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York and a colorectal surgery residency at Lahey Clinic in Burlington, Mass. He is certified by the American Board of Surgery and the American Board of Colon and Rectal Surgery.



UM Loses World-Renowned Researcher in Viral Lymphomas William J. Harrington Jr., M.D. 1954 – 2009

The University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and its Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center are saddened to report the untimely passing of a renowned researcher, physician, colleague and friend. William J. Harrington, Jr., M.D., professor of medicine in the Division of Hematology-Oncology at the Miller School, died from a cerebral hemorrhage on January 29 at the age of 54.

“It is impossible to express how much he will be missed by everyone at Sylvester and throughout the medical school and university,” said W. Jarrard Goodwin, M.D., director of Sylvester.

Harrington, co-leader of the Viral Oncology Program at Sylvester, was considered a leading authority on viral-induced cancers, establishing one of the nation’s most distinctive programs. His research centered on ways to treat viral-related tumors that had proven resistant to conventional chemotherapy.

A close colleague and friend, Glen Barber, Ph.D, professor of medicine in the Division of Hematology-Oncology and co-leader of the Viral Oncology Program with Harrington, said he “frequently obtained fantastic results that were not deemed possible.”

Harrington built relationships in South America that were unique, and bridged borders for research. He had been collaborating with investigators in Brazil to develop new therapies against Epstein Barr-related lymphoma, and was an internationally recognized expert for his clinical work with patients with HIV who developed viral lymphomas.

“His death has sent a ripple throughout the scientific and clinical communities,” says Barber. The acclaimed scientist was also “an adventurer and free spirit” who loved the outdoors, exploring and hiking all over the world, often without a map.

Juan C. Ramos, M.D., assistant professor of clinical medicine, considered Harrington his mentor, and worked with him for the past eight years. “It is because of Bill’s influence that I work in this field and have been successful so far,” said Ramos, who first began working in Harrington’s clinic and laboratory during his residency.

Ramos also credits his mentor for his award of a highly competitive grant to continue work in Harrington’s original project on HTLV1-related lymphomas. He says the visionary work that is Harrington’s legacy and passion will continue. “That’s my commitment. There’s nothing else that would drive me.”

Harrington’s work and dedication to his patients are what stand out for Mark Goodman, M.D., associate professor of medicine. He explains that Harrington’s patients were often poor and had no insurance, but he would see them any time of the day or night. Goodman says his colleague had a “real respect for the profession of medicine and for humanity.”

Harrington’s love for the University of Miami was described by many who knew him. Ramos says he cared deeply about the cancer center, the university and its academic status around the nation. Barber says he was really proud of the university and the Canes. “UM ran in his veins.”

Harrington’s link to UM began at a young age. His father, William J. Harrington Sr., M.D., former chair of medicine, founded the William J. Harrington Medical Training Programs in Latin America, which train top-tier medical graduates from Latin America and the Caribbean. Harrington had been encouraged to travel to Brazil just out of school, according to his brother, Thomas Harrington, M.D., an assistant professor of medicine at the Miller School of Medicine. The 18 months he spent in that country left a strong impression on him. Harrington picked up his father’s legacy, and had become co-director of the Medical Training Programs.