Edward Jimenez
CEO, UF Health Shands
Congratulations on joining us here in North Central Florida. No matter where you hail from, you will find that Gainesville is both a great city to live and a place filled with outstanding health care resources.
North Central Florida is growing, and UF Health is evolving to meet residents’ needs now and in the future. We continue to expand and offer physician practices in convenient locations across town. We have a main campus medical center plus specialty hospitals that unite top experts to provide streamlined, targeted care.
As part of our planned expansion to serve the needs of this dynamic and growing community, UF Health just opened a new freestanding emergency room, UF Health Emergency Center in Kanapaha, on the corner of Southwest Archer Road and Tower Road. In addition, we are building two new specialty hospitals, the UF Health Heart & Vascular Hospital and the UF Health Neuromedicine Hospital, to meet specific needs for highly specialized care.
These new health care facilities and the people who work in them are a reflection of our service to the Greater Gainesville area. At UF Health, we offer an integrated approach to providing comprehensive care provided by more than 1,000 UF College of Medicine expert physicians and thousands of skilled nurses and specially trained primary care and specialty providers. Our hospitals, physician practices, outpatient programs and emergency services are located throughout the area to provide easy access close to home. From prenatal care to senior care and every stage in between, we strive to meet all of your health and wellness needs.
UF Health even offers dental care at the UF College of Dentistry and animal care at the UF College of Veterinary Medicine.
As an academic health center, our doctors, nurses, providers and staff are constantly learning and improving on best practices in medicine. Because our physicians push the envelope in research advances, our patients benefit with the best possible outcomes for their health care needs.
Because of our unique missions of patient care, research, education and community service, and our high standards for safe, quality care, UF Health has become recognized as a regional health care resource and destination. We serve patients from every one of Florida’s 67 counties. We are proud that people travel great distances to access our experts and services, and we remain committed to serving residents from our local communities. We now welcome you and your loved ones to rely on our programs here in Gainesville.
We are deeply committed to giving back to the community in which we live, whether through collaborations to offer community clinics and classes or through donations and in-kind services to help community agencies to improve the health, wellness and quality of life of our citizens. As a not-for-profit organization, we reinvest all earnings back into our health care resources, and we are committed to providing a significant amount of charity care to support our most at-risk local residents. UF Health is also a partner with city, county and state agencies as the community’s “first-receiver” in emergencies, thanks to our emergency and trauma services, levels of expertise and diverse resources.
It is this continued commitment to community that makes Gainesville and the surrounding area a great place to live.