Bellevue Hospital Center / New York University

INTENSIVE PERSONALITY
DISORDER PROGRAM
(IPDP)

Bellevue's history can be traced through the changing health needs and concepts of the
community. The hospital is a lineal descendant of the infirmary for soldiers and slaves
established in New Amsterdam by Jacob Varrenvanger in 1658. When the colony came
under English rule, the Montgomerie Charter of 1731 provided for the building of a
"Public Workhouse and House of Correction" to cost eighty pounds and fifty gallons of
rum. In this building, at the site of the present City Hall, a single twenty-five by
twenty-three-foot room was set aside solely for the care of the indigent sick. in 1794,
yellow fever swept the coast of the newly independent nation, and the old almshouse
was given a new site on Chambers Street. The facilities were inadequate to deal with the
epidemic, so the city fathers acquired an estate about three miles from town, far enough
away to isolate the victims. The mansion, "Belle Vue," was used as a pesthouse and
gave its name to the hospital later built on this site. In 1811, the city bought additional
land adjoining the fever hospital from the Kip Estate, and the Honorable De Witt Clinton,
Mayor of New York, laid the cornerstone for a new set of almshouse buildings. The
War of 1812 intervened and the hospital was not completed until 1826. In 1847, in
response to clamor of the citizens, the almshouse and the penitentiary were removed
from the hospital grounds, and the facilities were opened for clinical instruction to the
medical students of the city.

The annals of Bellevue tell the history of the development of American medicine. Dr.
Valentine Seaman established at the almshouse the first lying-in ward in New York, and
delivered a series of lectures on obstetrics to the midwives of the town. Dr. Seaman
also introduced Jenner's new cowpox vaccine to New York. Dr. David Hosack
performed the first tying of the femoral artery in America at Bellevue. Dr. Wright Post
made the first successful ligature of the subclavian artery for brachial tumor. Dr.
Stephen Smith inaugurated the series of public health reform movements that swept the
country after the Civil War. The first hospital-based ambulance service in the world was
established at Bellevue in 1869 by Dr. Edward L. Dalton, who sent his horse and buggy
teams racing to every disaster within range of the hospital. The first school of nursing
in the nation was opened at Bellevue in 1873. Bellevue was also responsible for the
nation's first outpatient department, the Bureau of Medical and Surgical Relief for the
Outdoor Poor. In the first year, this service treated 437 patients; in the second, more
than 15,000; in recent years nearly 400,000.

Today, Bellevue Hospital occupies a 25-story, multi-million dollar patient care facility,
directly behind the old complex of Bellevue buildings.
Annually, Bellevue treats 26,000 inpatients and handles nearly 400,000 outpatient clinic
visits, while providing another 65,000 days of home care to 200 patients. Bellevue's
world-famous Emergency Service provides help for another 100,000 people each year,
approximately 50,000 in the Adult Emergency Services, 35,000 in Pediatric Emergency
Services, and the remaining 15,000 in Psychiatric Emergency Services.
In 1968, the School of Medicine assumed full responsibility for clinical services in
Bellevue Hospital. The hospital has an attending physician staff of 1,200 and a house
staff of more than 500 residents and interns.  Each floor of the New Bellevue
encompasses 1 1/2 acres of space for a total of 65,000 gross square feet of space per
floor. The building is centrally air-conditioned and includes 21 numbered floors, plus a
basement, ground floor, and mezzanine. Overall, a total of 4,400 rooms, are provided in
the structure. The logistics of providing care for Bellevue's patients have been eased
considerably by centralizing services primarily in one high-rise building as opposed to
treating patients in some ten buildings scattered over a widearea.

The old, open-ward arrangements traditional in municipal hospitals, have been eliminated
and Inpatients are housed in one-bed, two-bed, and four-bed rooms, all on the periphery
of the building. A total of 1,232 bedpatients can be accommodated. The building
includes six Intensive Care Units: a Cardiac Intensive Care Unit; a Medical Intensive
Care Unit; a Surgical Intensive Care Unit; a Neuro-Surgical Intensive Care Unit; and a
Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, and the Emergency Ward. The Operating Suites floor
includes 16 operating rooms, Surgical Pathology, the Blood Bank and a Cardiac
Catheterization area. There are twin operating rooms for organ transplant operations.
Television monitoring links satellite radiology stations in specialty areas to central
radiology headquarters on the third floor to provide immediate consultations as needed.


Retrieved from:  http://www.med.nyu.edu/Bellevue/

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