Spokane has long served as a central hub for health care for all of Eastern Washington and North Idaho. 

The Spokane County Medical Society was founded in 1885 and the Spokane Regional Health District in 1970. Over the years, the region added six hospitals: the VA Medical Center (1948), Deaconess Hospital (1896), Sacred Heart Hospital (1887), St. Luke’s (1897), Valley Hospital (1969), and Shriner’s Children’s Hospital (1924). These events demonstrated a commitment to innovation and public service for more than 100 years.  

The past 35 years, however, proved to be a huge step forward in technological advancements in health care. These technologies include improved disease prevention methods, growth in MRI capabilities, and use of state-of-the-art tools such as the da Vinci Xi surgical robot. In addition, there has been an increased focus on the patient and their family’s perception of their care in the hospital and in the medical office. This focus has helped to improve the overall patient experience and access to care.   

In the early 2000s, significant resources were invested in the Inland Northwest to move paper records to an electronic format. Not only did this make it easier for doctors across multiple disciplines to track their shared patients, it allowed patients to access their own health information online. 

Implementing software such as Epic, which we use at MultiCare, has allowed our two hospitals and 80-plus clinics to share a compatible electronic medical record system with the region’s other health care systems, providing patients and physicians with access to their patients’ records at any time, regardless of where their health care is being provided.  

Along with moving records to an electronic platform, the Inland Northwest health sector also has made great strides in providing telemedicine options for those patients who may have mobility or travel limitations. That advancement during the past decade proved to be a crucial tool as our region faced the COVID-19 pandemic, giving thousands of patients the option to receive care from the safety of their own home. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has allowed an opportunity to focus on innovative ideas to ensure all facets of the safety of our employees and patients are addressed while in our care. The region’s health care providers have invested resources and a sharper focus on keeping patients and staff safe every step of their health care journey with measures such as enhanced cleaning protocols, improved personal protective equipment, and ensuring we use best practices when it comes to patient transportation, medication management, and mental health awareness. Protecting patients and staff safety is assisting recovery as well as preventing injury. 

The Inland Northwest stays up to date on the latest health care solutions and practices to provide care that is comparable to anywhere else in the region. Spokane has long been a centralized location for advanced medicine because of its geographic location amongst a rural community base. 

For many of our surrounding rural communities, access to specialty health care services is limited. Spokane has been able to grow our range of services to meet the needs of these surrounding towns. 

Outside of what our health care systems are doing, the introduction of medical, nursing, and pharmacy programs in Spokane has been an asset for the region. The Washington State University Health Sciences campus in Spokane welcomed the WSU College of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences in 2013 and the Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine in 2017. The University of Washington School of Medicine – Gonzaga University Health Partnership launched in 2016 as one piece of the five-state WWAMI program. The goal of both medical programs is to train medical doctors, as well as bring new innovations in health care to our region. 

Our regional nursing programs are also highly respected and graduate excellent, caring, and skilled nurses to join the region’s health care teams. 

At MultiCare, we are proud to partner with our local schools and provide hands-on training and residency programs for medical, nursing, and pharmacy students. Our doctors and nurses enjoy the opportunity to teach and mentor these up-and-coming professionals. It creates a positive, academic-focused environment, allowing the most current evidence-based practices and guidelines to be incorporated into training programs.  

Working side-by-side with these students gives us an even greater feeling of excitement for the future of health care in Spokane. New practices and technologies paired with the innovative research conducted across so many of our region’s health care systems ensures that our region will continue to see tremendous growth in these areas in the coming years. 

Education won’t only be a resource desired by the health care professionals, researchers, and students, but a community wide interest as well. With the COVID-19 pandemic there has been a heightened awareness of just how much a single virus can uproot our lives. The public’s awareness of how simple measures, such as wearing a mask and practicing good hand hygiene can reduce the burden of diseases like the flu and other viral and bacterial respiratory illnesses, not just COVID-19, in our region.

The landscape of health care in Spokane will likely see many more changes in the coming months and years following this pandemic. The leadership and staff at MultiCare are grateful for the advancements made over the past 35 years that have set us up for success in whatever the future holds. 

We will continue to look for innovative and forward-thinking ways to meet our patients’ health care needs in the hospital, in the office, or online settings. Through growing telemedicine options, improved access to same-day care, optimized scheduling in the primary care setting, and bringing back “house call” options, our region is focused on providing the very best, high value, positive patient experience. 

Dr. David O’Brien is senior vice president and chief executive of MultiCare INW.