San Joaquin County’s only trauma center is up and running at full strength after a partial shutdown last year due to a staffing shortage.
The trauma center is making great strides in improving the level of care.
The San Joaquin General Hospital Trauma Center now has three full-time doctors skilled in general and critical care surgery and another surgeon joining the team in August.
Additionally, three neurosurgeons, trauma nurse clinicians, and radiology techs make up about a 30-person trauma team.
Hospital CEO David Culberson says he hopes to raise the Level 3 center to Level 2 to provide more care for critically injured patients.
“We have injuries that are resulting from shootings and stabbings, but we also have a lot of industrial accidents," says Culberson. "Our No. 1 volume, of course, is going to be motor vehicle collisions.”
Culberson says the trauma center is important when time is so critical and with the closest trauma centers located in Modesto or Sacramento.
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