Michael J. Spicer is the President and CEO of Saint Joseph’s Medical Center in Yonkers.
A neighborhood landmark for 130 years, Saint Joseph’s Medical Center continues to respond to the needs of patients under Michael Spicer’s leadership
Saint Joseph’s Medical Center has changed in significant ways since its founding in 1888, but it has never altered its commitment to the needs of the community it serves.
That is evident in Michael Spicer’s recently formed clinical affiliation with Montefiore Health System, his earlier acquisition of St. Vincent’s Hospital Westchester and his plans for further expansions and renovations in the coming months and years.
Saint Joseph’s Medical Center and Montefiore Health System announced their clinical affiliation in 2015. This partnership allows Saint Joseph’s Medical Center to expand the scope of advanced care that area residents can access locally.
The affiliation with Montefiore Health System is only the latest in a long line of patient-centered decisions made by CEO Michael Spicer to expand its offerings to the community.
Saint Joseph’s Medical Center purchased St. Vincent’s Hospital Westchester in Harrison, a 138-bed psychiatric facility with inpatient services and numerous outpatient behavioral health programs throughout Westchester and New York City.
These programs include mental health clinics, opioid treatment centers, and residential and housing options for patients living with mental illness or substance abuse disorders.
The addition of St. Vincent’s Hospital Westchester has turned Saint Joseph’s Medical Center into one of the most comprehensive behavioral health networks in the state, with campuses in both Yonkers and Harrison.
Beyond the services offered at St. Vincent’s Hospital Westchester, CEO Michael Spicer also has multiple psychiatric inpatient programs, 43 psychiatric beds, a mental health clinic, psychiatric emergency services, and a crisis prevention and response team at its Yonkers campus.
Behavioral health services at both campuses are continually reviewed so they can be tailored to community requirements. For example, the mobile crisis prevention and response team recently expanded its schedule to meet a community need.
Thanks to federal and state government initiatives to foster integrated delivery of health care in New York state, Michael Spicer will get the additional resources to move forward on his multiple renovation and expansion projects over the coming year and a half.
He is also overseeing a a complete makeover of Saint Joseph’s Medical Center’s Emergency Department.
The department will include an advanced triage area, psychiatric care area, acute care ER, psychiatric ER and extended primary care center.
Building the extended primary care center adjacent to the ER will allow Saint Joseph’s Medical Center to easily redirect patients who may not require emergency services.
The renovations, acquisitions and clinical affiliations all share Michael Spicer’s goal of reducing ER admissions by 25 percent over a five-year period.
A large part of this initiative includes Michael Spicer’s plan of creating approximately 240 new supportive-housing apartments in Yonkers and other nearby areas.
In Yonkers, he will begin construction on an 80-apartment complex with behavioral health-supportive and affordable housing.
He is also working on a building with 65 units of supportive primary care and affordable housing for the frail and elderly.
These units serve multiple functions, with behavioral health-supportive housing allowing residents to more easily receive outpatient behavioral health services.
Primary care supportive-housing units serve a similar function, making it convenient for residents to receive the outpatient care they need.
Residents are employed, pay rent and give back to the community.
Further renovation projects, led by Michael Spicer, include adding 2,000 square feet to the Saint Joseph’s Family Health Center for new waiting rooms, exam rooms and a reception area.
More importantly, Michael Spicer has added new IT systems that are installed at the Family Health Center and other locations to better facilitate communication and coordination between providers in and outside of the system.
Michael Spicer has also brought in other technology to enhance services as well, including a new 128-slice CT scanner that assists physicians in diagnosing their patients and improve imaging services.
Saint Joseph’s Medical Center has a legacy of providing advanced tools to its physicians. For example, it upgraded its special procedure operating room three years ago.
The operating room is especially important for the Vascular Surgery Department, which uses it for complicated arterial and vascular surgeries.
As Saint Joseph’s Medical Center grows, so does Michael Spicer’s ability to offer even more new programs to the community.
In addition to renovating and expanding existing care centers, Michael Spicer has finished the construction of a wound care center for patients with non-healing and persistent wounds.
The new Center for Advanced Wound Care & Hyperbaric Medicine at Saint Joseph’s Medical Center includes two hyperbaric units, three treatment rooms, and a renovated waiting room and registration area.
The center is now open and is staffed by providers who are certified to treat complex wounds.