Carolinas Medical Center (CMC) is an 874-bed

non-profit A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

tertiary Tertiary ( ) is a widely used but obsolete term for the geologic period from 66 million to 2.6 million years ago. The period began with the demise of the non-avian dinosaurs in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, at the start ...

, research and

academic medical center An academic medical centre (AMC), variously also known as academic health science centre, academic health science system, or academic health science partnership, is an educational and healthcare institute formed by the grouping of a health profess ...

located in

Charlotte, North Carolina Charlotte ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. Located in the Piedmont region, it is the county seat of Mecklenburg County. The population was 874,579 at the 2020 census, making Charlotte the 16th-most popu ...

, servicing the southern North Carolina, northern South Carolina, and the Metrolina region. Carolinas Medical Center is one of the region's only academic university-level teaching centers. The hospital is the flagship hospital of

Atrium Health Atrium Health, formerly Carolinas HealthCare System, is a hospital network with more than 70,000 employees and part of Advocate Aurora Health. It operates 40 hospitals, 7 freestanding emergency departments, over 30 urgent care centers, and more ...

. Carolinas Medical Center is affiliated with the Wake Forest School of Medicine. Carolinas Medical Center is also an ACS designated level I trauma center and has a heliport to handle medevac patients. Attached to the medical center is the Levine Children's Hospital, treating infants, children, adolescents, and young adults.

History

The hospital was organized in 1940 as Charlotte Memorial Hospital on Blythe Boulevard in the Dilworth neighborhood. Since that time, the hospital has undergone several major expansions, bringing the licensed bed capacity to 874 beds. In May 1970, the organ Transplant program began with the first cadaveric kidney transplant performed by Dr. Don Mullen and Dr. Dale Ensor. This was one of the first transplants in the USA done outside a medical school setting. A year later, Mullen and Ensor performed the first living related transplant. Dr. Francis Robicsek performed the first heart transplant at Carolinas Medical Center in 1986. In 2007, the multistory Levine Children's Hospital was completed and opened, making it the second largest children's hospital in the Southeastern United States, after Washington, D.C. In 2010, the

University of North Carolina School of Medicine The University of North Carolina School of Medicine is a professional school within the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It offers a Doctor of Medicine degree along with combined Doctor of Medicine / Doctor of Philosophy or Doctor o ...

established the Charlotte Campus of the UNC School of Medicine at Carolinas Medical Center. Students from UNC School of Medicine had been completing clinical rotations at Carolinas Medical Center for over 40 years prior. On July 28, 2011, '' Becker's Hospital Review'' listed Carolinas Medical Center under 60 Hospitals with Great Orthopedic Programs. In October 2020, Wake Forest School of Medicine and

began an agreement to make Carolinas Medical Center one of its flagship teaching hospitals along with the creation of a Charlotte campus of its medical school. Today, Carolinas Medical Center is the region's only Level 1 Trauma Center and part of

, one of the largest public not-for-profit healthcare systems in the United States.

References

External links

Carolinas Medical Center

Charlotte Memorial Hospital in 1972
{{authority control Atrium Health Hospitals in Charlotte, North Carolina Hospitals in North Carolina Trauma centers Public hospitals in the United States