HCA Florida Blake overcame rough beginnings 50 years ago. What’s next for the hospital?
The founders of what is today HCA Florida Blake Hospital were called the “Dirty Thirty” in 1973 when the hospital began as L.W. Blake Hospital.
The Dirty Thirty was the label opponents put on the 30 doctors who split from Manatee Memorial Hospital, then a county-owned hospital, to found Blake Hospital at 2020 59th St. W., Bradenton.
“As co-founders of Blake, we worked our way through severe press and bad accusations,” Dr. E. P. Dickerson told the Bradenton Herald in a 1986 interview.
“It was a long, hard battle, but it’s my primary accomplishment simply because it was so hard to do,” Dickerson said, according to Herald archives.
That contentious beginning and what has been accomplished since is being remembered on the 50th anniversary of the hospital.
Founders, along with past and present hospital leaders, recently gathered at the hospital to toast the anniversary and hear a proclamation by Bradenton Mayor Gene Brown.
“It’s a great thing that side of town has a hospital. You don’t need to be stuck in traffic when you need a doctor. It’s important to have the point of service close by,” Brown said.
“It was the time to do it,” Brown said of buying land and starting construction a half-century ago when there wasn’t much neighborhood development along 59th Street West.
Blake Hospital’s early struggle
Dickerson, who died in 1998, was eulogized not only as beloved by his patients, but as an innovator who was instrumental in bringing Blake to reality.
“That bold move opened up vast new opportunities for doctors to serve a growing Manatee County population. Though he was vilified in many circles for doing so, it is hard to imagine this community today with only one hospital,” a Bradenton Herald editorial said.
“The opening of a for-profit hospital competing with the county-owned Manatee Memorial split the community. The split often made for icy moments at social gatherings in northwest Bradenton,” a Bradenton Herald editorial in 2006 said.
Nashville-based HCA Healthcare bought Blake in 1980. In 1984, Manatee Hospitals and Health Systems Inc. bought Manatee Memorial Hospital, ending the era of community-owned hospitals in Manatee County. In 1995, a subsidiary of Universal Health Services, Inc., based in King of Prussia, Pa., purchased Manatee Memorial Hospital.
Dr. Preston Whaley, one of the founders of Blake, said a second hospital was needed in Manatee County, and that it has since contributed much-needed medical care to the area’s rapidly growing population.
As to any ill feelings caused by the creation of Blake, it was short-lived, Whaley, 87, said.
“Stuff like that, I let it go. It really didn’t matter. We built the hospital and it was a success immediately,” he said.
Blake today
The hospital has been through several name changes, starting as L.W. Blake Hospital, and later Blake Medical Center.
In 2022, it was renamed HCA Florida Blake Hospital, as part of a rebranding of all HCA Healthcare hospitals in Florida.
Today, Blake is a 383 licensed-bed hospital, the only trauma center in Manatee County and a comprehensive stroke center. It is also one of six accredited burn centers in Florida.
A few years ago, Blake completed an expansion to add four new operating rooms and 11 post-anesthesia bays.
The project also expanded and upgraded existing surgical support space, and expanded the intensive care unit to 43 beds, an increase of six.
Blake offers a variety of healthcare services including complex hand repair, neuroscience center, open-heart surgery, cancer care, joint replacement, spine surgery, breast health center, inpatient and outpatient physical therapy and rehabilitation and other specialized services.
In 2022, Blake reported over 91,000 patients treated, nearly 44,000 emergency room visits and more than 6,600 outpatient surgeries.
Steve Young was named CEO of Blake in 2023.
The future
Blake is building a free-standing emergency department, which will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in the Bayshore neighborhood at 6215 14th St. W., Bradenton.
The 11,500-square-foot facility is scheduled to begin serving patients this summer.
“We are excited to expand our emergency services into South Bradenton and the Bayshore community,” Young said in a news release in December.
“HCA Florida Blake Hospital continues to grow to meet the needs of the communities we serve and to ensure residents can receive quality health care services close to home,” he said.
Also under construction and scheduled to open this summer is a free-standing emergency department at 902 10th St. E., Palmetto.
“I do feel like we need more medical offices. Palmetto is an under-served community,” Mayor Shirley Groover Bryant said after plans for the 10,800-square-foot facility facility were announced.
For more information about HCA Florida Blake Hospital, call (941) 792-6611 or visit HCAFloridaHealthcare.com/BlakeHospital.
