Mayo Clinic is a not-for-profit medical practice and medical research group based in Rochester, Minnesota, specializing in treating difficult cases (tertiary care). Patients are referred to Mayo Clinic from across the U.S. and the world, and it is known for innovative and effective treatments. Mayo Clinic is known for being at the top of most accredited quality standard listings; for example, it has been near the top of the U.S. News & World Report List of Best Hospitals for more than 20 years.^[1] The practice is distinguished by integrated care, and a strong research presence is evidenced by the fact that over 40% of its resources are devoted towards research (rather than just medical practice).

Mayo Clinic has been on the list of America's "100 Best Companies to Work For" published by Fortune magazine for eight years in a row.^[2][3] From its humble beginnings as a family venture between a father and his two sons, the practice later became America's first integrated group practice, a model that is now standard in the United States. The current-day Mayo Clinic is an integrated practice of more than 3,700 physicians and scientists, and a total employment including nurses, students, and allied health staff of more than 56,000 persons.^[4]

History[link]

William Worrall Mayo, the founding father of what would become the Mayo Clinic.

Early Years[link]

In 1863, William Worrall Mayo (1819–1911) came to Rochester, Minnesota as part of his appointment as an examining surgeon for the military draft board during the Civil War. The city would be to his liking, and his wife and children would join him in early 1864. W.W. Mayo opened his medical practice after the war, and would also serve in several leadership roles in the community. Both of W.W. Mayo's sons, William James Mayo (1861–1939) and Charles Horace Mayo (1865–1939) would grow up in Rochester, and when old enough both attended medical school. William (Will) graduated in 1883 and joined his father's practice, with Charles (Charlie) joining after he completed his training in 1888.

Bronze statue of the Mayo brothers, "Dr. Charlie" (left) and "Dr. Will" (right), in front of the Mayo Clinic Gonda Building in Rochester, Minnesota

On August 21, 1883, a tornado struck Rochester, causing at least 37 deaths in the area and over 200 injuries.^[5] One-third of the town was destroyed, but the Mayo family escaped serious harm. The relief efforts began immediately with a temporary hospital being established at the city dance hall, and the doctors Mayo (W.W. and Will) were extensively involved in treating the injured who were brought there for help. Mother Alfred Moes and the Sisters of Saint Francis (a teaching order) were called in to act as nurses despite having been trained as teachers and with little if any medical experience.

After the crisis had subsided, Mother Alfred Moes approached W.W. Mayo about establishing a hospital in Rochester if he agreed to staff the hospital. On September 30, 1889, Saint Marys Hospital was opened. Dr. W.W. Mayo (who by this time was 70 years of age) became the consulting physician and surgeon at the hospital, and his two sons began seeing patients and performing surgeries with the assistance of the Sisters of Saint Francis.^[6]

Group Practice[link]

In 1892, Dr. Augustus Stinchfield was asked to join the practice by W.W. Mayo, who considered him to be the best doctor in the small towns surrounding Rochester. After Dr. Stinchfield joined the practice, W.W. Mayo retired at the age of 73. The group practice would continue to grow, eventually adding other physicians considered today as the "founders" of the Mayo Clinic. The earliest members of the group included Mayo brothers Will and Charlie, Dr. Stinchfield, Dr. Graham, Dr. Henry Plummer, Dr. Millet, Dr. Judd, and Dr. Balfour. These early partners shared in the profits of the private group practice, while other staff hired by the partners were salaried. W.W. Mayo died in 1911, but the group practice continued strong with an ever increasing presence nationally as a cutting edge center, particularly in the area of surgery. In 1919, the group partners created the Mayo Properties Association, and their private practice became a not-for-profit entity. The Mayo Brothers, who had retained ownership of all Clinic properties and furnishings, gave everything to this newly formed association. The integrated practice model of the original partners created a foundation for what would grow into the Mayo Clinic.

Growth and Current Practice[link]

The Group Practice continued steady growth throughout the 20th Century. The campus continued to grow to keep up with patient numbers and an increasing research focus of the Clinic's operations. In 1928, the Plummer Building was completed with considerable input from Clinic staff, and under the guidance of Dr. Henry Plummer (designed by John William Dawson and Ray Corwin from the architectural firm of Ellerbe & Round). At the time of its completion, it was the tallest building in Minnesota and remained so until the Foshay Tower was finished in Minneapolis in 1929. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1969, and has recently undergone a complete restoration of its bell tower. The Ellerbe firm is the architect of record for the 1914 Mayo "Red" building, the 1922 Mayo Institute of Experimental Medicine, the 1927 Plummer building (completed in 1928), the 1954 Mayo Clinic building, and the 2002 Gonda building. The historic 1914 "Red" Mayo Clinic building, a National Landmark listed on the National Register, was demolished by the Clinic in the 1980s to make way for the HGA designed Siebens building. Since 1986, the Mayo Clinic campus has formally included the Rochester Methodist Hospital and Saint Marys Hospital, as all operations were integrated under one governing board to more efficiently serve the needs of Mayo patients.^[6] In 2011, the foundation went before the Supreme Court to argue that medical residents should remain exempt from Social Security deductions. In Mayo Foundation v. United States the court sided with the Social Security Administration and required FICA to be deducted going forward.

The Mayo Clinic is a member of the Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine(CAHCIM).^[7][8] The stated mission of the CAHCIM is "to advance the principles and practices of integrative healthcare within academic institutions. The Consortium provides its institutional membership with a community of support for its academic missions and a collective voice for influencing change."^[9]

Locations[link]

The Plummer Building in Rochester, Minnesota.

Mayo Clinic has a large presence in three U.S. metropolitan areas: Rochester, Minnesota, Jacksonville, Florida, and Scottsdale/Phoenix, Arizona. The Clinic employs more than 32,000 people at the main campus in Rochester, Minnesota and is a major source of economic power.^[4] The Arizona and Florida sites employ approximately 5,000 persons at each site. In addition, the Mayo Clinic owns and operates the Mayo Clinic Health System, which consists of more than 70 hospitals and clinics across Minnesota, Iowa, and Wisconsin with an employment of 14,000 persons. Mayo Clinic also operates several colleges of medicine, including Mayo Medical School, the Mayo Graduate School, and the Mayo School of Graduate Medical Education, Mayo School of Health Sciences.

Core values[link]

As is evidenced by the Mayo Clinic logo, the institution has a three part focus. First and primary to the organization is the patient care practice, represented by the central shield. This is in accordance with the primary statement of the organization that "the needs of the patient always come first." The other two shields represent the areas of education and research, two areas of Mayo Clinic which have become more prominent over time.^{[citation needed]}

Patient care[link]

Each year, more than one million patients from all 50 states and from more than 150 countries are seen at one of the Mayo Clinic facilities.^[4] Mayo Clinic offers highly specialized medical care, and a large portion of the patient population are referrals from smaller clinics and hospitals from across the upper Midwest and the United States as a whole. Mayo Clinic physicians are paid a fixed salary that is not linked to patient volume (relative value units) or income from fee-for-service payments. This practice is thought to decrease the monetary motivation to see patients in large numbers and increase the incentive to spend more time with individuals. Salaries are determined by the marketplace salaries for physicians in comparable large group practices.

Research[link]

Mayo Clinic researchers contribute to the understanding of disease processes, best clinical practices, and translation of findings from the laboratory to the clinical practice. Nearly 400 doctoral level physicians and research scientists are employed, with an additional 2,800 allied health personnel and students with appointments in research.^[4] In 2010, more than 2,300 research protocols were reviewed by the Mayo Clinic Institutional review board and 8,000 ongoing human research studies. These research initiatives led to more than 5,000 research publications and review articles in peer-review journals.^[4]

Education[link]

Drs. William and Charles Mayo were proponents of education since very early in the history of Mayo Clinic. In 1917, they helped found and develop the medical school at the University of Minnesota with a two million dollar donation. Until the early 1970s, consulting physicians at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota held joint appointments as professors at the University of Minnesota medical school. The Mayo Clinic was a pioneer in helping to establish the current residency education system. In 1972, Mayo Clinic opened the doors of its own medical school (Mayo Medical School) in Rochester, which is known for its contributions the medical field.^[10]

Innovation[link]

Dr. Henry Stanley Plummer became a partner in the Clinic practice in 1901. He is considered by many American physicians to be the "architect of the modern medical practice" and a primary reason for Mayo Clinic's early success. He designed many of the systems which are now universally used around the world today, such as a shared, individual dossier-style medical record and an interconnecting telephone system. While the Mayo brothers excelled as surgeons, Dr. Plummer is largely credited with establishing and developing the diagnostic and clinical aspects of the practice. Dr. Louis B. Wilson was hired by the Clinic in 1907—at Dr. Henry Plummer's urging—to establish research and diagnostic laboratories.

Since about the year 2000, Mayo Clinic has also become known for achieving high quality at low cost. One extensive study found that the cost paid by insurers to treat Medicare patients in their last three years of life (the most expensive years) was only 54% of comparable costs in nearby clinics and hospitals. Mayo Clinic has been researched and presented many times during the passing of the 2009 healthcare reform bills in US Congress as a model to reduce healthcare costs while increasing quality for the nation. However, Mayo Clinic issued an open letter stating the healthcare reform bills as written in July 2009 would not reduce costs or increase quality nationwide.^[11]

The Biomedical Imaging Resource (BIR) at Mayo Clinic is dedicated to the advancement of research in the biomedical imaging and visualization sciences. The BIR provides expertise and advanced technology related to these fields, including image acquisition, processing, display and analysis; volume visualization; computer graphics; virtual reality and virtual environments; image databases; computer workstations, networks and programming. The BIR group developed the biomedical imaging software Analyze.

Leadership[link]

Mayo Clinic is led by President and CEO John Noseworthy, M.D. In May 2009, it was announced that when previous CEO Denis Cortese retires in November 2009, Dr. John Noseworthy would be named the new President and CEO.^[12]

After his retirement from Mayo in November 2009, Dr. Cortese became director of the Health Care Delivery and Policy Program at Arizona State University (ASU), Foundation Professor at ASU, and President of the Healthcare Transformation Institute. On July 29, 2010, EGHC, parent company of Essence Healthcare and other subsidiaries, announced that Dr. Cortese would join its Board of Directors.^[13]

Rankings[link]

In 2011, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, was ranked as the #3 overall hospital in the United States by U.S. News & World Report. A total of 4,825 hospitals were considered and ranked in 16 specialties from cancer and heart disease to respiratory disorders and urology; 140, or less than 3 percent of the total, were ranked in even one of the 16 specialties. Of the 140 hospitals that are ranked in one or more specialties, 17 qualified for the Honor Roll by earning high scores in at least six specialties. Mayo Clinic, Rochester, was ranked in the top 10 in all but one of 16 specialties, in the top 5 in 12 specialties, and was the #1 ranked hospital in four specialties.^[14]

U.S. News & World Report – Mayo Clinic, Rochester, 2011 Rankings by Medical Specialty

Additional images[link]

• 

  Gonda building from cafeteria.

• 

  Gonda building from 3rd Avenue SW.

• 

  Inside the Gonda building looking south toward the Mayo building.

• 

  The Plummer building.

• 

  The Opus Imaging Research Building.

• 

  Mayo Brothers U.S. Commemorative Stamp issued 1964

• 

  The Guggenheim Building in Rochester, MN.

Bibliography[link]

• Clapesattle, Helen. The Doctors Mayo (University of Minnesota Press, 1941; later editions are abridged).
• Fye, W. Bruce "The Origins and Evolution of the Mayo Clinic from 1864 to 1939: A Minnesota Family Practice Becomes an International 'Medical Mecca'", Bulletin of the History of Medicine Volume 84, Number 3, Fall 2010 pp. 323–357 in Project MUSE

See also[link]

• Mayo Medical School
• Mayo Clinic Diet
• SPARC Innovation Program
• American Legacy Foundation
• Medical centers in the United States
• Galvanic Vestibular Stimulation
• Mayo Clinic Center for Innovation

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Mayo Clinic

• Official site of Mayo Clinic
• Official site of Mayo Clinic Health System
• Mayo Clinic College of Medicine

Coordinates: 44°01′20″N 92°28′00″W / 44.0222°N 92.4666°W / 44.0222; -92.4666

Hunter Doherty "Patch" Adams
Adams in Anaheim, California, May 15, 2008
Born	(1945-05-28) May 28, 1945 (age 67) Washington, D.C., U.S.
Nationality	United States
Education	M.D., Virginia Commonwealth University
Alma mater	George Washington University
Home town	Arlington, Virginia
Spouse	Linda Edquist (1975–98; divorced)
Children	Atomic Zagnut Adams Lars Zig Edquist Adams

Hunter Doherty "Patch" Adams (born May 28, 1945, in Washington, D.C.) is an American physician, social activist, citizen diplomat and author. He founded the Gesundheit! Institute in 1971. Each year he organizes a group of volunteers from around the world to travel to various countries where they dress as clowns in an effort to bring humor to orphans, patients, and other people.^[1]

Adams is currently based in Urbana, Illinois. In collaboration with the institute, he promotes an alternative health care model, not funded by insurance policies.^[1]

Early life[link]

Adams had a difficult childhood. His father, an officer in the United States Army, had fought in Korea, and died while stationed in Germany when Adams was still a teenager.^[1] After his father's death, Adams returned to the United States with his mother and brother. Upon his return, Adams has stated that he encountered institutional injustice which made him a target for bullies at school. As a result, Adams was unhappy and became actively suicidal. After being hospitalized three times in one year for wanting to end his life, he decided "you don't kill yourself; you make revolution."^{[citation needed]}

Early career[link]

After graduating (1963) from Wakefield High School,^[2] Adams completed pre-med coursework at the George Washington University. He began medical school without an undergraduate degree, and earned his Doctor of Medicine degree at Virginia Commonwealth University (Medical College of Virginia) in 1971. In the late 1960s one of his closest friends (a man, not a woman as depicted in the Patch Adams film) was murdered. Convinced of the powerful connection between environment and wellness, he believes the health of an individual cannot be separated from the health of the family, community, and the world. While working in an adolescent clinic at MCV, in his final year of med school, he met Linda Edquist, a fellow VCU student who volunteered in the clinic. Soon after graduation, Patch, Linda, and friends founded the Gesundheit! Institute (originally known to many as the Zanies), which ran as a free community hospital for 12 years.

Adams and Edquist married in 1975 and had two sons, Atomic Zagnut "Zag" Adams and Lars Zig Edquist Adams. The couple divorced in 1998.^[3]

Gesundheit! Institute[link]

A revamped Gesundheit! Institute, envisioned as a free, full-scale hospital and health care eco-community, is planned on 316 acres (128 ha) in Pocahontas County, West Virginia. Its goal is to integrate a traditional hospital with alternative medicine, with the organization developing educational programs in sustainable systems design targeted to medical students and the general public.

Since the 1990s Adams has supported the Ithaca Health Alliance (IHA),^[4] founded as the Ithaca Health Fund (IHF) by Paul Glover. In January 2006 IHA launched the Ithaca Free Clinic, bringing to life key aspects of Adams' vision. Adams has also given strong praise to Health Democracy, Glover's book written and published the same year.

In October 2007, Adams and the Gesundheit Board unveiled its campaign to raise $1 million towards building a Teaching Center and Clinic on its land in West Virginia. The Center and Clinic will enable Gesundheit to see patients and teach health care design.

Adams urges medical students to develop compassionate connections with their patients. His prescription for this kind of care relies on humor and play, which he sees as essential to physical and emotional health. Ultimately, Adams wants the Gesundheit! Institute to open a 40-bed hospital in rural West Virginia that offers free, holistic care to anyone who wants it.^[5]

Adams was awarded the Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Award on January 29, 1997.^[6]

In 2008, Adams agreed to become honorary chair of the "International Association for the Advancement of Creative Maladjustment" or IAACM. In a number of his speeches and essays, Martin Luther King, Jr. had called for such an IAACM, but none was ever created. MindFreedom International, a nonprofit coalition that Gesundheit! belongs to as a sponsor group, launched the IAACM to support "creative maladjustment" and social change.^[7]

In media[link]

The 1998 film Patch Adams was based on Adams' life and views on medicine. Adams has criticized the film, saying it eschewed an accurate representation of his beliefs in favor of commercial viability. He said that out of all aspects of his life and activism, the film portrayed him merely as a funny doctor.^[8] Patch Adams also said of Robin Williams in an interview, "He made $21 million for four months of pretending to be me, in a very simplistic version, and did not give $10 to my free hospital. Patch Adams, the person, would have, if I had Robin's money, given all $21 million to a free hospital in a country where 80 million cannot get care."^[9]

However, in another interview, Adams did clarify that he did not hate Williams^[10], and Williams has actively supported St. Jude Children's Research Hospital for several years.^[11]

As a speaker, Dr. Adams travels around the globe lecturing about his medicine methods. ^[12].

Bibliography[link]

• Adams, Patch; Maureen Mylander (1998). Gesundheit! : bringing good health to you, the medical system, and society through physician service, complementary therapies, humor, and joy. Rochester, Vermont: Healing Arts Press. ISBN 978-0-89281-781-8. http://lccn.loc.gov/99187488. Retrieved 2008-12-16. 
• Adams, Patch; Maureen Mylander (1993). Gesundheit! : bringing good health to you, the medical system, and society through physician service, complementary therapies, humor, and joy. Rochester, Vermont: Healing Arts Press. ISBN 978-0-89281-442-8. http://lccn.loc.gov/92007008. Retrieved 2008-12-16. 
• Adams, Patch; Maureen Mylander (1998). Gesundheit! [sound recording]. Los Angeles, California: NewStar Media. ISBN 978-0-7871-1828-0. http://lccn.loc.gov/00717433. Retrieved 2008-12-16.  4 sound cassettes (ca. 6 hr.) : digitally mastered, Dolby processed.
• Adams, Patch (1998). House calls. cartoons by Jerry Van Amerongen. San Francisco, California: Robert D. Reed Publishers. ISBN 978-1-885003-18-8. http://lccn.loc.gov/98034266. Retrieved 2008-12-16. 
• Bourque, Judith (1999). The real Patch Adams (videorecording) / a film by Judith Bourque. Oley, PA: Bullfrog Films. ISBN 978-1-56029-811-3. http://lccn.loc.gov/2003389123. Retrieved 2008-12-16.  1 videocassette (53 min.) : sd., col. ; 1/2 in.
• Graham, John (1999). It’s up to us. foreword by Patch Adams. Langley, Washington: Giraffe Project. ISBN 978-1-893805-00-2. http://lccn.loc.gov/99097193. Retrieved 2008-12-16. 

References[link]

External links[link]

	Biography portal
	United States portal
	Medicine portal

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Patch Adams

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Patch Adams

• Official website
• Patch Adams at the Internet Movie Database