Transylvania Regional Hospital wants to be your first choice for care

Navigating and accessing healthcare involves making informed choices, like so many other things in life. Having choices is good, and the ones we make are often very consequential — just think of the lifestyle practices I talk about so often in this monthly column.

What we eat, how much we move, and many other factors have a great impact on our health and illustrate that maintaining our health, to a large extent, is up to us.

However, we also know that making the “right” choice, no matter what decision we’re pondering, can become complex. Who do we listen to? What evidence should we assess? Whose recommendations do we respect and trust?

At Transylvania Regional Hospital, we are aware that you always have a choice when it comes to deciding where to seek your care — whether you’re in need of emergency care, routine care, or specialty care. We feel too, that our distinct role as a community hospital that offers so many types of care under one roof is part of what makes us exceptional.

As the healthcare landscape expands in Western North Carolina, I want to remind community members that Transylvania Regional Hospital offers unmatched care with powerful, unique benefits you will not find anywhere else in Brevard and the surrounding areas.

We are proud to be Transylvania County’s only hospital and we offer a wide array of inpatient and outpatient services. Rural hospitals are vital to their communities and offer needed emergency care, surgical care, and treatment for inpatients and outpatients, which keep you close to home.

We are living in a climate where rural hospitals are struggling to survive — there have been massive closures across the country since 2010, and according to the American Hospital Association, a concerning 19 closures occurred just in 2020. The pandemic worsened the situation. This reality makes hospitals like TRH even more crucial, as rural communities’ needs for high-quality advanced care become ever more urgent.

Although there are a growing number of healthcare facilities and specialty offices from community members to choose from, there aren’t any others like TRH. In addition to our breadth of care, it’s important to understand that the caregivers here are your friends, neighbors, and sometimes even family. That is something truly special that sets us apart and the relationships forged aren’t easily replicable. In other words, they come with time and knowledge, and TRH’s history in this community is a real strength.

In addition, our team members tend to stay with us a long time. In fact, next month I will be talking about employee retention at TRH in more depth, as we prepare to celebrate our employees whose tenures here have been the longest. We look forward to recognizing staff who have given their best to patients for five, 10, and even 35 years. In fact, TRH has 37 employees with 20 or more years of service.

I am grateful for the dedication that these long-term TRH team members have shown, and I’m profoundly appreciative to every team member here, because they are who create this rare and special atmosphere of neighbors caring for neighbors with utmost concern and compassion. I see how our caregivers and all staff invest in every patient’s dignity, safety, and healing.

What I’m describing are qualities that our team members have that are intangible, but you can see them being lived out each day here at TRH. The connections created and relationships built here form a solid foundation of support for all our patients.

We continue to be grateful that you depend on us and trust us to deliver your “close to home” care. As you review the changing landscape of healthcare, please remember that we remain an institution filled with your friends and neighbors — who always have your health and wellbeing at heart.

Michele Pilon, MS, BSN, RN, NE-BC, is the chief executive officer and chief nursing officer of Transylvania Regional Hospital. Her diverse professional experience includes service as a bedside nurse and over a decade as a leader at healthcare institutions in Virginia, Florida, and North Carolina. Ms. Pilon earned a Bachelor’s in Nursing from Ohio’s University of Akron and a Masters in Health Services Administration from the University of St. Francis in Illinois; she is also a Board-Certified Nursing Executive.