Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Trauma Unit on 10 North in Vanderbilt University Adult Hospital opened 20 years ago this month, August 1998. Since its opening, close to 60,000 patients from Middle Tennessee and surrounding areas have been admitted to the 32-bed unit, the region’s only Level I trauma center.
Currently, the unit cares for about 5,000 patients per year. Longtime staff members gathered recently for an anniversary celebration, including, from left, John Morris, MD, associate chief of staff of the Vanderbilt Health System and former chief of the Division of Trauma and Surgical Critical Care, who oversaw the creation and the opening of the unit in 1998; Marcia Burns, a VUPD officer assigned to the unit; Beth Mills, RD, dietitian; Veleria East, medical receptionist; Richard Miller, MD, chief of the Division of Trauma and Surgical Critical Care; Linda Wilkinson, ACNP-BC, nurse practitioner; and Shannon Godby, RN. Mills, East, Wilkinson and Godby have worked in the unit since its founding.
