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Some Summa Health System physicians will attend a lot of Kent State University varsity events during the upcoming school year as part of a partnership between the Akron health system and Kent university. Beginning with the new school year, physicians from the Summa Center for Sports Health will provide medical care to Kent State student-athletes in all varsity sports, including baseball, basketball, cross country, field hockey, football, golf, gymnastics, soccer, softball, track and field, volleyball and wrestling.

Summa Wadsworth-Rittman Hospital is undergoing a rebirth.After cutbacks in recent years that included the end of its labor and delivery unit, the community hospital in Medina County is poised for growth and expansion in targeted areas.Leadership from Wadsworth-Rittman and its owner, Summa Health System, recently completed an intensive review and [...]

Dr. Thomesha Smoot Barton knew becoming a practicing physician wouldn’t be easy.”You know that you’re going to work hard and you’re not going to sleep a lot going into it,” she said.Still, she added, ”You can’t really prepare yourself to be sleep deprived.”AdvertisementLast year, the Akron Beacon Journal shared the stories [...]

Summa Health System has received a $1 million gift that will go toward establishing a research fellowship for a medical resident who specializes in orthopedics.The gift comes from the family of Robert and Judy Rice, according to a statement from the Summa Foundation.The fellowship is named in honor of Dr. Robert Kepley, a veteran orthopedist [...]

The head of Summa Health System’s Barberton and Wadsworth-Rittman hospitals is leaving for another job opportunity in northwestern Ohio.Jim Pope recently accepted a job as president and chief executive of Franciscan Health System, based in the Toledo suburb of Sylvania.In his new post, Pope will oversee a Catholic health system [...]

Akron General Health System is acquiring a cancer treatment center from the region’s largest urology practice.The health system announced on Wednesday that it is buying Physicians Urology’s outpatient prostate cancer treatment center on West Exchange Street near the hospital campus, effective Aug. 1.Under the deal, Akron General will contract with the 12-physician practice to staff [...]

An Akron doctor is exploring why American women who beat endometrial cancer still are at risk of premature death from other health problems.The likely reason: Few endometrial cancer survivors eat a balanced diet, quit smoking and get enough exercise, according to new research by Dr. Vivian von Gruenigen, department chair [...]

University Hospitals and Summa Health System in Ohio, and Fairview Health Services in Minnesota are among 19 members of an accountable care organization collaborative launched today by healthcare alliance Premier Inc.The “implementation” collaborative to which these hospitals belong is one of two being started by Premier, a hospital-owned company in Charlotte, North Carolina, that until [...]

Four Northeast Ohio institutions have received a four-year, $2.7 million federal grant to study cognitive impairment in heart failure patients.The study’s goal is to understand why heart failure patients often have trouble managing their complex medical regimen, according to a statement from Kent State University.The other collaborating institutions on the project are the Case Western [...]

Fitch Ratings has lowered its long-term view on the debt of Summa Health System because of its “increasing debt burden coupled with a slower-than-anticipated improvement in operating performance and liquidity position.”Fitch assigned its BBB+ rating to $175 million of fixed-rate hospital facilities revenue bonds to be issued on behalf of the Akron, Ohio-based system during [...]