Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital Somerset

Located in Somerville, New Jersey, Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital Somerset, an RWJBarnabas Health facility, is a nationally accredited, 361-bed regional medical center providing a variety of comprehensive emergency, medical/surgical, behavioral health and rehabilitative services to Central New Jersey residents. As a designated teaching hospital of Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, the hospital maintains a family medicine residency program with 21 residents.

RWJUH-Somerset has earned significant national recognition for clinical quality and patient safety including the prestigious Magnet® Award for Nursing Excellence and an “A” Hospital Safety Score from the Leapfrog Group. As the first hospital in New Jersey to offer primary health care services for the LGBTQIA community, RWJUH Somerset has been honored as a Leader in LGBT Healthcare Equality by the Human Rights Campaign.

The Steeplechase Cancer at RWJUH Somerset, a clinical research affiliate of Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey, has been designated as a Comprehensive Community Cancer Center by the American College of Surgeons’ Commission on Cancer.

History

Somerset Hospital was founded at a house on Main Street in 1901 as a 12-bed facility with a staff of 10 doctors. This converted residential home remained the location of the hospital until 1925 when the current building was completed. Additional wings were added to the hospital in 1946 and 1963, and the hospital was renamed in 1978 to Somerset Medical Center.^[1] As June 1, 2014, Somerset Medical Center completed its merger with Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, NJ and was renamed to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital Somerset as a campus in Somerville, NJ in Somerset County in New Jersey.

It was here that Charles Cullen, one of the most prolific serial killers in New Jersey history killed patients at Somerset Medical Center.^[2] In September 2002 Cullen began working for Somerset Medical Center in Somerville, New Jersey in the critical care unit. Around this time Cullen began dating a local woman, but his depression worsened. He killed at least eight patients and attempted to kill at least one more by June 2003. As usual, his drugs of choice were digoxin, epinephrine, and insulin.

On June 18, 2003 Cullen attempted to murder Philip Gregor, a patient at Somerset Medical Center. Gregor survived and was discharged, but he died six months later of natural causes. Soon afterward, Somerset Medical Center began to observe clues indicating Cullen's wrongdoing. The hospital's computer system showed that Cullen was accessing the records of patients to whom he was not assigned, co-workers began seeing him in the rooms of patients' to whom he was not assigned, and the hospital's computerized drug-dispensing cabinets showed that Cullen was requesting medications that his patients had not been prescribed. Cullen's drug requests were strange, with many orders that were immediately canceled, and many repetitive requests within minutes of each other.

In July 2003 the executive director of the New Jersey Poison Information and Education System warned Somerset Medical Center officials that at least four suspicious overdoses indicated the possibility that an employee was killing patients. The hospital delayed contacting authorities until October 2003. By then, Cullen had killed at least another five patients and attempted to kill a sixth.

When a patient in Somerset died of low blood sugar in October 2003, the medical center alerted state authorities. That patient was Cullen's final victim. State officials castigated the hospital for failing to report a nonfatal insulin overdose, administered by Cullen in August. An investigation into Cullen's employment history revealed past suspicions about his involvement with prior deaths. Somerset Medical Center fired Cullen on October 31, 2003, ostensibly for lying on his job application. Police kept him under surveillance for several weeks, until they had finished their investigation.^[3]

References

External links

• Official website