The Syde Hurdus Foundation has an extensive history of loyal support of South Nassau, donating annually for more than a decade to fund various hospital expansion and renovation projects.

1. For Immediate Release October 16, 2015
Contact: Damian Becker, Manager of Media Relations
(516) 377-5370
$20,000 Gift in Support of the Expansion of South Nassau’s ED
Oceanside, NY – South Nassau Communities Hospital has received a gift of $20,000
from the Syde Hurdus Foundation in support of the hospital’s $60-million emergency department
renovation and expansion project.
The project will increase the Emergency Department’s square footage from 16,000 to
30,000 square feet, increasing its overall size by 87%, giving it the necessary room to
accommodate in excess of 80,000 patient visits each year as well as establishing dedicated areas
for behavioral health and pediatric emergencies. The Emergency Department currently sees some
65,000 patients a year, but is designed to handle just 35,000 annually.
“We are grateful benefactors of the generosity and honorable mission of the Syde Hurdus
Foundation,” said South Nassau President & CEO Richard Murphy. “The foundation’s
generosity and mission has been essential to the robust growth of South Nassau to meet the needs
of the patients it serves.”
The Syde Hurdus Foundation has an extensive history of loyal support of South Nassau,
donating annually for more than a decade to fund various hospital expansion and renovation
projects. Previous gifts to South Nassau include funding for the purchase of cancer treatment
planning technologies and equipment for South Nassau’s Gertrude & Louis Feil Cancer Center;
to support construction of the hospital’s North Addition and Center for Cardiovascular Health;
for the purchase of bedside ultrasound equipment; and for the renovation and modernization of a
medical/surgical patient care unit.
This latest donation from the foundation will be used to fund the first phase of the ED
expansion, which encompasses a much-needed renovation of the patient and family waiting area,
the construction of dedicated units for pediatric and psychiatric emergencies, and the
reconfiguration of floor space for the addition of ten new treatment bays. The total cost of this
phase is approximately $15.5 million, which is expected to be completed in 2016.
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2. South Nassau’s Emergency Services Department is one of the busiest in Nassau County,
realizing an 8.5 percent increase in patient visits in 2013.
Presently housing 35 treatment bays, South Nassau’s ED is a New York State
Department of Health regional stroke center and the only Level II Trauma Center located in
southern Nassau County. The department is staffed by a team of dedicated professionals
including board-certified, residency-trained emergency medicine physicians as well as nurses,
nurse practitioners, certified emergency nurses and physicians' assistants who have been
specially-trained in emergency medical care. It is one of few hospitals in New York with such
staffing.
To reduce waiting times, the department has a special unit dedicated to treat minor
emergencies from abrasions to fractures, flu and fevers. Additionally, the ED deploys advanced
imaging technology with state-of-the-art CAT scanning, ultrasound and digital radiology
services with on-site radiologists available for rapid diagnostic results. Recognizing that
children have unique presentations for disease and sometimes require special handling, the
emergency department's staff includes physicians with specialized training in pediatrics and
emergency medicine.
A recipient of the Get With The Guidelines® Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement
Award, and a recipient of the American Stroke Association’s Target: Stroke designation, the
department is among the top 10% of stroke programs in the nation, and provides the rapid
assessment and advanced therapies and procedures for patients in need of emergency stroke care.
If a patient arrives at the department in need of emergency treatment for heart attack,
South Nassau is the only hospital on the South Shore of Nassau County to provide angioplasty in
an emergency. Angioplasty is a potentially life-saving, patient-centered treatment to reopen a
partially closed coronary artery that can cause a heart-attack.
When providing emergency angioplasty, South Nassau averages a “door-to-balloon-time”
of approximately 62 minutes, which is 28 minutes faster than the national standard door-to-
balloon time benchmark of 90 minutes. (Door-to-balloon time is the time measured in minutes
from the moment the patient walks in the door to the point the artery in the heart is re-opened
with a stent. Studies show that patients having a heart attack who receive treatment in less than
90 minutes have a better chance of recovery.) Many other New York hospitals with angioplasty
programs achieve the 90-minute average 75-85% of the time, but at South Nassau, we are
achieving it 100% of the time.
South Nassau is a recipient of the American Heart Association/American Stroke
Association’s Get With The Guidelines®–Target: Stroke Honor Roll-Elite Quality Achievement

3. Award as well as the American Heart Association/American College of Cardiology Foundation
Get With The Guidelines®–Heart Failure Silver-Plus Quality Achievement Award.
Designated a Magnet® hospital by the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC),
South Nassau® Communities Hospital is one of the region’s largest hospitals, with 455 beds,
more than 900 physicians and 3,000 employees. Located in Oceanside, NY, the hospital is an
acute-care, not-for-profit teaching hospital that provides state-of-the-art care in cardiac,
oncologic, orthopedic, bariatric, pain management, mental health and emergency services. In
addition to its extensive outpatient specialty centers, South Nassau provides emergency and
elective angioplasty, and is the only hospital on Long Island with the Novalis Tx™ and Gamma
Knife® radiosurgery technologies. South Nassau is a designated Stroke Center by the New York
State Department of Health and Comprehensive Community Cancer Center by the American
College of Surgeons and is an accredited center of the Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery
Association and Quality Improvement Program. In addition, the hospital has been awarded the
Joint Commission’s gold seal of approval as a Top Performer on Key Quality Measures,
including heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia and surgical care; and disease-specific care for
hip and joint replacement, wound care and end-stage renal disease. For more information, visit
www.southnassau.org.
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