Long Island College Hospital

University Hospital of Brooklyn at Long Island College Hospital (or LICH) was a 506-bed teaching hospital located in the Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill neighborhoods of Brooklyn, New York. It ceased operations on August 30, 2014.

Founded in 1858, the Long Island College Hospital introduced the practice of bedside teaching in 1860, and it later became the first U.S. hospital to use stethoscopes and anesthesia. In 1873 it introduced the first emergency ambulance service in Brooklyn. Its collegiate division would later form the Downstate Medical Center, an academic unit of the State University of New York in 1948.

The Polhemus Memorial Clinic, an eight-story 1897 tower that was part LICH until July 2008, is considered to be the first example of skyscraper hospital, anywhere in the world.

The hospital was affiliated with the Continuum Health Partners.

On May 27, 2011, Long Island College Hospital became part of SUNY Downstate's University Hospital of Brooklyn, renamed as University Hospital of Brooklyn at Long Island College Hospital, serving as a clinical campus for medical students in the Downstate College of Medicine.

On February 8, 2013, the Trustees of the State University of New York voted to close the hospital. A re-vote by the State University of New York board of trustees was taken on March 19, 2013, who again voted to close down the hospital. On April 1, 2013, for a second time the closing of the hospital was stalled in court.

On July 19, 2013, the New York State Department of Health approved SUNY Downstate Medical Center's plan to close the hospital, which calls for all remaining patients to be transferred or discharged on or before July 28. The plan also calls for the hospital to stop admitting patients from its emergency department on July 22, and calls for the hospital's elective surgery schedule to be canceled, effective the same day. According to the plan, LICH will continue to operate its emergency department until July 29. The hospital will not close July 28 as planned. A state supreme court justice upheld a temporary restraining order preventing SUNY Downstate from shutting it down, and ordered both sides back to court on July 31 to decide its future.

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