Expansion, New Leadership for GBMC Surgery

When Joel Turner, MD, FACS, became Chair of the Department of Surgery at GBMC HealthCare in 2021, he joined a long tradition of leaders focused on improving the experience of surgical patients and increasing GBMC’s capacity for minimally invasive surgical procedures.

Dr. Turner’s tenure as Chair began at an especially trying time for GBMC and the department, as both began to emerge from the pandemic shutdown. For Dr. Turner and GBMC surgery, the pause became a chance to regroup. In the intervening years, he hired new surgeons to the team and is now preparing for another improvement: the addition of a second surgical robot.

As the uses for robot-assisted surgeries have grown, more GBMC surgeons are performing procedures with the hospital’s one surgical robot. Demand is high enough to warrant a second system. Working with GBMC Philanthropy and Marketing, Dr. Turner has launched a campaign to raise the necessary funds.

Dr. Turner is a part of the legacy of excellence in surgical care at GBMC. He was born and raised in Baltimore and is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of Rochester, with a BS in Microbiology. He was also elected to the Phi Beta Kappa honor society. When he arrived at GBMC in 1999, Dr. Turner had completed General Surgical training and a Surgical Endoscopy and Laparoscopy fellowship at the University of Maryland Medical Center. Like many GBMC surgeons, this has been his professional home from the start of his career. He is a member of General Surgery with Finney Trimble at GBMC and has served as the Vice Chair of the Department of Surgery and director of the Surgical Value Analysis Committee for the last several years.

The campaign to bring GBMC into this new era for surgery offers an opportunity to honor those founding surgeons who paved the way for experts like Dr. Turner.

The first of those founders is Dr. Geary Stonesifer, who became the first Chief of Surgery soon after GBMC opened in 1965. A gifted and brilliant surgeon, he began a tradition of embracing technological and surgical advances, delivering personalized patient care, and leading with a focus on guiding and teaching the next generation of surgeons. In doing so, he launched GBMC’s reputation for highly skilled, compassionate surgeons, which the hospital continues to enjoy.

Dr. Stonesifer and his earliest colleagues, including Dr. James H. Dorsey, will be honored with an installation of portraits and biographies in the reception area of GBMC’s General Operating Rooms. The illustration of GBMC’s history of excellent, patient-centered surgical care will, no doubt, be a comfort to family and friends as they wait for patients just outside the operating rooms. The portraits and bios will show this legacy as they inspire confidence in the doctors of today and tomorrow.

This celebration of surgery at GBMC is the capstone to a campaign to enhance our capacity for care with the purchase of a second surgical robot. The GBMC Philanthropy team is dedicated to securing $2.7 million in donations for a purchase that will meet a present demand for leading-edge technology in surgical care.

For more information about the campaign to acquire a second surgical robot at GBMC, please contact Director of Major Gifts Maureen McNeill, CFRE, at (443) 849-4328 or mmcneill@gbmc.org.