Naming ceremony will be at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 5

Western Baptist Hospital invites the community to a celebration at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 5, to mark its name change to Baptist Health Paducah.

The ceremony will begin in the atrium of Doctors Office Building 2 before moving outside for the first lighting of its new beacon sign and a balloon release featuring the Paducah Tilghman High School drum corps.
“We are excited to announce that all seven hospitals in our Baptist family across Kentucky are adopting the same name to signify our unity and better align our medical expertise, services and resources to promote good health,” said Larry Barton, president and CEO of Baptist Health Paducah.

The new name was chosen to reflect the strength of the statewide system and reinforce its mission of enhancing the health of the community.

It comes as the Paducah hospital prepares to celebrate its 60th anniversary this year. It has been part of the same Baptist system since it opened in 1953.

The system, formerly Baptist Healthcare System Inc., announced its name change last September, noting that all of its hospitals, clinics and physician groups would re-brand over the next several months.

“It is exciting to have a new name and a new logo that better describe our services in the modern healthcare era,” Barton said.

However, he noted the hospital’s Christian mission to enhance health and commitment to provide quality care are unchanged. “Our new brand just magnifies our long-held promise to treat you like you are a member of our family,” he said.

Baptist Health Paducah has long been a leader in regional healthcare, opening the first heart center in Kentucky west of Louisville in 2007, extending outpatient imaging to four locations and expanding surgical services to include the region’s largest hybrid operating room and only dual da Vinci robotics. More babies are born there than at all other western Kentucky hospitals combined.

“As a part of Baptist Health, we believe we are positioned to grow to meet the needs of our communities,” Barton said, “so you can get the same expert care here you’d expect in Nashville or Louisville.”

The system was founded in 1924. It owns hospitals in Corbin, La Grange, Lexington, Louisville, Madisonville, Paducah and Richmond and manages hospitals in Elizabethtown and Russell Springs.

Tommy J. Smith, system president and CEO, said the new brand promotes the system’s cohesiveness while keeping healthcare “local” at each facility. “We have for many years been much more than a system of hospitals, and the new name reflects the broad scope of services that Baptist provides throughout the state,” he said.

The new brand is effective immediately, but changes on other signs and in print will be phased in over the next few years. It features a new vibrant logo, featuring leaves to symbolize Baptist Health’s growth; a cross, revealed in the space between the leaves, representing the constancy of Baptist’s spiritual roots; and a starburst to show vitality and hope.