Newswise — The Texas Department of State Health Services has reverified the Level I trauma center designation for the Ginni and Richard Mithoff Trauma Center at Ben Taub General Hospital, and the Level III trauma center designation for the emergency center at Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital.

The state’s approval follows an extensive survey by the American College of Surgeons. The review involved poring through years of patient charts, conducting interviews with key staff, inspecting facilities and equipment in the hospital’s emergency, radiology, operating room, post-anesthesiology care units, intensive care units and rehabilitation departments.

The designations assure the community that the trauma centers at Ben Taub and LBJ hospitals, facilities operated by the Harris County Hospital District, meet or exceed the strictest guidelines for patient care and trauma expertise set by the nationally recognized college. Reviews of all trauma programs across the country are done every three years.

With 104,000 patient visits annually, Ben Taub General Hospital has one of the busiest emergency centers in Texas. The history of trauma care expertise at the hospital emerged in the 1940s through the pioneer work by renowned surgeon Dr. Michael E. DeBakey at Jefferson Davis Hospital. Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital serves 84,000 patient visits a year in its emergency center and in 2011 expanded its center to 43,000-square-feet, nearly doubling its original size. The hospital was the first Level III trauma center designated in Texas, and is today one of the busiest Level III centers.

Both hospitals are part of an extensive trauma response system in place in Harris County and southeast Texas. Ben Taub General Hospital has been a state-designated Level I trauma center since 1994, while Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital has been a Level III trauma center since 1996.