N.Y. Hospital System Building Surgical Center for Women

Northwell Health broke ground on a $10M surgical center on Long Island, N.Y., that will exclusively serve female patients throughout their surgical journeys. The Katz Women’s Surgical Center at Glen Cove Hospital is a 25,000-square-foot project that is expected to open late in 2024. The center is being developed in partnership with Northwell’s Katz Institute for Women’s Health (KIWH).

Northwell Health officials say patients will be escorted to each point of their care by specialized nurse navigators and surgeons will perform the latest minimally invasive and robotic surgeries at the new facility. Comprehensive services for breast cancer, as well as reconstructive and cosmetic breast surgeries that will include preventative mastectomies, will be available. Other offerings will include advanced robotic-assisted mastectomy and breast reconstruction surgery, including a flap procedure that uses the patient’s own tissue, as well as implant-based reconstructions. Surgeries for gynecological, urological and thyroid and parathyroid gland disease, as well as procedures for skin cancer, will be performed at the center as well.

“This women’s surgical center is the first of its kind for Northwell Health and the region, and we are designing a model of care that could serve as a national destination,” says Neil Tanna, MD, the center’s vice president. “The program is multidisciplinary yet integrated with a team of experts who provide the highest quality, patient-centered, female-focused surgical care.”

Glen Cove Hospital Executive Director Kerri Anne Scanlon says the facility will be one of the very few separate centers of excellence for women’s surgery. “The Katz Women’s Surgical Center will be a fully integrated destination, providing excellent surgical and medical care, coupled with superb service under one roof,” she says.

The center is funded in part by longtime Glen Cove residents Iris and Saul Katz, who founded KWIH with Northwell to address health disparities faced by women. “Women’s bodies are different,” says Ms. Katz. “We were understudied, undertreated and misdiagnosed. Women must be taken care of differently. They deserve more.”