Breast Health Center unveiled at Southampton Hospital

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Suzie Roden, patient navigator, in the new Ellen P. Hermanson Breast Center at Southampton Hospital.
Photos by Dana Shaw

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Southampton Hospital on Wednesday unveiled the Ellen P. Hermanson Breast Health Center, a state-of-the-art facility for the diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer that also offers counseling services.

Hospital officials agreed this week that the new Breast Health Center would never have become a reality without the support of the Ellen P. Hermanson Foundation, which is based in Manhattan but raises funds to benefit East End women’s health. The foundation donated $500,000 to the center and a total of nearly $1 million to Southampton Hospital since its formation in 1997 to honor the memory and to carry on the mission of breast cancer awareness advocate Ellen Hermanson, a Brooklyn resident and frequent East Hampton visitor who died two years earlier.

Julie Ratner said when she first walked through the corridors of the hospital to the Breast Health Center and saw her sister Ellen’s name on the wall, it stopped her in her tracks.

“I really had to sit down, because it took my breath away and just made me cry,” Ms. Ratner said. “It shouldn’t be there. She should be here, and yet because she’s not here, an incredible amount of good has happened in the world.”

Ms. Hermanson, a longtime supporter of the hospital’s breast health program, was diagnosed with breast cancer in February 1989 and became an advocate and activist. As a journalist, she educated her readers on the challenges of living with breast cancer and the available resources women can seek out. She was also an active member of the National Coalition for Cancer Survivors and the first executive director of the Judges and Lawyers Breast Cancer Alert. She was 42 when she died in April 1995.

Ms. Ratner, who lives in East Hampton and Manhattan, and frequently shared her East End home with her sister, said that her life and so many others have been enriched by her sister, and now by the memory of her sister.

The center was designed to consolidate all of the hospital’s breast health and oncology services in an environment that aims to keep women comfortable as they undergo both diagnosis and treatment.

“When you enter this place, it feels different from the rest of the hospital,” Breast Health Center Medical Director Dr. Edna Kapenhas-Valdes said Monday. “You really don’t feel like you’re in the hospital.” Everything about the Breast Health Center, down to the choice of paint colors, furniture and lighting, was designed with patient comfort in mind, she said, adding, “It’s a beautiful place.”

And eventually, the center will also have a private entrance, so visitors do not need to travel through other parts of the hospital to reach it.

Dr. Kapenhas-Valdes said that while the Breast Health Center’s services were available before, they were spread out. For example, her office was on Hampton Road rather than in the hospital on Meeting House Lane.

“Now, everything is basically in the same place, as far as imaging, pathology, genetic counseling, all of the support services,” she said. “It’s basically one-stop shopping, so the diagnosis can be quicker.”

If an initial evaluation reveals an abnormality, a mammography, sonography and biopsy can all be completed the same day, Dr. Kapenhas-Valdes said. Previously, it would take a day or two between the biopsy and getting results back to the patient; now, it can be done in 15 to 20 minutes.

Dr. Kapenhas-Valdes operates two days a week in Southampton, typically performing surgery on five to seven patients weekly, and she also has privileges to operate at Peconic Bay Medical Center in Riverhead and Eastern Long Island Hospital in Greenport.

She earned her medical degree at the State University of New York at Buffalo and completed a five-year residency in general surgery at New York Hospital Medical Center of Queens. She spent an additional year in residency at Beth Israel Medical Center and St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center, both in New York City, specializing in breast oncology. She trained for a year as a breast surgery fellow at Beth Israel following her residencies and went on to serve as an attending surgeon for three years starting in 2004.

When Dr. Kapenhas-Valdes came to Southampton Hospital two years ago, she became the first breast surgeon to serve the East End. Before, women had to travel to New York City or western Long Island for surgery, she said, adding, “The community really needed a breast surgeon.”

The center also features a bone densitometry machine for osteoporosis patients. Southampton Hospital’s director of marketing and public affairs, Marsha Kenny, said that while the densitometry machine is not related to breast health, it is important for women’s health, and it made sense to have it at the new center.