History

Dignity Health Dominican Hospital has been caring for the Santa Cruz County community for 75 years and continues to reflect the core values of the founding Adrian Dominican Sisters and Dignity Health: excellence, justice, dignity, collaboration and stewardship.

Decades Of Services

In September 1941, responding to a request by the Monterey Bay area diocese of the Catholic Church, the Adrian Dominican Sisters of Adrian, Michigan, took over 18-bed Hanley Hospital on Santa Cruz's West Cliff Drive. It soon became known as, and was thereafter formally named, Sisters Hospital.

Ten years later, the Sisters purchased Santa Cruz Hospital on Soquel Avenue near downtown from a physician group, and operated two hospitals to meet the needs of the growing community.

To provide room for future growth, a 17-acre site was purchased on the outskirts of the city. The new Dominican Santa Cruz Hospital was formally dedicated in December 1967, and all services consolidated there.

In 1990, Dominican purchased AMI Community Hospital in Santa Cruz, which was transformed into Dominican Rehabilitation Services. The two campuses provide a total of 379 acute care beds.

Dominican Hospital, as we are now formally known, has been a member of Dignity Health since 1988.

In the early days, the Adrian Dominican Sisters were easy to spot in the traditional habit and gown.

Today, Adrian Dominican Sisters still hold pivotal positions throughout the Dominican organization, but they now wear modern business apparel and are virtually indistinguishable from the lay employees.

Lapel pins, with the Adrian Dominican logo of a wedge of light piercing the darkness, are still worn by the women religious.

Videos

In these brief videos, our Adrian Dominican Sisters reflect on the values that we strive to live out here at Dignity Health Dominican Hospital.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuoxvsAgi-byf6ybF07JbgMvUbYk-GnzI