Luisa Lopez
Lopez has worked at Medina
Regional Hospital for 38 years.
She started in the laundry
service department in April
1975. Back then, there were no
disposable linens for surgeries
and OB patients at the hospital,
so the staff washed and reused
the sheets, towels and patient
gowns from surgeries in a
separate washer. It wasn’t until
the 1980s that the hospital
began using a linen service.
“I have seen a lot of changes
at the hospital over the years and
still, to this day, enjoy my job,”
Lopez says. “It has been like my
second family. I had my youngest
child at the hospital after I
started working there, and now
my family has grown from five
children to 11 grandchildren and
five great-grandchildren.”
Yvonne Stein, RN
Stein began working at the
hospital as a registered nurse
in 1976. She attended college
at Southwest Texas State in
San Marcos and the Baptist
School of Nursing in San Antonio.
Upon graduation, she joined
the team at Medina Regional.
Both of her children were
delivered at Medina Regional
Hospital by ParkerMeyer,MD—and
her two grandchildren were also
delivered at Medina Regional.
“Nursing was very different
when I started,” Stein says.
“There was one RN, an LVN and
an aide for a 30-bed hospital.
There was not an ER doctor on
staff back then, so the nurse
would see the patients first and
call a local doctor as needed. The
changes in technology have made
all the difference in the world.
“I’ve never been a patient at
any other hospital. Our nursing staff is our greatest
asset, and you get the best personal care here. It is
your family, your friends and your neighbors caring
for you. There are some things that aren’t available
here, but we are constantly adding new surgeons and
services, so ask if your surgery can be performed here
before going anywhere else.”
B J
M , MD
T
he early years in my medical practice were
mostly educational. My father (Walter) and
Dr. Bob Landers were general practitioners
in the classic sense. ey did everything,
and my job was to learn. I also had my older
brother Parker to help me. Between us, we
were the only emergency room physicians,
so we were each on call 50 percent of the time. We had
to stay by a telephone because there were no beepers
and no cellphones. We delivered babies, took care of
nursing home patients, saw a lot of clinic patients, took
out appendixes and gallbladders, xed hernias, did
hysterectomies, gave general anesthetics, and so on.
ere was very little health insurance besides Medicare,
and the clinic chargewas $5 per visit. In our o ce, we had one
o ce person, who checked people in and out and handled
insurance, and we each had one assistant, whomwe trained
ourselves. I knew just about everybody in the hospital, as the
sta was quite small. ere was one person who did all the
lab tests and one person to do x-rays. Nurses wore white
uniforms and nurses’ caps, and they also did everything.
e hospital was always struggling nancially at that
time, so we had to be very frugal with the money spent.
e hospital Board, made up of community citizens—as
it is now—watched every dollar.
e medical sta was quite small at that time. I was
the h doctor. By 1977, we had lost several, so for a time,
my brother Parker and I were the only physicians on the
sta . We recruited several doctors over the early years
that came and went, the notable exception being Dr. Miles
Hutson, who has been on the sta almost as long as I have.
Over the years, I have seen a lot of changes in the
Employee spotlight
O
ur people are the sources of our strength” was
added to Medina Regional Hospital’s mission
statement in 2004, but it has been evident
throughout the 50 years of the hospital’s history. Two
employees, Luisa Lopez and Yvonne Stein, RN, joined the
staff of Medina County’s only hospital in the mid-1970s
and continue to share their skills and talents today.
A FAMILY THAT CARES:
John Meyer, MD, joined the medical sta of Medina Healthcare
System in 1975. irty-nine years later, he continues to provide medical care to area patients,
with the added bene t of working side by side with his daughter, Emily Meyer, MD, in their
family practice clinic in Hondo. Together they continue a legacy of caring that began in 1906,
when John Meyer’s grandfather, Henry Meyer, MD, moved to Hondo to open his general practice.
hospital and in the community. e hospital continued
to grow, o ering more and better services, both in trained
personnel and in technical abilities.We established a 24-hour
emergency department, a great service to the community;
we attracted a number of specialists from San Antonio to
come and provide their expertise locally; and we continued
to expand both the medical sta and the personnel working
at the hospital, becoming a leading employer in the county.
Hondo has grown a lot in the last 50 years. I never
considered moving my medical practice to another
community, because both my dad and my grandfather
spent their entire professional lives here, and I have always
felt that Hondo and Hondo people are special.
We now have a fourth-generation Dr. Meyer here: Dr.
Emily Meyer. She announced to us when she was about
that she was going to be doctor when she grew up, and
she never considered doing anything else as she grew. I
am very proud of her, but I don’t want anybody to think
that I am ready to pass the reins to her, because I still have
plenty of good years le and I love what I do. I intend
to still be on the medical sta when my twin grandsons
nish their medical training and return to Hondo.
F
The doctors Meyer
Emily Meyer, MD, joined the staff at Medina Healthcare System in 2007. She is pictured with (from left) her
uncles, OB-GYN James Meyer, MD, and family practice physician Parker Meyer, MD, and her father, family practice
physician John Meyer, MD.
A LEGACY OF COMMUNITY CARE IN MEDINA COUNTY
Top:
Luisa Lopez has
worked at Medina
Regional Hospital
since 1975.
Bottom:
Lopez says
the hospital has
been like a second
family.
Top:
Yvonne
Stein, RN, as a
nursing student.
Bottom:
Stein has
spent 37 years with
Medina Regional
Hospital.
NOW
NOW
THEN
THEN
From left: John Meyer, MD; James Meyer, MD; their
father, Walter Meyer, MD; and Parker Meyer, MD, at
James’s graduation.
“
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M E D I N A
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