The Center for Rural Emergency Services and Trauma (CREST) was founded at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center in 2007 to improve emergency services and trauma care in rural communities. CREST is located at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire, within the Emergency Department and the Trauma Center, a Level I, university-affiliated trauma center. Approximately 30,000 patients are treated annually in the Emergency Department, with 800 trauma activations annually.
Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center is also home to the Dartmouth Hitchcock Advanced Response Team (DHART), which provides ground and air transportation to the critically ill and injured in northern New England.
Goals
CREST is committed to improving rural health care delivery, strengthening collaboration among network hospitals, sharing best practices, providing a reliable resource for network hospitals, and increasing knowledge and skills around emergency care. We work collaboratively to enhance access to specialty care.
Network
The CREST network includes 19 critical access hospitals and community hospitals in rural New Hampshire and Vermont. These include:
- Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital
- Brattleboro Memorial Hospital
- Concord Hospital (Laconia)
- Cottage Hospital
- Cheshire Medical Center
- Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center
- Gifford Medical Center
- Grace Cottage Hospital
- Mt. Ascutney Hospital
- Monadnock Community Hospital
- New London Hospital
- North Country Hospital
- Northeastern Vermont Regional Hospital
- Southwestern Vermont Medical Center
- Speare Memorial Hospital
- Springfield Hospital
- Valley Regional Hospital
- Upper Connecticut Valley Hospital (UCVH)
Please email us for more information on becoming a CREST member.