Technology Timeline

1971
Cox Medical Center becomes one of the first hospitals nationwide with a mobile coronary care unit, a specially equipped ambulance for people in coronary distress.

1974
The hospital begins using computers.

1975
Cox Medical Center develops a regional kidney dialysis center, an intensive care nursery and a regional radiation therapy center.

Mid 1970s
The Baby Buggy is created to transport sick infants within a 150-mile radius.

1986
Cox Medical Centers becomes the first and only Children’s Miracle Network hospital in southwest Missouri, joining forces with local television station KY3 to televise the first Children’s Miracle Network telethon live from Cox Medical Center South.

1989

Cox Medical Centers’ first air ambulance – Cox Air Care – lifts off.

Late 1980s
Cox Medical Centers works with St. John’s Health System to bring magnetic resonance imaging to the Ozarks.

June 1997
CoxHealth Systems launches its first website, Cox Housecall, at coxnet.org.

October 2006 
CoxHealth becomes the first provider in the region to offer breast MRI.

September 2007
CoxHealth’s Information Technology department receives the 2007 GE Innovator Award – one of four nationwide – for development of the online Patient Express service portal.

December 2007 
CoxHealth is the first hospital nationwide to implement new cutting-edge ventilator technology known as NAVA.

July 2008
CoxHealth is named the 2008 Most Wired Innovator by Hospitals and Health Networks magazine for the creation of the bed board, an at-a-glance complete bed occupancy information system.

August 2008 
CoxHealth wins approval from the Health Facilities Review Committee to install a da Vinci-S Robotic Surgical System. CoxHealth physicians perform southwest Missouri’s first robotic surgery procedure the following month.

February 2009 
Cox Air Care becomes one of the first flight crews in Missouri to use night vision goggles.

March 2010
CoxHealth launches eVisits, the area’s first electronic physician visit option.

October 2011
The CoxHealth Breast Care Clinic also installs the area’s first Aurora 1.5T dedicated breast MRI system.

October 2012
CoxHealth and Cerner form a strategic alignment, Si3 – The Star Initiative for Information Innovation.

April 2013
CoxHealth opens Springfield’s first true hybrid operating room – a specially constructed OR with traditional operating room capabilities, plus advanced imaging equipment found in a cardiac catheterization lab.

July 2013
CoxHealth is recognized as a Most Wired: Most Improved health system in the 2013 Most Wired Survey, released by Hospitals & Health Networks magazine.

July 2014
CoxHealth is recognized as a Most Wired hospital by Hospitals & Health Networks.

April 2016
BabyBeginning, a Smartphone app, launches through a grant from Verizon.

CoxHealth implements germ-zapping robots at Cox Medical Center South.

Infertility services become available via telemedicine, thanks to a partnership between CoxHealth and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

July 2016
CoxHealth is recognized as a Most Wired Hospital by Hospitals & Health Networks.

September 2016
CoxHealth becomes the first health system in southwest Missouri to offer Genius 3-D Mammography technology.

February 2018
CoxHealth announces they will offer health care services at 22 local schools through telemedicine services. This is made possible due to a USDA Distance Learning and Telemedicine matching grant.

March 2018
CoxHealth implements a new technology to help patients spend less time in a waiting room. Called Save My Spot, this technology allows patients to go online before visiting an urgent care or walk-in clinic to select a time they’d like to be seen.