By Jennifer Pignolet and Steve Grazier

MEDINA — From a SpongeBob SquarePants appearance and magic shows to health screen­ings and bone marrow donor registries, Medina Hospital celebrated its first year as a Cleveland Clinic hospital this weekend with a free commu­nity day Sunday.

The family-friendly event also featured meet­-and- greets with members of the EMS teams — the hospital’s EMS providers — and tours of ambulances and the life-support helicopter.

Earl Grimm, of the Medina Hospital Life Support Team, talks with siblings Lauren and Noah Cusick, ages 3 and 5, of Medina, from the inside of an ambulance at Medina Hospital’s one-year celebration on Sunday. (GAZETTE PHOTO BY JENNIFER PIGNOLET)

Robin Louis, director of marketing for Medina Hospital, said the event was an opportunity for community interaction.

“Everybody has a good time doing it,” Louis said. “You don’t always have to come to the hos­pital when you’re sick.”

Earlier in the day, the hospital also sponsored and hosted the Race for Grace 5k Run and Fun Walk, an annual fundraiser for the Mary Grace Memorial Foundation, which helps local people affected by cancer pay for utility bills and other basic necessities.

Medina Hospital President Robert Stall said the hospital’s one-year partnership with the Cleveland Clinic has been a success for the region. The merger was an approximately three-year process, he said.

The hospital opened in 1944 as an independent facility.

“From the Medina Hospital perspective, this partnership brings the best of the Cleve­land Clinic to the Medina com­munity,” said Stall.

Stall cited some of medical services improved at Medina due to the collaboration. They include orthopedics, hospice, more day and night physicians, neurology and pain manage­ment.

“We’ve taken what we had and made it better,” he said. “We’ve now got folks coming in from out of state to use our orthopedics service. We’re going from good to great.”

Stall noted that a new elec­tronic medical service will be available to Medina Hospital patients by Nov. 15. The service will allow patients to contact Medina Hospital physicians through an Internet database, in addition to the more than 2,700 doctors in the Cleveland Clinic system ,to find a medical specialist that fits their individ­ual needs, he said.

“We’re extremely excited about the partnership and the future,” Stall said.

Contact Jennifer Pignolet at (330) 721-4063 or jpignolet@medina-gazette.com. Contact Steve Grazier at (330) 721-4012 or sgrazier@medina-gazette.com.