Olmsted Medical Group history

The major new partner was Olmsted Medical Group (now known as Olmsted Medical Center), which was established in 1949 as a primary care, multispecialty clinic.25 The result was linkage of medical data from almost all the sources of medical care used by the local population.

By 1953, with the endorsement of Mayo Clinic, the county secured state funding and soon began construction on Olmsted Community Hospital.

With his practice growing, and the need for a new hospital emerging, the parallels became apparent — so much so that once the hospital opened in 1955, his group began laying the groundwork to eventually begin staffing the facility.

Olmsted Medical Group's clinic at Miracle Mile in 1956 / Courtesy OMC

In 1959, Medical Economics published a story, "Family Practice in the Shadow of the Mayo Clinic," about the success of the small but thriving Olmsted Medical Group, as OMC was then known.

The key protagonists before 1966 were Henry Plummer, Mabel Root, and Joseph Berkson, who developed a medical records linkage system at Mayo Clinic.

With an innovative financing plan by Olmsted County, it expanded and was renovated in 1986.

Even after his retirement in 1987, Doctor Wente continued to make an impact.

The REP has been used in studies spanning almost every medical specialty and has yielded more than 2000 publications to date.

Starting in 2002, Jacobsen also introduced a more formal and permanent linkage of medical records to single individuals.

Improving access to health care data: the Open Government strategy.[JAMA. 2010] Conway PH, VanLare JM JAMA. 2010 Sep 1; 304(9):1007-8.

Prior to that position, she won Minnesota High School Principal of the Year in 2011 while at Park High School in Cottage Grove.

To provide some idea of the cost of maintaining the current infrastructure, the REP budget for 2012 was approximately $770,000 from the National Institute on Aging (total direct costs) and $600,000 from Mayo Clinic, for an annual total budget of $1,370,000.