Liholiho and Queen Emma went door to door seeking donations to build what became the Queen's Medical Center. - Courtesy Queen's Medical Center.

- Hawaiian heart center

By Liza Simon / Ka Wai Ola Loa

Queen's Hospital opened in 1859 with 18 beds and one doctor in a temporary structure on Fort Street Mall in Honolulu. This was the modest beginning of the Queen's Medical Center—Hawai'i's largest private hospital, also the flagship institution for healthcare in the Pacific Basin.

To mark its 150th anniversary, Queen's has invited broadcast personality Emme Tomimbang to explore the hospital's storied past in her "Island Moments" television series. "The role of the Hawaiian ali'i jumped out at me from the very beginning," said Tomimbang, referring to Queen Emma and King Kamehameha IV, the hospital founders. "They were determined to help the Hawaiian people who suffered terribly from the new diseases introduced by westerners," said Tomimbang.

The opening segment of the telecast, entitled "The Queen's Medical Center: 150 Years of Moments", depicts the smallpox epidemic that claimed the lives of tens of thousands of Kanaka Maoli between 1853 and 1854, spurring the ali'i interest in constructing a hospital. Evidence from archival writings issued in the show suggest that Native Hawaiians generally distrusted the medicine of the westerners who introduced smallpox and other deadly epidemics to their 'āina. Many Kanaka Maoli preferred their own traditions of healing instead of western doctors. Meanwhile, the western doctors often limited their practices to non-native patients.

Emme Tomimbang

"Queen Emma saw the separation between native and non-native medicine as wrong. She wanted equity. You could say she was before her time with her passion for getting the job done," said Tomimbang, adding that she herself became quickly captivated by 1850's headlines in the Pacific Commercial Advertiser, describing how the queen convinced her royal partner Alexander Liholiho to go out with her on a door-to-door campaign to raise money for a hospital. "We've included in the program a look at the original roster of the donors; it shows plenty of Hawaiian names and proves just how special Queen Emma was for putting aside comforts of royal life to do this labor of love," Tomimbang said.

The Island Moments show also highlights historians' take on Queen Emma as being unique among ali'i in her support of western medicine, owing to the fact that her hānai father was an English physician. It also documents that she was also no stranger to western diseases, which claimed her four-year-old son and later her husband. We see how the widowed Queen continued to search for a permanent home for Hale Ma'i O Ka Wahine Ali'i – sick house of the lady chief – as the temporary Fort Street site was first christened. Eventually, Queen Emma settled on nine acres of crown land known commonly as Punchbowl, a name that refers back to the presence an extinct volcano. Since the land was dry and uninviting, the Queen encouraged the hospital's first physician – also a botanist – to plant shade-giving trees.

Like a living symbol of the hospital's extraordinary growth over the years, the trees are prominently featured in the Island Moment's telecast. They are flourishing today, 150 years after taking root, just like Queen's Medical Center, a hospital that thrives today and is the winner of many national awards for excellence in care. But, like any hospital in these turbulent economic times, Queen's is hardly immune from rising costs of treatment, shortages of doctors and nurses and a host of other challenges that are part of a sweeping national healthcare crisis. As the Island Moments special points out, however, modern day Queen's Medical Center is also the beneficiary of the Queen Emma land trust, one of the largest of its kind and a source of supportive income for hospital care –another aspect of the legacy bequeathed by the institution's namesake ali'i.

But does medicine still mix with aloha, given that Queen's now serves a diverse population with an array of high-tech treatment? Tomimbang's producers tackle this question by bringing cameras inside the medical center for a montage of vignettes and interviews. Native Hawaiian medical students Jordan Lee and Keala Richardson share their excitement about the prospect of truly giving back to the Kanaka Maoli community. Former Hawaiian popular music entertainer Jesse Gamiao talks about his experience of a massive heart attack and his subsequent care at Queen's, where he now pursues a second career as a "kōkua greeter." Genetics experts in Queen's cutting-edge department for medical research describe their promising efforts to discover new treatment for diabetes and certain cancers that disproportionately affect Native Hawaiians. Tomimbang said she hopes that the resulting portrait is one of a hospital that serves everyone, but retains something uniquely tied to a rarified royal heritage.

"Queen's Medical Center has many milestones to celebrate, so it was hard to choose just a few, but it seems we found so many people who carry on the sense of sacrifice exemplified by the ali'i founders," said Tomimbang.