District capital since 1926, the city of Setúbal had its first Regional Hospital twenty years later, when it was awarded this title to the then Hospital da Misericórdia, located in an annex of the Setúbal Convent.

Some years later, from the Hospital of Espírito Santo of Santa Casa da Misericórdia, the Hospital of São Bernardo was born, facing the future and the health of the Users. It was in order to face difficulties in responding to the population that, in 1953, it was decided to build a new Hospital in Setúbal, in the old place of the Vine, in the eastern part of the city.

It was in 1953 that news emerged of the creation of the first Continent Regional Hospital, in Setúbal, with the existing services at Hospital do Espírito Santo being transferred to the new hospital: medical and surgical assistance, emergency aid and specialty clinics. . Misericórdia is in charge of its management, and the State is responsible for providing resources. This project, which started on the ground in 1955, is due to Antoine Velge, President of Sapec, since, for the start of the construction, he contributes 4,000 contos, and in honor of his eldest son, Bernard, who if he had cured in Portugal, he is called São Bernardo. With state honors, its inauguration takes place on May 9, 1959, four years after construction began.

At that time, Dr. Sousa Fialho was Clinical Director who writes that during that year the existing services were transferred to São Bernardo and new ones were opened, in order to respond to the “regional design”.

To open the new hospital, essentially, 18 doctors came from Santa Casa da Misericórdia, and for the provision of nursing care, religious personnel and servants. With about 250 beds, it has two wards for medicine, two for surgery, one for obstetrics and one for pediatrics. 13 Beds were intended for private rooms and, in an attached pavilion, 20 were reserved for infectious-contagious persons, subsequently assigned to Ophthalmology, Otolaryngology, Stomatology, Dermatology, Urology and Orthopedics.

At the time, the Hospital do Outão was a Sanatorium although there were already doctors specialized in Orthopedics, as the Clinical Director of São Bernardo tells us in 1962.

Pioneering has borne good fruit

Many of these early doctors had started out as volunteers. Some of them were hired and later worked at Hospital de São Bernardo, until practically, to the present day, going through almost 50 years of this history. Three are at the origin of the São Bernardo Emergency Service: Dr. Mário Moura, Dr. Rui de Moura, and Dr. Serra Pinto, according to the latter’s report. In the records of 1962, there is talk of „abuse“: already at that time many patients came to the emergency room, although they did not need this type of care.

In October 1971, a ceremony was held to place a bust of the meritorious Antoine Velge at the main entrance and, until 1974, the management was carried out by Administrative Tables with Providers designated by Misericórdia.

With the 25th of April, Management Commissions are set up to direct the Hospital and General Meetings of workers with deliberative functions. On 28 May, the creation of the first Hospital Management Committee – which replaces the Administrative Bureau – and the first Directive Committee – is announced, instead of the previous Clinical Directorate.

At the end of the month, the Draft Regulation for the new organic structure of the Hospital is launched for discussion. Then, in December, a dispatch in the Government Gazette appointing a Management Committee for the Hospital, and in March 1975, the 1st Installation Commission.

The first Pathological Anatomy at the district level

It was in 1974 that the Hospital received elements to perform the so-called Civic service and a group of doctors from the former colonies, such as Professor Gil da Costa, Director of the Faculty of Medicine of Luanda, who came to open a laboratory of pathological anatomy within the hospital. Thus, this was the first district hospital in the country to have a pathological anatomy laboratory.

Another doctor also linked to teaching was Professor Fonseca Ferreira, who had been a professor at the University of Lourenço Marques. These and other professionals joined the existing teams, reinforcing and developing specialties, techniques, and, not least, Teaching, giving a huge boost to medicine. Immediately afterwards, medical internships are created.

In mid-1976, an Installing Committee was created for the São Bernardo hospital and Sant’Iago do Outão hospital, with a view to creating a Hospital Center (in Setúbal) on the initiative of a group of doctors. During that same year, two governing structures coexist: the official (Installing Commission) and the one arising from 25 April (Management Commission).

With the establishment in 1977 of the “Regulation of Hospital Management and Management Bodies” and, in 1981, of the attribution of “technical, financial and administrative autonomy to Outão” the project falls apart. In the former auxiliary staff dormitory, the cafeteria is installed. The construction of a kindergarten / day care center with a capacity for 150 children dates from 1979, which shows the high number of professionals who worked here.

In 1984 the Hospital celebrates its 25th anniversary. With the high population growth in the municipality, the Hospital now has 315 beds and a wide range of services on six floors. So vast, that the then Management Board appoints six Floor Directors. There are already Nursing Services and management areas such as Administrative Services, Facilities and Equipment, General, Support for Personnel and Cultural.

The importance of the Hospital is so decisive, on the national scene that in the same year the work of A. Rodrigues Marques (hospital administrator) and Manuel Marques (chaplain of the Hospital de São Bernardo) is launched that, under the title “Subsidies for the History of Hospital de Setúbal ”.

The evolution continues

Created by Portuguese artist José Escada, the Hospital now has a Chapel and Religious Service in the 1980s. The External Consultation works in a prefabricated pavilion, with 20 offices. The Emergency Department has 3 counters (Men, Women and Pediatrics), a Cast Room, 2 Observation Rooms (OR), 2 Small Surgery Rooms, 1 Cardio – Respiratory Resuscitation Room and an intensive observation room. This is also where the Blood Service is installed, alongside the Pharmacy, which had already started, in Medicine, the distribution “Uni-dose”.

The Operating Room continues with two rooms for major surgery and one for a small one and its conversion is being studied. Attached is the Sterilization Center. The Clinical Analysis Laboratory was expanded in 1982. In this phase, Radiology has 2 offices.

It is at this time that the Gastroenterology Service (1976) and the Coronary Intensive Care Service (1977) are created. In 1985, Hemodialysis and the Intensive Care Unit were inaugurated, a work that once again counted on a donation of six thousand short stories from the Velge family.

A forward-looking organization

Despite the various works carried out over the years, the first stone of expansion of the Hospital was only laid on October 19, 1993, and the work was completed in 1997. In 1998, celebrating its 39th anniversary, the remodeling of building of the Hospital, essentially in view of the infectious-contagious area and acute psychiatric hospitalization.

1999 will also be the year of the registration of the funds necessary for the implementation of a maternal and child service, of the opening of external consultations in the future acute psychiatric service and of the remodeling of all floors of the old hospital.

Within the scope of the business process of some hospitals of the National Health Service, the Hospital de São Bernardo is transformed into a Limited Company, on December 11, 2002, and the Centro Hospitalar de Setúbal was created on December 31, 2005, integrating, by merger, Hospital de São Bernardo and Hospital Ortopédico Sant’Iago do Outão.

The Hospital’s services are installed in two architectural structures – initial structure and new building -, as well as a space located outside, the UDEP destined to the internment of Psychiatry (Chronicles).

It is now a Public Business Entity – an EPE, integrated in the National Health Service.