Welcome to Valley Baptist Health System

Welcome to the award-winning and nationally recognized Valley Baptist Health System.  Serving South Texas for nearly 100-years as a faith-based regional health system, Valley Baptist Medical Center – Brownsville, Valley Baptist Medical Center – Harlingen and Valley Baptist Micro-Hospital – Weslaco, are supported by Free Standing Emergency Centers, the FIRST Comprehensive Stroke Center in the Valley, comprehensive stroke rehabilitation services, a specialized children’s unit with a dedicated pediatric emergency unit, a specialty women’s center, geriatric behavioral health clinic, breast center, heart and vascular clinic, community reference laboratories, family care clinics, fitness center, healthy women’s centers, imaging centers, inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation centers, neurology center, family practice residency clinic, a physician network, and the Valley Baptist School of Vocational Nursing.

From celebrating the birth of your newborn babies to restoring health or treating you in an emergency, we know that care is more than medicine.  Valley Baptist is focused on helping our community achieve health for life through compassionate service inspired by faith, prompted by kindness and, an experience based on excellence.

The Valley Baptist network of care features 866-beds and includes more than 500 physicians, which are supported by 3,500 clinical and non-clinical staff members.  And, it extends many of its services beyond its facilities and into local communities, offering free medical screenings, supporting groups and numerous educational opportunities.   

Valley Baptist – Built on a Community of Care and safety.  We are honored to have the opportunity to serve you.

Better Together

Over the last 100+ years, our commitment remains the same. To provide personalized care with the highest quality standards in mind. We serve the Rio Grande Valley with advanced health care that includes technological innovation, service and community engagement. Together, we are united by a common goal and a deep commitment to one another and to those we serve.

Better Together

A Community Built on Care

Caring, nurturing and helping heal friends, loved ones and neighbors is our passion, and we’re honored to have the opportunity to serve you.

Learn about what makes us different

Price Transparency

We understand that it can be confusing to estimate treatment costs before choosing care. A comprehensive list of the hospital’s shoppable services and standard charges for services are available for review.

Pre-Entrance Packet for Class of 2025

News & Announcements

Valley Baptist Health System First to Bring Minimally Invasive, Robotic Spine Surgery to Rio Grande Valley

Feb 22, 2021

With the acquisition of advanced surgical equipment, Valley Baptist Medical Center-Harlingen is the first acute care hospital to bring the benefits of minimally invasive, robotic spine surgery to patients in the Rio Grande Valley and south of Waco, Texas.

The cutting-edge equipment, which includes a surgical robot to assist in spine procedures in addition to mobile, intraoperative imaging equipment, will allow neurosurgeons with the Valley Baptist Neuroscience Institute to offer new treatment options to patients for a wide array of medical conditions, reducing the additional burdens of seeking treatment far from home.

“At Valley Baptist-Harlingen, our continued goal is to provide our patients with the most advanced and precise treatments,” said neurosurgeon Dr. Alejandro Bentancourt, who became the first physician to utilize the Brainlab computer navigation system, AIRO mobile intraoperative CT, and Cirq robotic surgical arm during the area’s first robotic spinal procedure. “With the new advanced imaging equipment, we can capture and review images of the patient’s anatomy while they are still in the operating room, allowing us to make decisions rapidly and to potentially change course if required. This helps to both save time and, when combined with our image-guided surgery system, potentially enables greater surgical accuracy.”

The imaging equipment provides intraoperative images that can assist surgeons in a wide range of clinical applications in the operating room including cranial, spinal, ear/nose/throat (ENT), head and neck, trauma, orthopedic and general surgery. Those images can provide surgeons with a wealth of information that can be critical to providing appropriate care quickly and efficiently, Bentancourt said. Additionally, features of the navigation system help surgeons plan the procedure with greater precision and accuracy than ever before, which can lead to safer and more effective procedures for patients.

“With this technology, we can rely on real-time intraoperative information,” He said. “This is a great benefit to our patients, enabling us to confirm if we have precisely achieved the objective of the procedure. While still in surgery, we can acquire diagnostic-quality post-operative images to verify results as the final step before closing up the patient, potentially decreasing the need for revision surgery down the road.”

Bentancourt said utilizing the new surgical robotic equipment could also offer a variety of benefits to patients, including less post-operative pain, smaller incisions, and less scarring than traditional open surgery.

“The robot is controlled by the surgeon during the procedure,” he said. “By having an extra software-driven hand, your doctor can focus on all the surgical steps with both human hands.”

The high-tech additions mark Valley Baptist Health System’s latest efforts to continue to provide high-quality healthcare to patients in the Rio Grande Valley, said Jennifer Bartnesky-Smith, Chief Strategy Officer for Valley Baptist Health System.

“We are extremely excited to offer this additional advanced surgical and imaging equipment within our operating room in Harlingen. Not only does this help advance the surgical technology available for use by our award winning Valley Baptist Neuroscience Institute physicians, but it also advances the level of surgical care that can now be offered to our community right here at home. This is a continuation of our sincere goal to offer the very best, most advanced care to our community, while hopefully alleviating the financial burdens of being required to travel outside the Valley for healthcare.”