It doesn't bother me, but it is very corporate sounding.

St. Mary's-Duluth Clinic was pretty unwieldy too, though.

It is what I call a corporate non-name. Like  the paper mill on the west side of town that I believe is called Conesco or Enesco. It has no meaning and it seems the intention is to not let you know what they do. I've seen some signs with the Essentia name and I thought it was like Unicare, (another non-word that evidently stands for United Health) a medical claims processing center. I would never have guessed Essentia is SMDC. I think they just forgot the "l" in "essential" and by the time they realized it they had already printed the logos and  they decided it was cheaper to just run with Essentia.

The new name does sound very cold, corporate, and uncaring.  And I have a sneaking suspicion that it is!

PS - It sounds like a name from the folks at Dunder-Mufflin!

Dunder-Mifflin, Inc.

Darn lucky to not be able to afford health insurance? Or darn lucky to not qualify for MN Care?

Oh, and I heard the flap about the new Gap logo but hadn't seen it. That is absolutely gawd-awful!!! Are they a mid-90s tech start-up? Bleh!

But who names the company Essentia in the first place?  Dunder-Mifflin!

My mother got a new hip there. They were short on staff and hard on the nurses that had to work very hard to due to the cuts. No wonder they go on strike. It's corporate all the way. The new name stinks. Everybody will still refer to it as St. Mary's.

Lousy name. I'm sure the marketing powers-that-be decided it would generate cost savings to brand all locations the same. They ignored the research which has shown (posts here seem to prove it) that people dislike made-up words as corporate names. 

It sounds cold, and the present crappy newspaper ads look downright icy. Pity.

We could go Prince's route, as in "The Hospital Formerly Known as St. Mary's."

Even more off-topic: Sappi (the new name of Potlatch in Cloquet) means bile in Finnish. I assumed they were a Finnish company because the name sounded Finnish and they had a couple factories in Finland, but it turns out that it actually stands for South African Pulp and Paper Industries.

And yes, SMDC's new name sucks, as does Gap's attempted new logo.

You're missing a lovely afternoon of golf for this?

Jadiaz, they are not technically a for-profit are they? I also hope you don't lose your house because you get sick and Essentia sends their collection agents after you.

Tony it was a bit of sarcasm since it seemed like others were being a bit outlandish in their comments on the name change.

Technically a non-profit doesn't make a profit for shareholders or owners. I think the marketing resources are a huge misappropriation if the mission of the organization is to help sick people. Their CEO is one of the highest paid people in the city- making more than the CEO of Allete or the chancellor of UMD. Their priorities are out of whack in my opinion and that makes them money grubbers. I, too, have health insurance and consider myself lucky. I think that it's unfortunate that anyone should have to rely on luck when it comes to the health care system.

In Jadiaz's world, it's all the fault of that commie 10% of the population who are unemployed.

Sounds like dementia to me, which happens to rhyme with Essentia. Let's get to work on those lyrics.

I think the name change is just...weird. Hospitals and clinics should be called what they are to avoid confusion. It may be cold but it's a hospital/clinic, not a resort/spa. It's really not that big of a deal, pretty pointless really because like Wes said, everybody is still going to refer to it as SMDC.

I assumed that they changed their name to avoid the confusion caused by so many "Duluth Clinics" popping up in places that weren't in Duluth.

You are not over reacting at all. Unless there was some type of merger or something that forced a name change, it is a waste. And though it seems small, now that there are more colors in their logo, even their printing costs will be higher.

Hey, I'm a liberal but no fan of regulation. But this is the kind of crap that forces the gov. to say "Maybe you should be spending 85% of your receipts on patient care, which is what your stated purpose is anyway, and maybe we'll help you by making it law."

I can't believe they did this again!

I lived in a town with a Duluth Clinic a few years ago, when they decided to change the name of all various Duluth Clinics (e.g. Duluth Clinic-Ashland, Duluth Clinic-Hayward, etc) to names after the town (Ashland Clinic, Hayward Clinic) even though the previous names were well recognized brands. None of the employees liked it. A great deal of money was spent changing the stationery, website, etc. However, by the time they came around to changing the old signage outside the clinics almost a year later, the names were changed back to Duluth Clinic - Ashland, Duluth Clinic - Hayward. 

I think somebody in the top management in Essentia Health (formerly SMDC/Duluth Clinic) must have an interest in some advertising and/or printing company.

Do any of you know why they changed the name?  Do any of you realize that by uniting all the clinics and hospitals across the Midwest that it will bring the costs of health care in our region down?  Did you know that there have been hundreds of corporate job cuts in HR, Admin and other big wig departments but the employment opportunities for doctors, nurses and support staff has gone up?

Get your facts straight before you freak out about a stupid name change.  Do your research.

Me->Little Miss' NP->Little Miss' Pediatrician->MILWAUKEE->Little Miss' Pediatrician->Me.

This is the route that our request for Little Miss' health records so that she could attend school.

The process took about a week.

Before Essentia, we could talk to her doctor directly.