In the early 1920s a small parish rest home is working in Negrar, called “Sacro Cuore”. The founder, Father Angelo Sempreboni, parish priest since 1908, desires to build also a hospital that meets the needs of population, supported in this by the vast majority of believers.

In 1932 Father Angelo dies prematurely and the Negrar facility is entrusted to Father Calabria and religiouses of his Congregation, who since the end of 1933 manage the charity with the collaboration of Congregation “Piccole Suore della Sacra Famiglia” and an ever-increasing number of laic health workers.

The purely hospital activity began in 1944. After the 1968’s Italian Hospital Law, in 1970 the Negrar’s Hospitals are classified as “Area General Hospital” and “Provincial Hospital for Long-stay Patients”, and included by right in Veneto regional programming in order to carry out public health activity. They are configured as “Classified hospitals”, namely religious hospitals providing public healthcare, but privately managed. The healthcare reforms of 1978 (Law 833/1978), 1992-1993 (Legislation 502/1992 and 517/1993) and 1999 (Legislation 229/1999) reconfirmed this configuration.

The Hospital was accredited by the Veneto Regional Health Service with Resolution of Regional Council – DGR 3134/2010, replaced with Resolution of Regional Council – DGR 2746/2010.

With Resolution of Regional Council 2122/2013 was approved the hospital equipment schedule in which the Hospital is recognized as “Hospital Unit” of Veneto Region.

The “Cittadella della Carità” in Negrar

Chronology

1932: Father Angelo Sempreboni, Negrar’s parish priest, dies: among his parish organizations there is a rest home for elderlies and needy persons, the “Casa del Sacro Cuore”.

1933 – August: Friar Antonio Consolaro, on behalf of Father Calabria, meets Luigi Salgari, president of Casa del S. Cuore and Dr Brugnoli, on behalf of ‘zia Maria’, appointed to negotiate the transfer of rest home to Don Calabria’s Congregation.

1933 – 20 December: Possession takes place. Present: Father Calabria, Father Franchini and Friar Consolaro, accompanied by Dr Brugnoli. The following day the transfer was definitely officialized with the deed of assignment by new parih priest Father Francesco Beltrame. The deed was signed at Bishop’s see.

1935 – 28 March: The “Casa” buys the Rural Bank building used until then as School of Religion. It was at once ‘occupied’ by 60 elderly guests.

1937: Meetings at Casa Nazareth in Verona between Father Calabria and Podestà of Negrar to decide the fate of Casa.

1943: The Verona’s Civil Hospital, partially occupied by German troops, is bombed. The health authority of Verona doesn’t know where to host the patients and asks Casa del Sacro Cuore to receive some of them. It starts to make its way the concrete possibility of realizing the dream of Casa’s founder, Father Sempreboni, that is transforming the rest home into a hospital.

1944 – 8 May: In an operating room, quickly equipped, the surgeon Dr Zanuso, returning from the front, performs the first surgery on a strangled hernia. Despite lack of everything, the work gets hectic.

1945: The number of patients and their different type by the time force to build a new elderly home independent from the hospital even if integrated into it.

1952 – 31 May: The deed of purchase of 22.000 square meters land is signed. Father Calabria, in the face of pressing requests by owners, encourages: «Don’t worry about the money. Do the project, start as soon as possible». Father Calabria dies in 1954 with prophetic vision of the new great building, but he cannot see the start.

1955 – April: The works for “Geriatrics” begin. In the Sacro Cuore’s patronal celebration the first stone is blessed.

1958 – 12 September: The construction of “Geriactrics”, inaugurated by the Archibishop Giovanni Urbani, is completed. The new building can host up to 400 people and is called “Ospedale Geriatrico Don Calabria”. In the following decades this Hospital and its predecessor (the old “Casa del Sacro Cuore”) underwent the necessary extensions and updates up to the size of today’s health facility.

1970: After the 1968’s Hospital Law, the Area General Hospital “Sacro Cuore” and Provincial Hospital for Long-stay Patients “Don Calabria” are “classified”, namely defined as public hospitals but privately managed. The healthcare reform of 1978 reconfirmed this configuration.

1984 – 26 November: The construction of Brother Francesco Perez’s House is completed, destined to host poor people and outcasts who cannot remain in the family and senior priests of diocese and some religious institutes.

1996 – 14 June: The House “Fr. Pietro Nogarè” is officially inaugurated. It is configured as health and rest home for elderly. Since November 2001 it also hosts a ward for coma patients.

2018 – 23 May: With Decree 23rd May 2018 the Italian Health Ministry recognizes the Ospedale Sacro Cuore Don Calabria as Scientific Research Hospital (IRCCS) for infectious and tropical diseases.

2018 – 4 December: UNICEF appoints the IRCCS Ospedale Sacro Cuore Don Calabria as “Hospital Friend of Children” for promotion of breastfeeding.