Tuesday, May 22, 2012BOARDMAN, Ohio – St. Elizabeth Health Center in Youngstown will remain the largest of Humility of Mary’s Health Partners’ three hospitals even after the completion a $103.7 million expansion of the St. Elizabeth Boardman campus, and planned upgrades will bring inner-city hospital up to the same modern level as the newer suburban campus, system officials said.
Unveiling its master plan Monday afternoon, Humility of Mary announced a $203.3 million expansion of its three hospitals, including $64.9 million in upgrades begining in 2014 to expand services and increase the number of private patient rooms at the Youngstown campus.
The health-care system plans to break ground in September on the new seven-floor, 165,000-square-foot second tower at the Boardman campus, which will add roughly 100 beds to the 128 now there, said Robert Shroder, president and CEO. The new tower will be parallel to Market Street.
“Change is all around us and many have opted to take a wait-and-see attitude and build their health-care system in response to what the government does and what other providers do. We realize we cannot take a wait-and-see attitude. We see the needs in our community and we are ready to do what is necessary to meet them,” Shroder said.
Those changes also mean nearly $23.8 million in upgrades this year at the main Youngstown campus including renovations in preoperative areas, the Belmont lobby and maternity rooms, relocation and upgrading of endoscopy, anesthesia and laboratory, and purchase of a new daVinci surgical robot. Upgrades totaling more than $10.9 million planned for St. Joseph Health Center in Warren include work on the cafeteria, installation of a new linear accelerator for cancer treatment, expansion of cancer therapy and expansion and relocation of the emergency and diagnostic center in Andover.
The Boardman addition will include 32 telemetry, medical and surgical beds, six intensive care beds and four operating rooms, which will bring the total number of operating rooms at Boardman to 10, said Genie Aubel, president of St. Elizabeth Boardman Health Center. In addition, 12 labor and delivery rooms, 32 postpartum rooms and a new 24-bed newborn nursery will be added to accommodate the relocation of the delivery and neonatal unit, which will be operated by Akron Children’s Hospital as it is now on the Youngstown campus.
The Boardman campus was designed for expansion due to population growth in Boardman, Canfield and Poland, Aubel said. “We didn’t quite know it would happen this quickly. We were thinking a little further out than five years,” she remarked. Humility of Mary officials are working with architects and construction contractors. The new labor and delivery unit should open at Boardman during the first quarter of 2014, she said.
Two-thirds of all deliveries are coming from what he describes as Humility of Mary’s “southern market,” Shroder said. “So we’re actually bringing the service where the patients need the service,” he observed.
Hospital officials say 100 or more tradesmen will work on the new Boardman tower, which will employ more than 300 staff, including some transfers from the Youngstown campus, Shroder and Aubel said.
Having a “faith-based, nonprofit health-care provider in our community is more important than ever,” said Daryl S. Cameron, chairman of Humility of Mary’s board of directors. In 2011 the system provided charity care to more than 99,000 individuals at a cost of $27.6 million, a 12% increase over 2010, and this year is already reflecting an increase over last year, he noted.
“If any member of the board of directors saw any possibility that the administration was planning an action that would create two separate levels of care – for those with insurance versus those without or with limited insurance – we would put a stop to it,” Cameron stressed. “I am pleased to say we have never had to remind hospital administrators of their duty to the community.
“HMHP is not abandoning the city of Youngstown as some might speculate,” he continued. “The steps we are announcing today will strengthen St. Elizabeth’s position as the central hub of Humility of Mary Health Partners.”
St Elizabeth’s Youngstown campus will continue to be where high-risk patients will receive care and where heart and brain surgeries will be performed, and where the Joanie Abdu Comprehensive Breast Care Center and Level 1 trauma center are housed. Psychiatric and safety net services also will be based out of the Youngstown campus where human resources, administration and finance will remain. Rooms will be renovated at the hospitals to accommodate a shift toward all private rooms.
The relocation of the delivery and neonatal unit will also provide the opportunity for upgrades to be made to the main campus, which recently marked 100 years. “We’re very proud of that but there are areas where the hospital is starting to show its age,” Cameron said. “It is not our plan to allow the hospital to fade gently into the night.”
Vacating the seventh floor will allow Humility of Mary to build an intensive care unit at the main campus “which is fitting for a tertiary care trauma center so that we can provide the best care to the sickest patients,” said Don Koenig, executive vice president, operations. The hospital will also be adding a hybrid operating room with dedicated diagnostic equipment “so that the most advanced heart and vascular procedures can be done in the best possible setting,” he said.
Humility of Mary would not be spending in excess of $60 million in renovations at the main campus if it wasn’t considered a “long-term asset,” Shroder emphasized.
Copyright 2012 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.