News

Long-range Plan Improves Regional Access to Care

St. Dominic's Details Plans for Madison County and Investments for Future

JACKSON, MS -- Leaders of St. Dominic's detailed today the hospital's long-range plan to expand St. Dominic Hospital's campus with the development of a 71-bed acute care hospital in Madison County. The development of a Madison campus is part of a bigger long-range plan that significantly invests in the main campus in Jackson, resulting in growth and economic development for the entire region.

Central to St. Dominic's long-range plan is meeting the rapidly growing demand and choice for increased hospital care and advanced emergency services in Madison County. According to the Mississippi State Department of Health, over 86% of all Madison County residents currently leave the county for hospital care. Madison County is one of the state's fastest growing counties, yet ranks near the bottom in the number of acute care (short stay) hospital beds per 1,000 people for counties in Mississippi. The same data shows St. Dominic Hospital is the number one choice for hospital care by Madison County residents and patients.

St. Dominic's plans to move 71 of its existing licensed beds from its Jackson campus to a new campus in Madison County, east of Interstate 55 at the Galleria Parkway and the planned Reunion Parkway interchange. The $121 million facility will be complemented by a 60,000 square foot medical office building for primary care and specialty physician offices. As currently planned, St. Dominic's Madison facility will include a Level IV emergency department, 65 beds for acute medical/surgical and intensive care, and six labor and delivery suites. As a full-service community facility, it will also provide surgery and recovery services, imaging services, including magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), laboratory and outpatient services.

St. Dominic's has a long history of providing a Christian ministry of healing and serving the healthcare needs of people living in Madison County, said Sister Mary Dorothea Sondgeroth, OP, President, St. Dominic Health Services. This hospital is an extension of that mission and we remain committed to delivering the medical and emergency services residents there so desperately need close to home.

St. Dominic's filed a Certificate of Need (CON) application in December 2008 with the Mississippi State Department of Health and will have an administrative hearing February 3-17, 2010. The CON application process is a state regulatory requirement before a hospital can expand its campus or add selected services. The citizens of the community have a role to play in the State's review process. Voicing their concern for lack of healthcare and demanding additional hospital and emergency services is considered part of determining community need.

We are reaching out to residents of Madison County to share our campus expansion plans and to help improve their access to medical and emergency services, said Claude W. Harbarger, FACHE, President, St. Dominic Hospital. Madison County residents and leaders have repeatedly told us better healthcare is essential to protecting their community's future. So we're urging people to make their voices heard and make this critical need clear to the state regulators. Citizens can go to our web site, www.mystdommadison.com for more information and to sign a petition in support of our plans as well as tell their friends, neighbors, anyone in their community about the opportunity to support this effort.

St. Dominic'ss long-range plan also calls for a significant investment in the Jackson campus, its tertiary care center for the region. Due to projected growth and demand for hospital services, St. Dominic's will have to renovate and expand its existing campus over the next 10 years. Once the Madison campus is approved, St. Dominic's expects to invest an estimated $150 million over a 10-year period to expand and renovate its Jackson campus to accommodate services and technologies required to meet the needs of the more acutely ill (i.e., more critically ill patients with complex diseases).

"Our long-range facility plan reflects our mission to meet the full range of healthcare needs of people in central Mississippi with a high level of compassion, quality and sensitivity to the individual patient,” added Harbarger. “We believe establishing a Madison satellite facility and significantly enhancing our Jackson campus is also the most effective and economical plan for responding to what this region needs now and in the future. We continue to be committed to being a valuable partner to the community and doing everything possible to improve the health and well-being of all people living here."