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Demands on Healthcare Continue to Grow

Petal Family Practice Clinic will soon have a little growing room. Ground was broken in August for the new 11,300-square-foot clinic on the Evelyn Gandy Parkway. The building, which should be completed in fall 2009, will include 17 examination rooms in addition to ancillary space for services provided by Hattiesburg Clinic.

The current clinic on Old Corinth Road is about half the size of the building under construction, said Karen Garner, office manager, and has four fewer exam rooms than the new facility.

"We're looking forward to it," Garner said. "With Petal's growth, we have seen an increase in patients. In November of 2006, we added another physician. He brought a lot of his patients with him."

Petal Family Practice Clinic currently has physicians Donald Conerly, Robert Heath, Rodney Lovitt and Keith Simicht on staff. Lovitt joined the clinic when it opened in 1978, and Heath was the most recent addition. When the new facility opens, they hope to add two additional doctors and offer additional services, said Billy Allen, senior assistant administrator at Hattiesburg Clinic.

The clinic offers primary medical care services, as well as x-rays. Patients with cold and sinus problems are the most common, Garner said, but they also do minor surgeries and treat fractures. Patients who require more specialized treatment are referred to Hattiesburg Clinic. The clinic also offers an after-hours clinic six days a week, where walk-in patients are treated.

"The Petal Family Practice Clinic has been a part of our organization since the '70s," Allen told the crowd at the ground-breaking ceremony. "We chose a site that will hopefully accommodate the needs of the clinic as it continues to grow and serve the needs of its patients in the Petal area."

All over Mississippi, medical facilities are expanding their facilities and services, and changing ownership and names. They include:
Hattiesburg
NAN (No Appointment Necessary) Clinic began offering services at its new location at Lincoln Center on the Lincoln Parkway on Sept. 3. The clinic will offer the same services as before, including a full range of medical care, follow-up care, referral services, laboratory tests, treatment for work-related injuries and physicals for school, sports and employment. Physicians are Nancy Weible and Nicole Whitson.

Greenville
Delta Regional Medical Center is expanding its service lines with a newly expanded and improved emergency room, and is opening a Heart & Vascular Center and a Level III Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. The formal closing on a $35,725,000 revenue bond issue took place March 22, 2007, in Jackson, and will be used to refinance the 2005 purchase of The King's Daughters Hospital ($21 million) and to further expand Delta Regional Medical Center facilities and services ($10.6 million). Groundbreaking was held March 26, 2007. "With this financing package, we can move forward immediately with our plans to make significant expansions and improvements to our facilities," said L. Ray Humphrey, CEO of DRMC, in a press release. "We will have four major projects under way at the same time on the main campus, a 5,920-square-foot expansion of the emergency department and 3,445 square feet of renovations to the existing space, the conversion of the former burn center to a state-of-the-art heart and vascular center, a 3,980-square-foot expansion of the Maternal Child Center including the addition of a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, and an advanced 64-slice CT scanner to be added to the center's imaging capabilities."

Magee
Groundbreaking was held July 10, 2007, for a new medical center at Magee General Hospital that will offer innovations in health care for patients and health professionals in the area. Upon completion, the new Medical Center of Excellence will replace the 1936 structure that received additions in 1972 and 1988. Althea Crumpton, MGH administrator, said in a press release that the construction would be done in phases, with the front entrance facing Old Highway 49 to be completed this fall. The first phase will include 22,000 square feet and provide modernization and expansion of surgical suites, laboratory, waiting areas for patients and families, a spacious lobby fronted by a covered canopy and a new office for HealthTrust, MGH's Foundation.

Humphreys County
Ray Shoemaker, CEO of Rural Healthcare Developers, Inc., a healthcare management and development company based in Plantersville, purchased Humphreys County Memorial Hospital April 30, from the Humphreys County Board of Supervisors and the HCMH Hospital Board. The 34-bed critical access hospital will be renamed Patients' Choice Medical Center of Humphreys County LLC. The hospital has been under the company's management for the past 16 months with Shoemaker as administrator. According to a press release, under Shoemaker's leadership, the financially-troubled hospital has dramatically increased patient admissions to their acute and swing bed units, added new programs and seen revenue increase.

D'Iberville
D'Iberville Medical Center recently celebrated its grand opening as part of the Singing River Hospital System. The center has two full-time physicians, Gregg Novak, MD, who specializes in pediatric internal medicine, and Julia Jensen, MD, who specializes in family medicine. The new center is part of the hospital system's mission to find areas that are underserved, especially in primary health care.

Brandon
Rankin Medical Center officials announced on May 9 that the hospital is changing its name to Crossgates River Oaks Hospital, and the four other hospitals operated by Health Management Associates, Inc., in the Jackson metro area are to be known collectively as River Oaks Healthcare. The five hospitals were previously known as Preferred Hospitals of Metro Jackson. With the planned expansion of Crossgates Boulevard, Crossgates River Oaks Hospital will be at the heart of a major thoroughfare linking Interstate 20, Mississippi 80 and Lakeland Drive.

Grenada
Grenada Lakes Medical Center recently announced that their Ambulatory Care Unit has expanded from an 11-bed to an 18-bed unit that provides outpatient surgery and procedure cases that do not require an overnight hospital stay.

Laurel
The first phase of a new 32,200-square-foot inpatient surgical facility and critical care unit opened March 31 at South Central Regional Medical Center. The construction project has been under way since December 2005. "The surgeons and staff at South Central were actively involved in designing the new facility," said Doug Higginbotham, executive director of South Central, in a press release. "We traveled to five different surgical program sites before making a final decision on the design of the facility at South Central. With our remarkable growth in surgical services, it was important for us to develop an overall design that would include some of the most technologically advanced surgical components available today." Due to growth in inpatient volume, additional beds are needed in the Critical Care Unit. When completed, the new facility will more than double in size from 8,000 square feet to 19,600 square feet. The 17-bed area will include spacious patient rooms, a new family waiting room and a new family conference room. The unit will be located directly above the new surgical facility and is planned to open in fall 2009.

Picayune
Highland Community Hospital is being built in Picayune on a 31-acre parcel of land at Highland Common, a planned unit development with a mixture of residential, commercial and office-professional properties. The new hospital will replace the former Crosby Memorial Hospital, which was purchased by Forrest General Hospital in May 2006. A Certificate of Need was recently approved by the Mississippi State Department of Health. "We are very fortunate to be able to build a new hospital, as Picayune has needed this for a long time," said Steve Grimm, administrator of Highland Community Hospital, in a press release. "While we move forward on this new facility, the community will continue to see Highland offer new services to the area." The first phase of the hospital will feature 46 inpatient beds and a modern layout designed to accommodate the latest trends in health care. The emergency room will be more than twice the space of the current ER. A new physician office building is currently being constructed on an additional 15 acres adjoining the hospital property.

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