Work begins for long-term acute care hospital

Select Medical Corp. of Mechanicsburg, Pa., is building Select Specialty Hospital, 1630 E. Primrose St., on nine acres in southeast Springfield it’s leasing from Wehr Properties. The property is west of Sun Rocket call center on the south side of Primrose.

General contractor Brasfield & Gorrie of Birmingham, Ala., will begin laying the foundation for the 48,000-square-foot, one-story hospital this month, said Carolyn Curnane, Select Medical Corp.’s director of corporate communications.

“Everything is going smoothly and as planned,” Curnane said.

Brasfield & Gorrie is building a similar hospital for Select Medical in Pensacola, Fla., according to a city building permit approved there in November. According to the contractor’s Web site, Brasfield & Gorrie was ranked No. 1 among the nation’s health care general contractors in 2006 by Modern Healthcare magazine.

Preparing for patients

The hospital, which primarily caters to critically ill and catastrophically injured patients, is slated to open in March 2008, Curnane said. Its staff of more than 100 full- and part-time employees will include physicians, nurses, pharmacists and dietitians as well as respiratory, physical and occupational therapists. Also included in the mix will be a local CEO, who has yet to be hired, Curnane said.

The majority of the hospital’s rooms will be reserved for general patients, but the facility also will house six intensive-care beds, Curnane said. In-house programs would likely include pulmonary, vent weaning, heart failure and complex wound care, she added.

“Most of our patients … come to us from a short-term hospital’s (intensive care unit),” Curnane said.

Once it opens, Select Specialty Hospital will begin admitting patients through a variety of referral sources, including physicians and case managers, based on their medical and clinical needs, she said.

Ron Prenger, vice president of clinical services at CoxHealth, said Select Specialty Hospital would serve patients undergoing long-term recovery who may depend on complex equipment, such as ventilators. He said a long-term acute care hospital fills a health care void between ICU and skilled nursing centers.

“There’s a definite need for it,” Prenger said. “It is an intense level of care.”

As for staffing the new hospital, Prenger said the number of area health care professionals qualified for long-term acute care is limited.

“We’re all in need of qualified people,” he said.

“It’s going to put a strain on the people that are qualified to work in that environment. I’m sure it will compete with both Cox and St. John’s and other institutions in Springfield that have people that are qualified to work at that level,” Prenger added.

Getting here

Realtor Galen Pellham with Pellham Commercial Realtors said a Select Medical employee responsible for site selection contacted him in 2005. Pellham assisted the company in its real estate search and arranged meetings with local, state and federal officials to line up support for the proposed hospital.

“They had an interest in Springfield because of our two medical anchors – Cox and St. John’s,” Pellham said. “(The specialty hospital is) not competition with Cox or St. John’s. They offer a service that those two hospitals prefer not to provide.”

After narrowing the number of sites down to about five, Select Medical signed a long-term lease agreement for the East Primrose property in early 2006, Pellham said. “It was a neutral location, but it was conveniently located between the two hospitals.”

The Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee ultimately approved a Certificate of Need for the $15.7 million specialty hospital in November 2005, according to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services.

Pellham said widespread support from city officials and influential politicians, including U.S. Rep Roy Blunt and former U.S. Sen. Jim Talent, were instrumental in obtaining the certificate.

Examining Select Medical Corp.

Select Medical Corp. operates 92 long-term acute care hospitals in 26 states, four acute medical rehabilitation hospitals, and 544 outpatient rehabilitation clinics in 19 states and the District of Columbia, according to a Dec. 31 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

In 2006, the company’s annual net operating revenues were $1.85 billion, about 75 percent of which were attributed to its specialty hospitals.

Select Medical Corp. was co-founded by Rocco A. Ortenzio and Robert A. Ortenzio in 1996.