Business

Thursday, Nov. 05, 2009

Singing River breaks ground on facility

PASCAGOULA — Singing River Health System ceremonially broke ground Thursday on an outpatient facility that speakers described as a confluence of health care, economic development, local revitalization and community growth needs.

The $20 million, 70,000-square-foot Singing River Medical Park and Healthplex Medical Wellness Center will be built just east of Singing River Hospital and is scheduled for completion in 2011.

Services provided there are expected to include a neurosciences center, medical laboratory, outpatient imaging services, cardiac rehabilitation, physical therapy and Healthplex, a medically-based fitness center. Health system officials said they expect up to 200,000 visits per year for outpatient treatment, preventive and lifestyle improvement services.

Chris Anderson, chief executive officer of the health system, said the facility will take stress off Singing River and Ocean Springs hospitals while increasing access to services, and represents a renewed commitment to the Jackson County community.

“We live here, we work here and most importantly and distinctively, we are governed here,” he said. “We exist to improve the quality of life to everyone in our community, and we are Singing River Health System.”

A group of local dignitaries, elected officials and hospital employees stood in line equipped with hardhats and shovels to turn earth in what was dubbed a “dirt-dumping,” while behind them Anderson and Michael Heidelberg, president of the SRHS Board of Trustees, sat in the cabs of excavators, where they pulled levers to dump more dirt from the vehicles’ upraised scoops.

Pascagoula City Manager Kay Kell spoke of the area’s revitalization since Hurricane Katrina and said the new health care facility fits in with recent growth and increasing quality of life.

“We need one more thing. We need to be healthy enough to enjoy it,” she said.

George Freeland, executive director of the Jackson County Economic Development Foundation, said SRHS already has a payroll of more than $150 million per year and accounts directly or indirectly for more than 3,700 jobs. He said adding the medical park and wellness center will improve the livability of the community and, as a result, foster continued economic growth through an organization that already touches most area resident’s lives on a daily basis.

“All of these are certainly cause for celebration,” Freeland said.

Heidelberg told the crowd that strong leadership and management in all levels of SRHS made it possible to embark on a $20 million expansion at a time when many hospital systems are cutting back, and the new facility will give worthwhile returns to area residents.

“The citizens of Jackson County, Miss., know they don’t have to leave the county to get world-class health care,” he said.