Medical service providers in Northwest Arkansas have grown dramatically in the last decade.
Mercy Health System opened a new, 200-bed hospital in March 2008 near the Pinnacle Hills Promenade in Rogers. The move also prompted the opening of Mercy Physician's Plaza adjacent to the hospital.
Northwest Health System doubled the size of its emergency department in 2012 and gave its downtown Springdale hospital a face lift, which included a new entrance.
Dan McKay, chief executive officer of Northwest Health System, said growing patient visits prompted the additional emergency department space. Before increasing to 30,000 square feet, it was designed to see 25,000 patients annually, but was reporting 35,000 visits. Emergency room trips hit 40,000 in 2013.
Northwest Medical Center Bentonville opened in May 2003 and replaced Bates Medical Center. The health system also purchased Willow Creek Women's Hospital in 2002 from two independent physician groups. Willow Creek is the area's only specialty hospital dedicated to women's health.
Washington Regional Medical Center moved to its North Hills Medical Park location in north Fayetteville in 2002. The hospital needed additional space shortly after the move and built on a fifth floor in 2007. The hospital's new floor is home to a Senior Specialty Unit designed to use an interdisciplinary team approach to helping elderly patients.
The campus also includes the Pat Walker Center for Seniors, a 38,000-square-foot facility that houses many senior programs, including a memory clinic and exercise center.
Siloam Springs Memorial Hospital also found a new home a few miles east of downtown. The move nearly doubled hospital space from 53,000 square feet to 92,000 square feet.
The Breast Center, a Medical Associates of Northwest Arkansas facility, provides breast imaging, screening and diagnostic services. The clinic opened in 2003 in Fayetteville and expanded into Bentonville in 2006.
Highlands Oncology Group also opened a new Benton County facility in recent years. It opened a 56,000-square-foot cancer center in Rogers in July 2011. The group started in 1996 and moved into its Fayetteville North Hills site in 2001 and expanded in 2006, said Kathey Parker, administrator at Highlands Oncology Group.
The Rogers site replaced an office in Bentonville they had outgrown, she said.
"When we started planning the Rogers clinic we wanted to have everything under one roof," Parker said. "State-of-the-art cancer care is available right here in Northwest Arkansas."
The Benton County center includes radiation therapy, a large chemotherapy suite, physician offices, coffee shop, retail pharmacy, diagnostic clinic and chapel.
NW News on 03/23/2014