ROGERS --A stairwell flanked by winders and lit in different colors for each floor at the new children's hospital will act as a light tower and make it easier to spot.
"If a family is frantic to get there, seeing this is like a beacon," said Kim Dutton, development director for Arkansas Children's Northwest. "And for a kid, it looks like a big lifesaver. They want to go there."
Arkansas Children’s Northwest
Hospital will include:
• 24 inpatient beds
• 30 emergency department rooms
• 5 operating rooms
• 30 clinic rooms
Source: Arkansas Children’s Hospital
Dutton shared an update on the look of feel of the children's hospital Thursday during a Benton County Community Coalition meeting.
The hospital is under construction on a 37-acre campus in Springdale off of Interstate 49 between the Don Tyson Parkway and Sunset Avenue exits. It's scheduled to open in January 2018.
Large windows in waiting rooms point toward Arvest Ballpark, where families will be able to spot ballgames and concerts from afar. A number of green spaces will be incorporated into the campus, including a meditation garden, places to eat outside, an outdoor chapel and a one-mile walking trail, Dutton said.
Dutton estimates 70 percent of children in Northwest Arkansas are within a 30-minute drive of the hospital and expects the facility will serve 200,000 children in 11 area counties once it opens.
The new hospital will employ more than 300 people, she said.
"It will open up so many jobs," Quinta Henry, a registered nurse for the Benton County Health Department, said during the meeting. "I know a lot of people who love to work with kids, but because of the population and the need of nurses in hospitals, that's a very small opportunity.
"But the opportunity to be with kids and impact them is great."
The creation of Arkansas Children's Northwest is a signal of the hospital's mission to become a statewide network that provides services all over Arkansas, Dutton said.
"We're one of the busiest outpatient hospitals in the country. We had 400,000 visits last year," she said. Becoming a statewide network, "in Northwest Arkansas that means having a brick and mortar (location). For smaller areas, the solution is tougher."
Northwest Arkansas was pinned for a physical location because it met the population density mark of 70 children per square milethe hospital uses to identify areas needing services the most, she said. Areas with smaller populations, such as El Dorado, will receive mobile and in-school clinics and make use of telemedicine, which is to have a medical appointment through virtual means.
Upon opening, the Northwest Arkansas location will become a licensed facility that is separate from the Little Rock hospital, Dutton said. Rather than reporting to the Little Rock hospital, it will be under the umbrella of NWA Children's Inc.
Children who are critically ill or need extended hospital visits will still make trips to the Little Rock hospital, Dutton said. The Northwest campus won't house a neonatal intensive care unit because area hospitals offer the service and the new site is meant to enhance, rather than compete with, the medical service offerings of the region, she said.
NW News on 07/01/2016