North Memorial Health Care Plans to Move Hospital Beds To Serve Expanding "Northwest Corridor" Communities
Requesting state approval to bring hospital services to Maple Grove
(November 11, 2004) — North Memorial Health Care has submitted a request to the Minnesota Department of Health to approve a plan to move 80 of its current hospital beds to a new location in Maple Grove, Minnesota—one of the fastest growing areas in the expanding Twin Cities area. This is the first step in obtaining required state approval for a hospital in Maple Grove. In addition to the Department of Health’s review of the request, action is required by the state legislature for any hospital to be built in Maple Grove.
"We currently serve nearly three times as many Maple Grove residents as any other hospital in the Twin Cities, and we definitely want to continue serving these patients. We are responding to the need for Maple Grove area residents to have much faster, more convenient access to emergency and hospital care,” says Dave Cress, Chief Operating Officer, North Memorial Health Care. “Our discussions and research with consumers show very clearly that these communities want and need a hospital. Our plan is to provide this hospital in a very rational, cost effective way. The plan we have submitted to the state is to move licensed hospital beds from our existing facility to a new facility. We would not actually add any beds to the health care system—rather we would move them to serve our patients who are moving to this new area."
Consumer research with Maple Grove residents shows overwhelmingly that residents believe a hospital is needed in their community, and they want the hospital to be available as soon as possible. Key health care needs noted by the residents included urgent and emergency care, pediatric care and obstetrics services. Independent market research by Scarborough Research shows that North Memorial is the hospital most preferred by Maple Grove residents for their health care needs.
"We will start expanding health care services to the Maple Grove area through an outpatient health care campus that will give residents many of the services they need, but we believe it’s also time to start making plans for inpatient hospital care," says Cress.
Phase I of North Memorial’s 30-acre health care campus will include an outpatient care center, with outpatient surgery, primary and specialty care, lab and pharmacy, and urgent care/emergency services. The campus, part of a larger development, will be located at the intersection of Interstate 94 and future Highway 610, with facility space totaling 170,000 sq. ft. Consumer research shows this as the preferred location for a hospital. The final campus plans will be reviewed by the Maple Grove City Council in December 2004. Construction on Phase I of the campus is scheduled to start in 2005, with a targeted completed date of 2006. Phase II of the campus would include an 80-bed hospital, which would be expected to be open within two to three years following local and state approvals.
The campus will feature a park-like setting, walking paths, ample parking and a glass and stone exterior that will provide natural lighting to the interior spaces.
North Memorial Health Care is celebrating 50 years of service to communities in the northwest metro. North Memorial consists of North Memorial Medical Center, a Level I Trauma Center, and North Memorial Ambulance, which currently provides the majority of ambulance and emergency care for the northwest corridor area. In addition to emergency and trauma services, North Memorial is recognized for its outstanding cardiology, oncology, and women and children’s services as well as its six primary care clinics throughout the northwestern Twin Cities.
