Madison Arnold, Pensacola News Journal Published 6:00 a.m. CT Nov. 25, 2019

Ascension Sacred Heart is moving forward with a number of projects, two of which are scheduled to open in 2020, in an effort to move more services out into the community.

A new outpatient rehabilitation center is under construction at the intersection of Grande and Market Place driveswith an estimated finish in April. That project will be followed by the completion of an outpatient surgery and dermatology center, among other services, just off Summit Boulevard next November.

"We know that toprovide a patient-friendly, family-friendly experience that we need to be in the neighborhood, we need to be out in the community," saidDawn Rudolph, hospital president. "... With innovation and capabilities that we've been able to bring,more things can be done outside of the hospital."

Construction of the brand new Ascension Sacred Health outpatient service center on Summit Boulevard is underway on Friday.(Photo: Tony Giberson/tgiberson@pnj.com)

The $9.5 million rehabilitation center will be a 17,500-square-foot facility and offer physical, occupation and speech therapy. Currently, the hospital system offers those servicesat two locations one inSanta Rosa County andthe other along Davis Highway and Sorrento Road.

The surgical center will be quite a bit larger at 58,000 square feet and next to the hospital's Haven of Our Lady of Peace nursing home. The $19 million project will include six outpatient operating rooms, imaging equipment, the breast health center with mammography and a dermatology center.

When determining what services are needed and where in the community to put them, Ascension Sacred Heart staff look at data, including the number of homes in growing areas andpropensity and prevalence of particular diseases, Rudolph said.

"Those lenses allow us to know what is the highest and best used of our services and try to customize it as much as possible," Rudolph said. "How can we make it easy for people to get good health care? That's the bottom line."

Currently, the system is looking into opening a separate emergency room to accommodate growth in Beulah, although an exact timeline hasn't yet been finalized, said spokesman Mike Burke. A media release announcing the project in August said it's planned to be an $11 million,4,700-square-foot facility scheduled to open in late 2020.

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It will be constructed on Nine Mile Road, nearthe new Ascension Sacred Heart Health Center at Milestone, an outpatient medical facility that opened in March.

These facility expansions come on the heels of the hospital system's new $85 million Studer Family Children's Hospital in April opening. Now Ascension Sacred Heart is construction a $19 million pediatric intensive care unit and operating rooms onto the children's hospital, which is scheduled to be finished in January 2021.

Madison Arnold can be reached at marnold@pnj.com and 850-435-8522.

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Ascension Sacred Heart on track to open at least two new facilities in 2020 - Pensacola News Journal