Local health community celebrates new addition

Hospital administrator Brian Bentley calls today’s grand opening ceremony “a three-fold celebration.”

Dignitaries from Presbyterian Healthcare Services, Plains Regional Medical Center and the community will celebrate the culmination of three events related to the hospital’s expansion at 3 p.m. at the site of the new Healthplex facility, 2217 Dillon St.

“We’ll celebrate the grand opening of the Healthplex and the hospital’s 25th anniversary as well as break ground to begin the construction for our new emergency room,” Bentley said. “With that new construction, we’ll be creating a much nicer single unit that will house the emergency room, the urgent care unit and a registration area for both units.”

Completion of the new emergency room/urgent care addition, which will modernize the hospital’s emergency services and add 25 percent more room for patients, is about a year away, Bentley said.

Meanwhile, the doors of the hospital’s new Healthplex, a patient therapy and rehabilitation center, will officially open today.

“The new 15,000-square-foot Healthplex represents the most modern approach to patient rehabilitation and therapy,” Bentley said. “PRMC will now offer a new spacious healing environment for physical therapy, speech and swallowing therapy, occupational therapy, wound care and a healing garden where rehab patients can do the hard work of recovery in a peaceful, recuperative environment.”

Nola Pawol, director of home health, hospice and rehabilitation, said she and her staff welcome the new, state-of-the-art facility.

“We’re excited to be able to have our former patients and the entire community to see our new facility,” she said. “We shared with our medical staff on Monday, and they were all very excited about it.”