ENGLEWOOD — Come June, Englewood residents no longer will have to leave their community or use the emergency room for primary care.
St. Bernard Hospital is opening a 70,000-square-foot, three-story Ambulatory Care Center at 63rd Street and Stewart Avenue on June 7. The hospital will continue to operate next to the new facility. The center promotes illness prevention and wellness through primary care and specialty clinics, advanced diagnostic imaging, on-site physician offices, a laboratory and a pharmacy.
All equipment is new and state-of-the-art, hospital officials said. The building is equipped with energy-efficient features like sensor lights. There’s a green roof. Each floor has extra space for expansion. There are mock bathrooms and kitchens to help stroke patients navigate their homes when they return to them.
The facility broke ground in October 2014. A community needs assessment in 2012 revealed that residents in the area needed outpatient care, said Diahann Sinclair, vice president of Organizational and Community Development.
“It was sort of reconfirmed in 2015," she said. “We found that a lot of people were traveling outside of the neighborhood to get some very basic things.”
It’s not uncommon for people to go to the ER for nonemergencies, Sinclair said, because many don’t have a primary care physician. Others wait until a health condition gets really bad, and then they have no choice but to come to the ER, she said.
Asthma is one condition that the new center can help address before it escalates to an emergency.
“Asthma is something that needs to be managed,” Sinclair said. “What tends to happen is that when a child has an attack, or a flare-up, they come to the ER, he or she gets treated, the symptoms go down, but it’s not cured.”
The new care center will have a pediatric asthma clinic. Parents will receive education on how to prevent constant flare-ups said Evelyn Jones, vice president of nursing services. The Englewood native said parents will take home a kit that will include a nebulizer, a spacer, a twin-size hypoallergenic mattress cover and a hypoallergenic pillow case.
After doing another study, the medical team learned that people were traveling 3 to 10 miles to get basic services, such as an MRI. To see a specialist for such chronic conditions as hypertension or cardiac or respiratory issues, people had to travel outside of Englewood, Sinclair said.
During certain days of the week a specialty clinic will be open, with the list of conditions covered constantly rotating. One day it might be pediatric asthma, another day it might be cardiology.
The new building will have a tremendous impact on Englewood, Jones said.
“We’re excited, and this is long overdue for Englewood,” she said. “I think the No. 1 thing is convenience for the community, so they don’t have to go all over, because transportation is an issue for many.”
Another thing that's important is quality, Sinclair said.
"This is coming at a time when the neighborhood needs it," she said. "We are really proud about being able to provide this because the residents of Englewood deserve to have the same quality facility and services that other neighborhoods have at their fingertips."
This new building will also house the Women’s Wellness Clinic, which is much needed, both women said. They moved it around in the hospital, but always ran out of space because so many women required its services.
The clinic is a grant-funded program open to women of childbearing age, regardless of their ability to pay, and insurance is not required. They can take prenatal classes and receive free pregnancy tests. More information can be found online at www.STBH.org.
Here’s a list of some of the services the specialty clinics will provide:
• Pediatric asthma care
• Outpatient behavioral health
• Cardiology
• Chronic disease/internal medicine
• Diabetes care
• Orthopedics, physical medicine and rehabilitation
In addition to treating outpatients, the center will stress patient education, Sinclair and Jones said. The center has a 90-person capacity conference area that can be divided into three rooms for smaller events. Sinclair said the rooms will be used for discussions led by doctors who specialize in the treatment of issues affecting the African-American community.
“I think with education, we’re empowering them, we’re giving them knowledge,” Sinclair said. “We are excited, we can’t wait to open the doors.”
To learn more about the center's services or to schedule an appointment call 773-962-3939, or visit the website at www.stbh.org.
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