Summerlin to get new medical center

Art Nadler

Friday, Nov. 8, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

Summerlin Medical Center, an affiliate of Valley Hospital Medical Center, is opening its outpatient center on Tuesday.

In completing the second phase of a $70 million project, the facility will offer urgent-care services, outpatient surgery, diagnostics, mammograms and cancer treatment.

"You'll be able to get 90 percent of the treatment you could get at a hospital," said K.D. Justyn, chief executive officer and managing director. "We'll be serving about 300,000 people within a 10-mile radius."

The only operations Summerlin Medical Center physicians won't do are heart, eye and major in-patient surgeries. These patients will be referred to acute-care facilities, such as Valley Hospital.

A full-service 149-bed acute-care hospital will open next summer adjacent to the medical center and the already existing 110,000-square-foot medical office building, Justyn said. Urgent-care services will be available Nov. 18 at the 40-acre site at 655 Town Center Drive.

Justyn said Summerlin Medical Center's staff of 40 should handle about 25 surgeries a day, 50 MRI (imaging) diagnoses, 150 laboratory tests, 85 urgent-care cases and about 12 radiology treatments.

"There aren't too many places where you can get total radiology treatments in one place," said radiologist Dr. Paul Wiesner. "There is a tremendous need to service people in this area. It makes sense to service people in their own community."

Wiesner said patients will be able to have chest X-rays done, kidney studies, ultrasounds, bone fracture X-rays and nuclear medicine tests.

The medical center's cancer treatment facility will provide inpatient and outpatient care. It has been designed in a relaxed, living-room style, void of the sterile hospital atmosphere.

"It is important to make patients feel more comfortable because of their anxiety," said Dr. Dan Curtis of the center's Cancer Institute of Nevada. "The more relaxing you make it for the patient, the more positive the outcome will be. In most hospitals, these (cancer) centers are found in the basement or in tight quarters."

Justyn said Summerlin Medical Center plans to have its in-patient hospital expanded to 400 beds within five years. This will finish the fifth and final phase of the Valley Hospital project.

"We want to give a patient comfort, confidentiality and access," Justyn said. "This center will fill the needs of Summerlin, The Lakes area and Peccole Ranch."