Nevada’s newest hospital set to open

Michelle Swafford

Thursday, July 8, 2004 | 11:14 a.m.

MESQUITE -- Residents of Mesquite will soon have emergency medical services in their own backyard after 26 years of having to travel to the Las Vegas Valley or St. George, Utah, for treatment.

Plano, Texas-based Triad Hospitals Inc. built Mesa View Regional Hospital in Mesquite to serve a population of about 21,000 people in the city and its surrounding communities.

"(The hospital) is one more impediment to growth that has been removed," interim Chief Executive and Triad division President Kevin Andrews said.

He anticipates the hospital's service area will grow between 9 percent and 10 percent annually.

The construction is completed and Mesa View is finishing up its state health inspections. No date has been set, but the hospital expects to open this month.

Mesa View cost nearly $32 million to build and will open with 21 private rooms with the ability to expand to 40 beds in private and semi-private rooms without additional construction, Andrews said. A third floor with 50 beds can be added once demand increases, bringing the hospital to 90 beds, he said.

The 86,000-square-foot hospital will offer emergency care, intensive care, obstetrics, physical and occupational therapy, diagnostic, medical and surgical services. A helipad will enable helicopters to quickly transport critical patients to hospitals in St. George or Las Vegas.

The hospital will offer magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanning, computed-tomography (CT) scanning and other diagnostic equipment that is common in larger hospitals

"You don't see many 40-bed hospitals with an MRI, much less a fixed MRI, meaning in the building and not in a trailer," Andrews said. "That's part of a Triad signature involving the scope of services."

Mesquite-area residents have had to travel on I-15 to Dixie Regional Medical Center in St. George or to the Las Vegas Valley, which is about 80 miles away, for inpatient medical services.

Residents of Mesquite, a fast-growing casino town also known for its retirement communities, say they're elated to have a full-service hospital opening.

"Seniors, they need a place where there's a hospital," new Mesquite resident Gracie Karpstein-Boland said. "The difference of going 37 miles to Dixie Medical can mean the difference between life and death."

Mesquite City Manager Bryan Montgomery said the hospital is a "key element" of attracting businesses and spurring the city's economic development.

Dr. Enrique Alfaro, chief of staff for Mesa View, said he and his colleagues will be able to treat many patients in Mesquite without transferring them for routine surgeries, emergency services and obstetrics procedures.

Nearly 40 physicians have been authorized to practice at the hospital and another 60 applications are being processed from physicians in St. George, Las Vegas and Mesquite, Andrews said. The hospital will have about 20 physicians on duty and the others will be able to treat patients as needed or requested, he said. An adjacent 30,000-square-foot medical office building will house many of Mesquite's physicians and two-thirds of the space is leased, Andrews said.

The hospital has hired 24 full-time registered nurses and 13 nurses who will work on a per-diem basis, meaning they are paid for the hours they work and do not have benefits.

Mesquite's climate, population growth, proximity to the Las Vegas Valley and the outdoor lifestyle are some of the reasons physicians and nurses are attracted to working for the new hospital, Andrews said.

Andrews said Triad was interested in building the hospital because "there was a need that could be sustained."

Triad owns 53 hospitals and 14 outpatient surgery centers in 16 states and manages 200 independent community hospitals through its subsidiary.

Triad was not the first company to make a commitment to build a hospital in Mesquite. Banner Health had expressed interest in building a 25-bed hospital in 2001, but later it scraped the plans after the company shifted its focus.

Mesa View is Mesquite's first full-service hospital in several years, but is not the city's first hospital. Mesquite had a branch of Clark County General Hospital on its main street, Mesquite Boulevard, from 1942 to 1977, but the hospital closed after its chief nurse and caretaker, Bertha Howe, became ill. The former hospital is now a museum with artifacts of the city and hospital.