Submitted Graphics A drawing by architectural firm JLG shows an exterior view of a new Heart of America Medical Center in Rugby. Hospital CEO Erik Christenson said ground should be broken at the new site on U.S. Highway 2 in mid-2022.

RUGBY — In response to financial problems stemming from an aging facility, the Good Samaritan Hospital Association approved plans to build a new Heart of America Medical Center campus in Rugby in 2021.

Work on the project has moved forward at a steady pace in one year, according to HAMC CEO Erik Christenson.

Since the project’s approval, the hospital association board has applied for a grant from the USDA Rural Development program to help finance the project. The board selected a site for the new campus on the east side of Rugby near U.S. Highway 2, formed steering committees, hired architects, and more.

Christenson said a new hospital is crucial to not only the health of area patients, but its community’s health as well.

“If you look at some of the grounding needs of infrastructure in small communities like Rugby, you have education, you have agriculture, and you have health care,” Christenson explained. “And health care is a pinnacle need and requirement for a community to progress.”

Christenson said access to health care played a key role in the lives of not only families with young children in the area, “but also, it assures that those who are getting toward retirement age and may need more health care facilities, that they have facilities in town so they can actually purchase property, purchase houses and remain in the community and continue to attend sporting events for the kids; continue to go to restaurants.

“The whole infrastructure of the community depends on health care being available,” he added.

As needs change for Rugby area residents, a new facility would better meet those needs, Christenson explained.

The structure currently housing HAMC consists of one main building, dating to the late 1940s, with wings added in 1964, 1973, and 1991. The hodgepodge of additions has resulted in higher maintenance costs and missed opportunities for Medicare reimbursement stemming from the inefficient use of the large space.

A study Wisconsin accounting firm Wipfli performed for HAMC found the higher costs from the current structure would put the availability of health care services for the Rugby area in jeopardy.

A newer structure, however, would improve HAMC’s bottom line by cutting wasted space, resulting in a better Medicare reimbursement rate.

The board hired architectural firm JLG for the new facility’s design.

“In the last couple of months, we’ve gone through four different renditions of design,” Christenson said. “We just closed out schematic design two weeks ago, so schematic design is finished.”

Work began recently on the building’s interior design.

Christenson said the new design lends itself to “more of a holistic health process.

“There’s a lot of talk about that in modern medicine – taking care of the whole person,” he said. “So, that is the idea of exposure to the environment, outdoors, exercising, community engagement, social engagement – all of these things that create a healthy, inviting environment.”

Christenson said the new hospital “will have the amenities of a clinic, a wellness center, all of these things that obviously encourage health.

“There will be a cafe there, where you can sit and talk and eat and converse with people around you – an inviting, homey feel, more like the small-town cafe as opposed to an institutional environment with the cold corridors and dormitory rooms like we have now, which is not very inviting or healing,” he added.

The new streamlined hospital will have seven inpatient beds for acute care, Christenson said.

“We’ll have one ER observation bed for people who just need to have observation to determine whether they need to be admitted or have further testing. Then, we’ll have an 18 long-term swing bed (unit) which will function as a long-term care facility, so it will be very much like a long-term care (unit), but under the critical access hospital,” he added.

Christenson said many services HAMC offers from its present building, such as the wellness center, will move to the new site. Christenson said HAMC’s current partnerships with providers of specialties such as cancer care would continue.

“We plan to have a chemotherapy infusion suite in the new hospital,” he said. “We are partnering with the oncologists of Altru for that. We will still have telemedicine options for psychiatric care and diabetes care.”

“Of course, it depends on provider availability, but it seems like telemedicine continues to be available and we’ll continue to utilize that,” Christenson added. “When you look at telemedicine, it’s not ideal for rural health. We don’t get reimbursed well for it and I don’t think people like it as well. For oncology, (partnerships with specialists) work well, because we do procedures here for oncology. We do the infusions. That works really well.”

Christenson said government agencies and most rural patients prefer in-person visits.

“So, at this point, we encourage people to see your provider face-to-face,” he said.

Providers in the present HAMC Johnson Clinic will relocate to the new building, also.

“The new clinic has much better patient access,” Christenson said. “You’ll have more access to the rooms; bigger doors, nicer doors with bigger rooms you can move in and not have to walk around people. The clinic will have provider offices and nursing stations that are centralized. It’s amazing how much time you can waste walking back and forth between the printer, the rooms, the office. All that is minimized and yet it enhances the patient experience.”

Other enhancements to patient care include windows to allow sunlight into treatment rooms.

Christenson said HAMC listened to community concerns about how the hospital’s current site would be used once it moves to its Highway 2 location.

“Current campus development is (under the direction) of Kevin Leier, and we have a steering committee looking for anchor tenants and we’re looking for some ideas for the current structure,” he added.

Christenson said the newer design could attract young healthcare professionals to the area as well.

“Right now in health care, recruiting young professionals is extremely difficult,” he said. “Having a modern campus does enhance your ability to recruit. It shows you’re being progressive. It shows you are caring about your community. It shows you’re serious about health care in your community.

“With this kind of infrastructure, when you do this in your community – you take this risk, you put this work into it – there’s a lot of sweat and tears into this kind of work,” he added. “You’re showing you’re serious about progress in Rugby.”