Nearly six babies are born a day at Mercy Health-Fairfield
Hospital.
“That gives you one small example of the population growth in the
area,” says Greg Ossmann, Mercy Health-Fairfield spokesman. “We have the largest
birthing center in Butler County. Over 2,100 babies were born there last year
and that’s increasing.”
Indeed, the Butler County population has grown by 40,000 in the
last 10 years, now at 370,000, with similar growth in neighboring Warren County,
which has seen a 34 percent increase in the previous 13 years.
The growth in Greater Cincinnati’s northern counties mirrors
growth in health care services during the last decade. It’s not a surprising
trend, considering hospitals will follow their patients just as any retail
business will follow its customers.
The last five years saw the opening of three major hospitals in
the north: UC Health’s West Chester Hospital, the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital
Medical Center Liberty campus and the Atrium Medical Center that replaced the
Middletown Regional Hospital. They join Mercy Health-Fairfield Hospital,
established 30 years ago; TriHealth’s Bethesda North in Montgomery, which has
been around for more than 40 years; and Fort Hamilton Hospital with roots back
to 1925.
If competition is good for health care, it should only get better
in the North in terms of quality and range of services. As Ossmann says, “All of
health care is very competitive. The northern market for Mercy Health is an
ultra-competitive market and getting more so every day.”
Beyond Good Growth
When it comes to additional services and facilities, perhaps the
biggest news this year is the opening of the groundbreaking Women’s Health
Center, part of the UC Health system at West Chester Hospital.
A long time dream of Dr. Lisa Larkin, a specialist in midlife
health issues and menopause, the center is not simply an OB-GYN service; it is
an integrated approach to women’s health issues, from adolescence to geriatrics.
It amounts to one-stop shopping for women, covering areas that include primary
care, OB-GYN, psychological services, skin care and reconstructive surgery, and
special surgical and comprehensive breast care that includes cancer treatment.
The 26,000-square-foot facility features 47 exam rooms, 20
physician specialists on staff and 30 more who visit the center.
Dr. Larkin sees the center as a resource for women in the area,
even if they don’t become regular patients. “I want this to be perceived as a
place that women can contact to get good, evidence-based information,” she says.
“I have not seen anything close to this in the country with this many services
under one roof and where services will be integrated.”
UC Health also plans to add a second patient tower in West Chester
that will take two years to complete. The $135 million project will include
maternity services that the hospital does not currently offer.
Other hospitals in the area are also adding to their repertoire of
services. Cincinnati Children’s Liberty campus increased its infectious disease
services this year and is offering outpatient psychology and psychiatry
services. Mercy Health-Fairfield opened a new fifth floor patient tower, adding
29 private oncology beds. It became the first in the region to use a
groundbreaking new stent, started an aquatic class for breast cancer recovery,
and launched a new outpatient wound center that is equipped with special
hyperbaric oxygen chambers. Mercy Health-Fairfield has also begun fundraising to
add a state-of-the art special care nursery with eight private rooms and a focus
on treating babies born with addictions passed on by the mother.
Most of the hospitals in the region now offer robotic surgery
procedures in a wide range of areas including prostate focal therapy,
arthroscopy and hip replacement, prolapse procedures and heart surgery. While
the equipment is obviously expensive, it’s seen as cost-effective for patients
in the long run since robotics permit a range of minimally invasive procedures,
significantly cutting back on the need for expensive, extended hospital
stays.
A Prescription for Fitness
Another trend in the region is integrating exercise with medical
needs as more health care providers subscribe to the “exercise is medicine”
approach. TriHealth has its Blue Ash fitness center integrated with physicians
at Bethesda North for care in such areas as cardiac rehab, diabetes and
orthopedic issues. Mercy Health has a similar system with its hospitals and
Healthplexes in Fairfield and Anderson.
In fact, the gym is becoming a center for at-risk individuals and
patients as much as the traditional workout junkie. “The whole health care
system has realized that if people are not physically active, it’s costing them
money,” says Deb Riggs, general manger at TriHealth Fitness & Health
Pavilion.
Fitness centers that offer a wealth of workout options and
classes, medically integrated with a hospital component and a physicians’
network, are well positioned to meet the new accountable care, wellness trend.
“We have certainly been trending toward that and now it is
accelerating. (We’re) trying to keep people well rather than fix them when they
are broken,” says Gretchen Aberg, a master personal trainer at Mercy.
A Healthy Tomorrow
Observers expect health care options to increase in the North.
Gone are the days when those who wanted sophisticated health care needed to go
to “Pill Hill,” the cluster of hospitals in Clifton. The trend is for suburban
hospitals to continue to add specialty services and technology, such as robotics
and advanced digital imaging, treatment previously only found at one or two
central hospitals.
“We have to offer top-notch care for our patients because they now
have choices in this region,” Ossmann says. “Other hospitals have opened and
expanded in our northern market and that’s because they see it as we see it.
It’s where the population is and where it’s growing. So, it becomes more
competitive every day.”
Hospitals in the region can boast plenty of “best of”
designations accrued during the last couple years to attract patients.