CRESTVIEW HOSPITAL PLANS FOR EXPANSION

Another step forward to meeting the tremendous growth planned for our area. This move by North Okaloosa Medical Center will only help folks in their decision process to move to the north end of Okaloosa County. Crestview is certainly going to solidify is place as the "Hub City".


Crestview hospital plans for more healthy growth
Medical Center near OK for ‘patient tower’
By KYLE WRIGHT Florida Freedom Newspapers

CRESTVIEW — North Okaloosa Medical Center continues to take steps to grow with the community. CEO David Sanders said the hospital is in the final stages of the approval process for a $22 million “patient tower” that would expand the hospital’s intensive care unit from eight beds to 20 and would add 28 private rooms. The 40 additional beds would expand the hospital’s capacity from 110 to 150 beds. Sanders is optimistic that ground will be broken for construction by the end of this year. He hopes the patient tower will be complete in time for the arrival of the Army 7th Special Forces (Airborne) at Eglin Air Force Base. The Special Forces’ move is scheduled to be complete by the fall of 2011. The patient tower would follow $12 million in upgrades completed since 2007. Recent improvements include a renovation of the labor and delivery unit, new PET/CT and CT scanners, and an upgraded catheterization lab. The hospital’s interior and exterior also have been refurbished. “I am very optimistic about the direction the hospital is going in. I believe we are working well with the community to be an active part of the community,” Sanders said. “We are very well supported by our corporation, as evidenced by more than $12 million spent in the last two and half years and by the possibility of greater expansion,” he added. “For someone to put about $30 million into a facility in a five-year period shows the community a lot of people’s commitment to the success of the community and the success of the hospital.”