Hospitals in the North continue to advance health care
Local hospitals are advancing health care in the Greater Cincinnati region by expanding care capabilities, opening and building new facilities, and engaging experts who are paving the way in the north.
New Heart Hospital Underway at TriHealth
The new TriHealth Heart Hospital on the Bethesda North Hospital campus will expand TriHealth’s capabilities and capacity by using state-of-the art facilities and technology while delivering team-based care under one roof.
“The fact that we’ve brought all of these incredible programs, technologies and clinicians together in one location gives us the ability to provide the care needed at any time within our hospital,” says John Ward, senior vice president of the Bethesda North Region at TriHealth.
The Heart Hospital will increase TriHealth’s capacity for all cardiac services. This will include adding procedural labs (cardiac catheterization, vascular, interventional radiology, and neurosurgery and electrophysiology) as well as the associated pre-and post-procedural space. The number of beds in the cardiovascular intensive care unit will be increased and the rooms will be refreshed.
There will also be a brand-new endoscopy suite with five procedural rooms, a waiting room and administrative areas. Another hybrid operating room will be built to accommodate multidisciplinary procedures addressing structural heart conditions, atrial fibrillation and stroke. The Heart Hospital will also be the home to TriHealth’s new Advanced Heart Failure Center and left ventricular assist device (LVAD) program.
The $110-million-dollar capital investment project is expected to be completed in several phases over the next few years with the final renovations and additions being completed in 2025.
TriHealth’s cardiac program is the only one in the region to earn a three-star rating—the highest quality rating—from the Society of Thoracic Surgeons in 2021, placing it among the top 8% of cardiac surgery programs in U.S. and Canada.
The Pelvic Health Center at UC Health
UC Health recently launched a new Pelvic Health Center on its West Chester Campus. The center is the region’s only pelvic floor and incontinence center staffed by fellowship-trained urogynecologists from both gynecologic and urologic areas of medicine.
“This is the only center of its kind in the Cincinnati/Southwestern Ohio area that hosts urology and gynecology under the same roof. We are looking forward to serving the community and we’re excited about this,” says Dr. Ayman Mahdy, the center’s director.
Many factors can contribute to pelvic floor disorders, including vaginal childbirth, pregnancy, cancer, menopause, genetics, smoking, age and race. Women who are overweight or obese also have a greater risk for pelvic floor disorders.
According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), nearly 24% of U.S. women are affected with one or more pelvic floor disorders.
“Pelvic floor disorders are really common, and they are sensitive topics. We see a lot of women who have suffered for a long time, because they have felt ashamed to bring them up to health care providers, so they’ve just been suffering, or the other common thing we hear is, ‘I thought this was just normal,’” says Dr. Hayley Barnes, a pelvic medicine and reconstructive surgeon at the center.
Signs and symptoms of pelvic floor dysfunction can include bladder and bowel leakage; urinary problems, such as an urgent need to urinate; painful urination or incomplete bladder emptying; a heavy feeling in the pelvis or a bulge in the vagina or rectum; straining, pain or incomplete evacuation during bowel movements; pain or pressure in the vagina or rectum; or painful sexual intercourse.
Mercy Health Opens New Urgent Care in Maineville
Mercy Health has several expansions underway to serve patients in the Greater Cincinnati region, including the opening of its newest location in Warren County, Mercy Health – Maineville Urgent Care. The 3,194-square-foot facility opened in mid-September.
Courtney Seitz, chief operating officer at Mercy Health Physicians – Cincinnati, says the goal is to better support and respond to care needs of the patients and the community.
“The mission of our founders has helped create the foundation of us providing care and responding to our communities, being present where people live and where people are active, and I think we’ve continued that in our strategy, year-over-year,” she says.
Services offered at Maineville Urgent Care include COVID-19 testing, digital X-rays, health screenings, immunizations, lab tests, occupational health, physicals, splinting and wrapping, and stitches, among others.
Mercy Health – Maineville Urgent Care is only a few storefronts down from Mercy Health – Maineville Primary Care, which opened in February. The opening of these new facilities come after the opening of Kings Mills Primary Care, which opened in January of 2021.
“What we’re doing with our expansion, overall, is really trying to pull those services close to home, accessible for our patients, so, hopefully, we can get them on a wellness path to be better,” Seitz says.
Mercy Health – Cincinnati also recently broke ground late in October on a new, $156-million 60-bed hospital and medical office complex on a 30-acre site along the Interstate 71 Corridor in Mason at Kings Mills, just north of Kings Island. Construction on the 156,900-square-foot facility, which will be called Mercy Health – Kings Mills Hospital, is expected to be completed late in 2023.
Christ Hospital Health Network Expands into Springboro
The Christ Hospital Health Network is slated to open a new Obstetrics and Gynecology Physician Office in Springboro in January with a formal ribbon-cutting ceremony.
“We are excited about opening the new office. Myself and Dr. Teresa Schutte will be providing a full spectrum of office OB-GYN care,” says Dr. Dena Costa at The Christ Hospital Health Network.
The site will include exam rooms, a large procedure room, offices and a medical lab. The Springboro location is the latest expansion of the hospital’s women’s health services in Warren County and is the result of requests from patients to expand coverage. The free-standing facility offers easy access from expressways, easy entry into the building and ample parking.
The new location signifies the furthest expansion north for the network. Since The Christ Hospital Medical Center – Liberty Township opened in January of 2018, the center has treated thousands of patients throughout Butler and Warren Counties. The new office in Springboro will also allow patients access to the Family Birthing Center in Liberty Township.
“The Christ Hospital Liberty Township Birthing Center has seen an increase in patients, and with this, comes a greater need to expand our services,” says Dr. Jenny Demos, associate medical director for women’s health at The Christ Hospital Health Network.
The Family Birthing Center at The Christ Hospital Medical Center – Liberty Township includes labor, delivery, recovery, post-partum and nursing rooms, private special care nursery rooms and dedicated cesarean section birthing rooms. The birthing center also offers natural childbirth amenities and inpatient/outpatient lactation services.
Atrium Medical Center Leads with Specialized Lung Procedure
Premier Health’s Atrium Medical Center is leading Ohio with the number of patients who have participated in the Zephyr Endobronchial Valve procedure, the first minimally invasive procedure that treats patients with severe COPD and emphysema.
Dr. Jamie Yunger, medical director of the Intensive Care Unit, performed the first Zephyr Endobronchial Valve procedure in the Dayton and Cincinnati region in 2019 and was the second physician in Ohio to perform this procedure.
“When you look at the studies that are out there, patients typically see about a 60% improvement on how they feel, and improvement in lung function. I think, from our standpoint, we’ve done a little bit better than that, and consistently, right around 80% of our patients have seen benefit,” Yunger says.
He says the Zephyr Endobronchial Valve procedure is a way of performing lung volume reduction surgery without cutting on the patient.
According to a recent study by the American Lung Association, 16.4 million Americans, or 6.6% of adults, have been diagnosed with COPD, chronic bronchitis or emphysema.
