State representative Mike Sheridan speaks at the Janesville Medical Campus Groundbreaking ceremony for St. Mary's Janesville Hospital and new Dean Health System clinic.
Speakers and other honorary construction crew members at the Janesville Medical Campus Groundbreaking ceremony for St. Mary's Janesville Hospital and new Dean Health System clinic break the cold ground with ice augers.
Mark McDade, MD, Mary Starmann-Harrison, Regional President/CEO of SSM Health Care of Wisconsin, and Craig Samitt, MD and President/CEO of Dean Health System, stand on the future home of St. Mary's Janesville Hospital and new Dean Health System clinic. The three were speakers at the groundbreaking ceremony held there.
JANESVILLE — It’s still two years away, but Helen Anderson refers to St. Mary’s Janesville Hospital as an answer to her prayers.
As many as 45 years ago, Anderson and her husband, Sherman, went to Madison to lobby for a second hospital in Janesville. The couple, however, were told the city’s population wouldn’t support more hospital beds.
But much has changed in 45 years, and state panels no longer influence how many hospitals a community will have.
In Wisconsin, it’s determined by the free market, and SSM Health Care of Wisconsin and Dean Health System have determined that the Janesville market is ready for a $140 million hospital and physician office complex.
Officials broke ground Monday for the project at the southeast intersection of Interstate 90/39 and Highway 11 on Janesville’s east side.
The Andersons, longtime patients of the Dean Riverview Clinic in Janesville and St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison, were masters of ceremonies for the groundbreaking.
“Competition is good,” Helen said in reference to the arrival of St. Mary’s Janesville Hospital in a market that Mercy Hospital has owned for decades.
The new 50-bed hospital and adjacent physician office complex should open in 2010.
The hospital will be part of SSM Health Care of Wisconsin, the parent company of St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison and St. Clare Hospital in Baraboo. It will include all private rooms, electronic health records and a state-of-the-art emergency department.
Dean will develop the new physician office complex, which will offer services comparable to those already provided at Riverview Clinic. Eventually, most of Dean’s physicians, staff and services will move from Riverview to the new facility.
The new hospital and physician office is expected to employ 344, with the possibility of an additional 155 indirect jobs. Dean currently has about 50 doctors and 200 employees at its Riverview and Northview clinics in Janesville.
Dean and SSM officials have said Janesville residents want more health care options. Studies, they’ve said, show the Janesville area will need 100 more hospital beds by 2011 and that 40 percent of residents leave Janesville for their health care.
Craig Sammitt, Dean’s president and CEO, said the project is the beginning of a new health care legacy in Janesville.
Mary Starmann-Harrison, SSM regional president in Wisconsin, said that legacy will be built by two service-oriented, mission-driven organizations.
“What will happen on this land will literally change lives,” she said. “This is a place where daughters will become moms, hearts will grow strong again and sick children will grow well.”
State Rep. Mike Sheridan commended the two companies for moving forward in the face of a difficult economy.
“We will come through this,” he said, “and when we do, we will have a first-class facility.”