Local Health Care Receives a Lift

By Corey Preston, CoreyPreston@miconews.com

CNA Susan Cannon reviews paperwork at the Mercy Health Services clinic in Pleasanton. Mercy Health has expanded the hours and doctor availability at the clinic to prepare for a move to a larger facility planned along U.S. Highway 69.The project is one of two projects for new health facilities being planned — the other is a partnership with Olathe Medical Center in La Cygne — with a third such project being discussed in Mound City. (Photo by Corey Preston/CoreyPreston@miconews.com)

If there was any doubt about the need for improved health services in Linn County, one need only look at the success of expanded hours at the Mercy Health Services clinic in Pleasanton to put those concerns to rest.

“We’ve probably tripled our patient encounters,” said nurse practitioner Rhonda Kellstadt of the clinic’s business since it added a full-time physician and expanded hours to 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., at the beginning of January. “We’ve gotten a really good response, and once we get our new building, I think it’s going to grow.”

Mercy Health Services expanded its hours and offerings in order to grow a patient base in preparation for a move to a proposed new facility along U.S. Highway 69 in Pleasanton.

The project is one of two health facility initiatives in the works — the Lincoln-Scott township is teaming with Olathe Medical Center to place a facility in La Cygne — to improve local health care in Linn County. Meanwhile members of the Chamber of Commerce in Mound City are also hoping to work with Olathe Medical Center to update Mound City’s facility.

“With the growth happening in the area, it just makes sense to try to expand our services,” said John Woodrich, CEO of Mercy Health Services.

Woodrich is working with the city of Pleasanton and the Linn County Commission to place a 5,500-6,000 square-foot clinic along the new U.S. 69 corridor on the eastern side of the city.

The clinic would offer all the services offered by the current Pleasanton clinic — including treatment for minor emergencies, immunizations, preventative care, maintenance of chronic problems, lab work and physicals — along with new services such as radiology, lab capabilities and potentially an on-site pharmacy, Woodrich said.

“That’s something we’re still working on,” he said of plans for a pharmacy. “It might work out best to just have a local pharmacy lease space right there in the clinic, which would be to the benefit of everyone.”

The current Pleasanton clinic had been operating with just a nurse practitioner daily, and a physician on hand for two half-days each week.

“We had to make sure the volumes were there (for the new facility),” Woodrich said. “Based on the first three or four weeks, I’d say the demand is definitely there.”

Similarly, in La Cygne, local officials are working with Olathe Medical Center to expand health services in the community.

“We’ve got a clinic in town that’s only about 1,300 square-feet, which isn’t even big enough to get a gurney in there if somebody got really sick,” said Joe Turpen, president of the Lincoln-Scott township hospital board and a member of the La Cygne City Council.

The hospital board has identified a site on the eastern edge of the city, at 1017 E. Market St., on which it hopes to build an approximately 4,000 square-foot facility that would be operated by Olathe Medical Center.

“We want something that’s going to be big enough for a doctor and a licensed nurse, and it’s going to be designed so we can add on if the demand’s there,” Turpen said. “I’m hoping we can get a young doctor in here, somebody who will want to grow up with the community and really get involved here.”

Turpen said that plans for the building still have to be finalized, but that he’s hoping early construction on the facility could begin by April.

Woodrich is anxious to get work started on the Mercy Health facility, but is negotiating the extension of infrastructure to the proposed site with the city of Pleasanton. He said he hoped to begin construction this spring, with work not likely to take more than four or five months.

“That area is going to grow, so we want to be able to keep up with that ... We might be able to service some people from Mound City as well,” Woodrich said.

With new facilities planned in both La Cygne and Pleasanton, the Mound City Chamber of Commerce is hoping to improve services in its community in order to ensure the long-term viability of the Olathe Medical Center facility in Mound City.

The chamber of commerce has invited both Olathe Medical Center and the Linn County Commission to its meeting Thursday to discuss health care in the city and the county. Olathe Medical Center has discussed upgrading the facility it currently runs in Mound City, according to Chamber President Al Hurt.

“We just wanted to get them and the commission together to talk about it,” Hurt said.

Olathe Medical Center has provided proposals in the past for upgrading the facility that were a little too expensive, Hurt said, so the thinking is an option to move into another building.