New Women’s Clinic Will Feature Obstetrics Unit

A group of Northwest Arkansas physicians is proceeding with plans to build a new 80,000-SF women’s center, complete with an obstetrics unit, in Johnson.

The physicians involved in the project practice at Parkhill Clinic for Women in Fayetteville and at Northwest Arkansas OB-GYN Associates in Springdale.

The hospital will be built and managed by MediSphere Health Partners, a Nashville, Tenn.-based company. Also involved will be CareSelect Group, a Dallas company that owns the assets but not the practices of the two physician groups.

Groundbreaking for the new facility is expected to take place in the next few weeks and construction should be complete within 15 months, says Howard Flushman, senior vice president for CareSelect.

The site, on the west side of U.S. Highway 71 at the Johnson exit, was chosen with great care, Flushman says.

“[The physicians] want this to be a regional facility. It isn’t for Fayetteville [only]; it isn’t for Springdale,” he explains. “This is supposed to be serving the whole regional area, the entire Northwest Arkansas market. They tried to pick a neutral place, one that’s easy to get to and right off the freeway.”

The facility, which hadn’t been officially named at press time, will apparently compete with the new women’s and children’s center planned by Washington Regional Medical Center. Washington Regional officials previously announced plans for their new center, a $10 million, 50,000-SF facility to be on the west side of North Hills Medical Park in Fayetteville.

In mid-May, Washington Regional said it would also go ahead with plans to relocate its entire acute care complex to the location, a $70 million project expected to take two years to complete.

Although construction crews have begun relocating a portion of North Hills Boulevard necessary for Regional’s project, Flushman questions the timing of the announcement, which did not discourage the physicians in his group from their own project.

The doctors of Parkhill Clinic have been closely tied with Regional’s obstetrics unit for the past 25 years, he says, and they’ve repeatedly urged the hospital to build a women’s center. But all earlier efforts for a new center went nowhere, Flushman says.

In this latest attempt, the physicians were excluded from taking an equity position in the project. That, along with other issues, helped persuade them to build their own center, Flushman says.

“They’re trying to get … more control over their lives,” he says. “This is a way they can center themselves facility-wise and office-wise and then branch out from there [to also practice throughout the rest of the region].”

A recent filing with the Arkansas Securities Department indicated that a limited-liability corporation between the parties, which include Real Practices Inc. of Russellville, had been formed. The operating agreement filed with the state said that the new facility would require about 10 acres of a 40-plus acre tract being purchased for $2 million. Six acres of the tract is in a floodway, according to the filing, and the remaining 24 acres may be developed for additional medical facilities.

Although the physicians expect to continue delivering babies at Regional as well as at the other area hospitals, they also expect to prove they can deliver high quality care at a lower price, Flushman says.

“I think the thing that will be proved out over time is the issue of who delivers [what] the marketplace wants … the best quality and the most fair and reasonable price. That’s what our challenge is to deliver,” he says.

“Our docs have already demonstrated to the marketplace their quality of care. Now is the opportunity to show that, under their management, without the burden of large institutional costs, they can deliver … an even more comprehensive product.”

The doctors, Flushman continues, “are not giving up on Washington Regional. They’ll still deliver babies at Regional … for that business that requires us to go there. This is just another opportunity to offer an alternative site.”

Six physicians currently practice at Parkhill, and Northwest has four doctors. Most but not all of them are investors in the new center, Flushman says. Their individual investments vary in size.

Flushman says women’s health centers are one of the hottest areas of growth in the obstetrics/gynecological specialty.

“The market wants better coordinated services for women – more comprehensive, better coordinated and more evenly distributed care.”

Both Regional and the physicians’ new center include plans to have the physicians’ offices in the same building as the delivery rooms. Flushman says that’s more efficient for the doctors because they can manage cases from their offices and the hospital at the same time.

That arrangement also allows the doctors to better coordinate in ensuring coverage for their patients, he says.