Major expansion announced at Huntsville Hospital

Huntsville Hospital Health System CEO Jeff Samz said the Madison Street Tower will add five additional floors and 100 patient rooms.

“In 2008, the Madison Street Tower was created with expansion in mind. This project, we’ll add five floors of patient care space on top of what you know is the emergency department,” said Samz. “Today, we will have a new state-of-the-art cardiothoracic ICU. And that project is made possible by the largest charitable gift in the history of our system, a $10 million donation to create a new era of cardiovascular medicine in our region.”

A new neurosciences ICU is on the way as well, Samz said.

“We’ll also have a brand new neurosciences intensive care unit serving stroke neurosurgical patients from across the Tennessee Valley,” he said. “We’ll have three additional floors of ICU or medical intensive care or medical surgery space; very flexible rooms that allow patients who need the specialists only available in Huntsville to receive care.”

With 13 hospitals and more than 19,500 employees, Samz said the Huntsville Hospital Health System must continue to grow to keep up with the needs of the region.

“Since 1895, we’ve been here to help the community meet these growing healthcare needs,” he said. “The success of Huntsville, Madison County and the broader Tennessee Valley in becoming one of the best places to live in the United States brings new people to our community every day, and it’s incumbent on us, as the region’s leading healthcare provider, to respond with new space and new resources to meet those needs.”

Samz said the expansion will have a ripple effect throughout their healthcare system and improve the region’s only Level 1 trauma center.

“The emergency department in Huntsville is the Level 1 trauma center for the entire region,” he said. “We bring in stroke, heart attack and trauma patients from across the region and this new project will give us space to admit people and move them through our emergency department quickly and make sure they can get a bed so our ER can keep moving.

“It will also allow us to more promptly accept transfers from the regional hospitals when they need to come to Huntsville for care.”

In a move that will be sure to please anyone who has ever had to share a hospital room, Samz announced there will be no more double occupancy.

“This project eliminates the use of double-occupancy hospital rooms in Huntsville Hospital,” he said. “Nobody wants to share a hospital room with anyone else, and this project puts an end to that practice once and for all.”

While the Huntsville Hospital Health System already has a $3.3 billion economic impact on the region, Samz said the new project will increase that impact.

“This project will also have a substantial impact on the local economy,” he said. “Not only will we spend $150 million to construct the facility itself, the patient care space being created will add 350 new healthcare jobs to the local economy.”

The project is estimated to take 22 months with construction expected to begin this fall, pending state approval of the certificate of need.

This story originally appeared in 256 Today.