Mercy Health's $200M Kings Mills Hospital nearing completion in Warren County
Dec. 1—Warren County's newest hospital, the $200 million Mercy Health Kings Mills Hospital, is expected to open in the first quarter of 2024.
The Dayton Daily News last week was given a tour of the new facility, which is in the process of being furnished with medical and diagnostic equipment. The healthcare provider received its temporary certificate of occupancy before Thanksgiving, and the 172,500 square-foot building has been in a flurry of activity since, with equipment installation and other interior projects.
The hospital is on a 30-acre site at Kings Mills Road and Kings Island Drive where the College Football Hall of Fame was once located. The signage is up around the campus across the street from Kings High School, but some of it is covered until the new hospital is opened.
The Ohio Emergency Medical Services website currently lists three hospitals in Warren County — Atrium Medical Center in Middletown, Bethesda Medical Center at Arrow Springs in Lebanon and Kettering Health — Franklin Emergency Center in Franklin — compared with eight in Butler County and more than a dozen in Montgomery County.
Jason Asic, president of Mercy Health Kings Mills Hospital, said the building was designed to give patients "an easier feel to get services people need."
"We wanted to look at ways to add innovation with staff input," he said. "We have to get the basics right."
He said flexibility was also important in designing the hospital so that it can evolve to meet community demands.
Asic said the new 60-bed community hospital was designed with the input of Mercy staff to make it more efficient to assist patients with an eye to improving the patient's experience and care. The main entrance at 5440 Kings Island Drive features a two-story atrium with cathedral beams and natural light. A patient can immediately go to a registration booth to check in the four-story hospital or go to the two-story physician's office building. Other amenities such as a coffee stand and a cafeteria are nearby.
The Emergency Department will be open 24/7 and will have 16 treatment spaces and one trauma bay for patients who walk in or who arrive by ambulance. There is also a helipad to transport serious trauma cases to other facilities. The walkways around the ambulance areas and to the helipad have deicing systems. Asic said the Emergency Department can be expanded as needed.
One thing that an emergency patient won't see are curtains in the treatment spaces. Each space has "switch glass" that changes from clear to frosted at the flip of a switch to provide patient privacy. Asic said not having the curtains helps with infection control and saves on the costs of washing the curtains. He said there is also sound masking using white noise to increase patient privacy.
The second floor will house surgical and procedure rooms and the intensive care unit, as well as a recovery room, and a cath lab with separate prep and recovery areas. Asic said there is 3,000 square-feet of shell space that can be used for future expansion if there is a need to build a second cath lab. He said there are four operating rooms and another shelled operating room for future expansion.
The third and fourth floors and have 24 beds each for patient care. Each of the rooms also has a special lockbox to store drugs and other medications the patient might need.
Asic said the patient rooms have television systems with cameras in the room so a patient can have a video call with family or utilize roof cameras to see what's going on at nearby Kings Island or outside around the hospital.
"Everyday we're starting to evolve into a hospital," Asic said. "When we open, the lights will never go off."
Asic said staff hiring started earlier this year and some of the new employees are already working at other Mercy Health facilities. He said instilling the right employee culture is important. Asic said people make a place great, and they want to deliver and make a good first impression on patients.
"We're building a network of care," Asic said. "We want to meet people where they live and give them the right level of care based on their needs."
