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Debate raised as Las Vegas neighborhood hospitals go up

A hospital operator with local facilities is developing micro-hospitals across the Las Vegas Valley, offshoots of a type of facility that’s become debated in parts of the country.

Dignity Health, the not-for-profit company that runs St. Rose Dominican hospitals locally, broke ground on its third of four planned neighborhood hospitals this week near West Sahara Avenue and South Decatur Boulevard.

The facilities, which will include emergency departments, primary-care offices and diagnostic imaging services, will also be in the areas of Craig Road and Martin Luther King Boulevard, the 215 Beltway and West Flamingo Road and Blue Diamond Road and Decatur Boulevard.

“People would come to our smaller hospitals in the same instance they’d come to our current three campuses,” Dignity spokeswoman Kathleen Ryan said.

The buildings aren’t an exact comparison to what are called freestanding emergency rooms, which don’t have to be associated with hospitals and generally lack the primary care services Dignity plans to offer, but they’re similar in offering neighborhood emergency rooms.

Dylan Roby, faculty associate with the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, said the core issue for Medicare is that patients with less serious conditions who could be seen at urgent care centers and head to freestanding emergency facilities anyway risk higher bills.

“If the same patient had gone to an urgent care center instead, there would be no facility fee, so there is a concern that these freestanding ERs are far more expensive than the urgent care centers they are replacing,” he said.

It’s an argument the competition also makes.

The Urgent Care Association of America has warned that people might mistake the emergency rooms, which operate like smaller versions of hospital-based emergency rooms, for quick care centers.

But Brian Brannman, Dignity Health Senior Vice President of Operations for Nevada, said that its planned facilities are more developed than freestanding emergency rooms.

He added that the neighborhood hospitals are planned for underserved areas including North Las Vegas to ensure immediate care for those who lack access.

Hospital Corporation of America, operator of Sunrise, MountainView and Southern Hills hospitals, is developing ER at the Lakes, a freestanding emergency room that will act as a department of Southern Hills, which is roughly 4 miles away.

Contact Pashtana Usufzy at pusufzy@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-4563. Follow @pashtana_u on Twitter.

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