HCA Virginia to open freestanding emergency rooms in Richmond, Chesterfield and Loudoun next year
Launching in areas of high growth, the emergency facilities are part of a $60 million investment
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HCA Virginia plans to open three freestanding emergency rooms by the middle of next year in the city of Richmond as well as Henrico and Loudoun counties. Officials say the facilities will help reduce emergency department wait times at other hospitals both in and outside of the HCA umbrella.
While celebrating the groundbreaking of the Richmond location on Thursday morning, speakers emphasized that the facility is an example of “meeting people where they are.”
The freestanding ERs are expected to operate 24/7 everyday of the year. They’ll be staffed by board-certified emergency physicians, along with nurses and supported by full diagnostic and imaging capabilities.
“It will mean quicker access to emergency expert care,” said Dr. Bjorn Bernhardsen, a medical director with HCA. “It means confidence that when emergencies happen, help is close by.”
The decision to open new facilities in Richmond, Chesterfield and Loudoun County stems from the localities’ noted population growth and anticipated projections through the Weldon Cooper Center For Public Service at the University of Virginia.
Dubbed Scott’s Walk ER, the Richmond facility will be built in the Scott’s Addition neighborhood. While the city has hospitals in its eastern and western reaches, the freestanding ER will fill a gap in the area and is also located near I-95 — an access point for Henrico County residents that might need it.
Devin Tobin, chief operations officer at Henrico Doctors’ Hospital, said that neighboring facilities were seeing patients coming from within Richmond city limits and that helped signal the need for a facility in the area. HCA Virginia is also investing $5 million to open three new urgent care centers in the Richmond region over the next two years.
The forthcoming facilities are in development at a time when some health systems are bracing for federal funding changes and expected drops in Medicaid patients stemming from a reconciliation bill that Congress passed this summer.
Formally titled the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the legislation was aimed at reducing taxes for some and increasing federal spending on the U.S. military and border security, and was fully backed by President Donald Trump. It came at the cost of major changes to federal health care funding that affects hospitals and adjustments to Medicaid eligibility.
Last month, Augusta Health announced the closure of two primary care clinics and an urgent care clinic and cited the OBBBA as one of the factors in the decision. Six hospitals in Virginia were also flagged as vulnerable to potential service cuts or closures when the federal funding changes take effect and thousands of Virginians may lose their health insurance through Medicaid.
Prior to the passage of the OBBBA, an association that speaks on behalf of hospital chains and health systems in Virginia joined several other states in writing a letter to Congress expressing concerns about the bill. While Democrats opposed the legislation, some Republicans expressed similar concerns. U.S. Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Westmoreland, and Jen Kiggans, R-Virginia Beach, were among a small group of Republicans cautioning against the bill before ultimately voting to pass it.
While the six vulnerable Virginia-based hospitals are not owned by HCA, the health system has about 180 hospitals around the country, Tobin said Thursday morning. She explained that HCA leadership has been in conversations regionally and nationally about their needs.
“Learning from each other of how we’re adapting with the regulatory changes has really been a focus, and then really relying on our relationships with our political leaders to educate them on what we need in order to care for the communities has been, I think, a big benefit and success,” she said.
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