Aurora facility on track for fall opening

By Jennifer Eisenbart

Editor

As the new year came and went and 2015 ticked into 2016, the clock started running for Aurora Health Care and a planned new facility in Burlington.

Now, as March approaches, Lisa Just, president of the Burlington/Walworth patient service market for Aurora Health Care, said the new facility is just the beginning of good things in the area.

“We’re excited that we’re on schedule to be opening in October of this year,” Just said. “It’s really becoming a reality for us.”

It’s been a long journey for Aurora Health Care in the area. In late 2012, the group announced it would be eliminating labor and delivery services at Aurora Memorial Hospital of Burlington in July of 2013.

The City of Burlington began exploring other options – including reaching out to another health care provider – before both Aurora and an ad-hoc committee came back to the table to try and figure out the differences.

In January of 2014, Aurora announced it would dedicate $100 million to build a new facility that would house several departments, for upgrades to both Memorial Hospital of Burlington and Lakeland Hospital in Elkhorn, as well as funds for physician recruitment.

Last week, Just began to lay out the details of where that money is going.

First and foremost, is the $76 million for “Aurora Health Center Southern Lakes,” located near Highway 36 on Spring Valley Road west of Burlington. That facility will house day surgery facilities as well as the new Vince Lombardi Cancer Clinic.

The clinic will have infusion bays for chemotherapy, private treatment rooms, counseling (both psychological and genetic), integrative medicine (aromatherapy, reiki, etc.) as well as Aurora’s accredited breast care program and a dedicated women’s imaging program.

Aurora will also offer 3-D mammography for the first time in the area.

“I believe it will become the standard,” Just said.

The cancer clinic will overlook a specially constructed healing garden that will combine with walking paths and also connect to the bike trails in the area.

“To me, this cancer center is really bringing a service to our patients and our families that they’ve not been able to get before,” Just said.

The new facility, originally budgeted for about $76 million, is running about $80 million right now due to cost inflation and the addition of some areas that weren’t in the original plan.

The remainder of the money will go to upgrades at both Burlington and Lakeland. Both hospitals will get renovations to the medical/surgical inpatient hospital areas and the intensive care unit, plus Burlington’s lobby will get new carpet, furniture and lighting.

Burlington will also get a second CT scanner.

“That will give us the ‘never having to be without one,’” Just said, as the first unit does occasionally need to be shut down for maintenance. “This will always give us the redundancy we need.”

Lakeland, meanwhile, will be getting what Just said is a “rural residency track,” meaning physicians doing their residency at the hospital will get their second and third years with a focus on medicine in rural communities.

Just said that rural track helps create doctors who stay in rural medicine. Providers across the area will be involved, but the students will spend the majority of their time at Lakeland.

Lakeland will also get an upgrade to its sleep lab and will relocate the occupational medicine space.