ST. LOUIS — After many years of planning, Mercy recently broke ground on its new multispecialty center across from Mercy Hospital St. Louis.
The 272,000-square-foot, five-level outpatient center will be designed with “the patient experience at top of mind at every turn, offering a seamless experience,” hospital officials wrote in a news release.
“The technologies and patient-centered approaches we plan to introduce will pave the way for the patient experience of the future, along with a better, more streamlined experience for our physicians and co-workers,” said Stephen Mackin, Mercy executive vice president and Mercy St. Louis community president. “We evaluated leading consumer models both inside and outside of health care, are crafting the experience based on what patients want and need, incorporating both patient and physician input.”
Through research, Mercy has taken lessons from other world-class, customer-focused industries and applied them to health care, the release stated. The new model of care will consider every step of a patient’s journey.
“We looked at everything. Nothing was off the table,” said Dr. Jeff Ciaramita, president of Mercy Clinic in the St. Louis region. “Mercy’s mission is to get health care right and we know that when patients are dealing with health concerns, they need ease. We must make everything from finding a parking spot to wait times easier for our patients. By enabling them to plan and take charge, we provide calm in the midst of sometimes challenging health care needs.”
The center will include a new scheduling experience where patients receive an itinerary for each step of their visit prior to arriving. The center will also offer single point of care, ensuring patients get everything they need without adding another step. Patients will also be able to have virtual visitors when loved ones can’t be there physically.
Specialties will include bariatrics, gastroenterology, neurosurgery, orthopedics and sports medicine, reconstructive surgery and urology. There will be additional services to support weight and wellness programming, imaging services and a surgery center.
The design of the center is meant to improve experiences between physicians and other providers across specialties by combining their expertise through use of collaboration spaces and technologies to improve patient care.
Some of the functionality was enhanced due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Coworker and lounge areas will serve as spaces for collaboration and separation, as needed. Waiting rooms have also been designed to provide space for social distancing if necessary.
The facility will be located at Ballas and Conway roads in Creve Coeur. Construction officially began on Jan. 13 and the center is scheduled to open in spring 2023.