In just over two months, St. Clair residents will have a new, state-of-the-art hospital.

The total cost of the project is $31.4 million and is between 80 to 85 percent complete.

“What we’ve tried to do is design something that’s patient- and customer- friendly,” said Terrell Vick, president and chief operating officer for St. Vincent’s St. Clair Hospital.

The new hospital has a streamlined emergency room area, with 14 rooms flanked by imaging and laboratory units. “To be able to have a tool like this is really positive,” Vick said of the new ER area, which he called the “front door” of any hospital.  “You’re looking at a building, but really it’s streamlined into service units.”

For patients entering the actual front, visible from I-20 in Pell City, a main corridor running west to east connects the rehabilitation center, the cafeteria, a patient check-in area, the chapel and the medical office building.

The gastrointestinal suite, along with surgery, same-day surgery preparation and recovery/observation, waiting, critical care unit, inpatient rooms and pharmacy will be located on the second floor.

Though it takes up the same square footage as the current St. Vincent’s St. Clair, there are more rooms for each unit. The emergency area will have 14 rooms, the critical care rooms are increased to six and there are long-term care rooms as well.

“If you’re an emergency patient, for example, we’ll take care of you and you’ll never leave the ER area,” Vick said. “Medicine has changed so much since the 1970s that you can free up space for other things.”

He said one of the real focuses of the new hospital is surgery. “We’ve got a lot of folks who are traveling west to get things done. Probably 80 to 85 percent of what Birmingham offers for basic-type care will now be taken care of here. There’s no comparison for these operating rooms in this facility.”

He said the goal is to recruit physicians that will support fulltime, orthopedic, cardiac and general surgery.

The facility will also be digital, the St. Vincent’s Birmingham location was named one of the “most wired” in the country earlier this week. “When the dust settles, in the end, we could be the most wired in our system,” Vick said. There are five St. Vincent’s hospitals in this area serving seven counties.

State-of-the-art diagnostic equipment will be integrated into the facility, including CT scan, MRI and nuclear medicine.

One piece from the current location that will be moving to the new site will be the MRI machine, which will receive an upgrade in the coming weeks.

The overall look draws influence from neighboring St. Vincent’s locations. “It has a common denominator of architectural elements of St. Vincent’s East and Blount, but is unique,” said Russ Realmuto with Birchfield, Penuel and Associates, LLC, who designed the building. “The chapel has some resemblance to the East chapel.”

The St. Clair County Health Care Authority, St. Clair County Commission, city of Pell City, St. Clair County Economic Development Council and St. Vincent’s Health System have worked together to build the 40-bed, 79,000-square-foot, two-story hospital.

“This beautiful hospital is more than just a building.  It’s a lasting testament to what working together can create and the citizens of St. Clair County will reap the benefits of what St. Vincent’s, the County Commission, the Health Care Authority, and the city of Pell City was committed,” said Don Smith, Executive Director of the St. Clair Economic Development Council.

“This development has truly become greater than its individual parts,” he said.  “This new hospital operated by St. Vincent’s will provide first-class health care to our citizens and also help provide the Veterans Affairs project with premium care to the veterans of Alabama.  Jefferson State Community College’s nursing program will, in turn, provide a solid pool of well-trained nurses and healthcare providers to both.”  

 More than just care, said Smith, are the jobs the facility has and will create. “It feels me with great pride when I’m on these job sites and I see all of the St. Clair County car tags of the construction workers and local businesses”.