MetroHealth opens new hospital at Severance Circle
Hospital Medical Director and Cleveland Heights resident Dr. Johnbuck Creamer (at left), Cleveland Heights City Manager Tanisha Briley, MetroHealth Board Chairman Thomas McDonald and MetroHealth CEO Dr. Akram Boutros cut the ribbon for the new 12-bed hospital.
On Jan. 3, leaders from Cleveland Heights and MetroHealth cut the ribbon on a new 12-bed hospital at Severance Circle in Cleveland Heights.
The hospital is located on the second floor of the building where MetroHealth has operated an emergency department and medical clinic since 2016—shortly after Healthspan (formerly Kaiser Permanente) dissolved its medical practice and vacated the building.
MetroHealth spent about $12 million to build the hospital, and its total investment in Cleveland Heights now stands at about $25 million, according to Dr. Akram Boutros, president and CEO of The MetroHealth System.
Across the nation, hospitals are opening sophisticated satellite facilities like this one in an effort to increase their patient base.
With its main campus on West 25th Street in Cleveland, MetroHealth didn’t have an East Side presence before taking over the Severance Circle facility—along with the healthcare coverage of many area Healthspan subscribers.
“People had been going to Healthspan-Kaiser their whole lives and they didn’t know where else to go,” Boutros said in an interview at the ribbon-cutting. “We want to be able to serve people close to where they live.”
The hospital is equipped to handle a range of conditions requiring hospital stays of about 3–5 days, such as pneumonia, asthma, COPD, diabetes, and severe cases of flu or other illness, according to literature from MetroHealth. Other services requiring specialized equipment or critical care will continue to be treated at the main facility.
Officials at the ribbon-cutting were especially proud of the layout and amenities offered at the new mini-hospital, which include free parking, comfortable accommodations for overnight visitors, window blinds that can be controlled from the bed, and on-demand food service with restaurant-style meals. The beds themselves incorporate a range of technologies, such as weighing patients and warning people when it’s not safe to get out of bed.
Throughout the ribbon-cutting event, hospital officials emphasized the desire to incorporate the facility into community life. Its medical director is Cleveland Heights resident Dr. Johnbuck Creamer. A Bikur Cholim room provides a place for the area’s Orthodox Jewish community to follow the traditional Jewish commandment of extending aid to the sick.
Boutros said this facility—along with a similar 16-bed MetroHealth hospital in Parma—provides a proving ground for processes and systems that are likely to be incorporated into the planned $1.25 billion transformation of MetroHealth’s main campus.
Bob Rosenbaum
Cleveland Heights resident Bob Rosenbaum is co-chair of the Heights Observer Advisory Committee, and is responsible for its advertising sales and market development.