Before the paint dried on the new $68 million Community Cancer Institute, we announced yet another construction project on the campus of Clovis Community Medical Center.
 
The $390 million expansion will include a five-story bed tower, eight new operating rooms, 15,000 additional square feet of emergency room space, more parking, a bigger dining area and enhanced radiology and lab services.
 
The project is more than one-third completed. And when it is done in 2022, Clovis Community will have 352 all-private inpatient beds and will offer 420 new jobs for nurses, therapists, technicians and support staff. The total number of inpatient beds in Community’s system will then climb to nearly 1,300.

More hospital rooms are needed

Community’s President and CEO, Tim Joslin, says the growth is in response to an increasing demand for hospital beds at Community, “Our goal is simple – to bring as many inpatient beds in operation as quickly and cost-effectively as possible.”

In the last decade, patient admissions have risen by 37% and emergency room visits have climbed 53% to Community Medical Centers’ hospitals.

Expanded mental health services for the Central Valley

While work crews broke ground on new buildings in Clovis, other crews were expanding access to mental health services at Community Behavioral Health Center, adding 12 more beds and framing in space for an additional 18 beds in the near future.

Joslin says it will take more expansion to keep pace with the need. “Our management team is working on short and long-term solutions to help alleviate bed capacity constraints throughout our system.”

It will take an ongoing effort

Since 2005, Community has invested well over $1 billion to expand and upgrade its facilities.  And the growth will continue. Community will soon break ground on a new 150-bed skilled nursing facility across Herndon Avenue from the Clovis Community campus. Plans for a massive expansion of Community Regional Medical Center are already being developed.