St. Mary’s Medical Center Welcomed First Patients
DULUTH, Minn.—“It’s a big deal. I feel honored that I get to participate and that our community has this new hospital. I’ve been treated very well here so I’m excited,” said first St. Mary’s Medical Center patient Bethany Johnson.
After 4 years, Essentia’s Health opened St. Mary’s Medical Center is welcoming their patients over from their legacy building, with new patients set to walk in as early as Monday.
It’s been a day four-years in the making for Duluth’s state of the art $900,000 hospital.
It only took hospital staff six and a half hours to move 232 patients over from Essentia Health’s legacy hospital to the replacement St. Mary’s Medical Center. Each patient was assisted by three different teams of hospital staff teams at the Legacy St. Mary, transport staff that took patients between the two hospitals, and then at the New St. Mary’s Medical Center.
Hospital staff say that this is a bittersweet moment as many nurses and patients have strong attachments to the old building. However, Essentia staff says that they’re just ready to have the new state of the art building open.
“We’re really excited to be able to open this up, have this available for the community to be able to start. 2019 is when it started. I think everybody’s ready to be moved in and start serving the community with this new, beautiful medical center,” said President of East Essential & Emergency Physician Bill Heegaard.
Bethany Johnson was their first patient welcomed into the new St. Mary’s Medical Center, at 7:01 a.m. Johnson was transported to the Medical Center’s brand new birthing center and is expecting her second child in just a few weeks. She was excited to see all of the new amenities in the new birthplace.
“I’m glad it’s finally here because people have been talking about it since I got here. And I couldn’t really settle in my room because they were like ‘we’re going to be moving you’,” said Johnson.
The new St. Mary’s Medical Center can fit up to 350 patients, with room for future expansion for ICU rooms. Each patient gets their own room, which will help mediate patients in case of any future pandemics.
