TriStar Health's Advanced Joint Replacement Institute is located on the eighth floor of TriStar Centennial Medical Center.
By Joel Stinnett – Reporter, Nashville Business Journal
TriStar Health’s new 50,000-square-foot joint-replacement center at Centennial Medical Center is completed and set for its first surgery, but officials hope the facility feels more like a Holiday Inn than a hospital.
The $96 million Advanced Joint Replacement Institute features 10 operating rooms, a family waiting area and 18 private patient rooms occupying the entire eighth floor of the tower. TriStar is a division of Nashville-based HCA Healthcare Inc. (NYSE: HCA).
“Everything here is state-of-the-art and focused on patient experience,” said Dr. Michael Christie, medical director of the institute. “We want the experience to be similar to one you might have in a hotel.”
The institute is part of a $500 million investment TriStar is making in its network of hospitals and care centers in Middle Tennessee, including the $123.7 million, four-floor expansion of Centennial’s patient tower.
Centennial is Nashville’s second-largest hospital, according to Nashville Business Journal research, with 656 beds and $3.74 billion of revenue in 2016.
| Rank | Name | Gross Patient Revenue |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Vanderbilt University Medical Center and Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt | $7.29 billion |
| 2 | TriStar Centennial Medical Center | $3.74 billion |
| 3 | Saint Thomas West Hospital | $1.77 billion |
The new institute will be capable of performing 5,000 surgeries a year, an increase of 1,400 surgeries compared to the number of joint replacements at Centennial in 2017.
Part of that increase is because the center’s entire staff of more than 30, along with a centrally located supply and washing rooms, will now be housed on the same floor, making it more efficient, Christie said.
When designing the center, however, TriStar CEO Heather Rohan said the patient and their families was the first concern.
The waiting area has a fireplace, coffee bar, separate family seating areas, computer workstations and smart screens to keep relatives updated on a patient’s progress.
“Undergoing any kind of surgery can be very anxiety-provoking for a patient and their family. There is no such thing as minor surgery if it’s you,” Rohan said. “So the vision was to create a warm space.”
The construction of the institute was challenged in a certificate of need dispute by Saint Thomas Health in 2015, after Saint Thomas Midtown had recently completed its own $25 million joint-center expansion. The Tennessee Health Services and Development Agency ultimately approved the project.
Joint replacement is one of the most profitable procedures inside a hospital, and demand for the surgery has exploded as baby boomers have aged.
“People are getting older and suffering the consequences of things they did when they were young,” Christie said. “This is an operation that changes lives. We probably get more hugs per clinician than any one else.”
Two more TriStar hospitals will also be growing vertically, with a $69.3 million addition of two floors at TriStar Skyline Medical Center and an $18.6 million, eighth-floor medical/surgical bed unit at TriStar Summit Medical Center. The Skyline expansion was set to begin in June, while the Summit project will be completed in late 2019.
Other investments include a $12 million expanded behavioral health unit at TriStar StoneCrest Medical Center, a $28.1 million behavioral health hospital in partnership with Maury Regional Medical Center in Columbia and a $10 million freestanding emergency room in Mt. Juliet.
Rohan said the investments are in response to advances in technology and procedures, as well as Nashville’s growing population.
“We’ve got to make sure we meet the needs of the community,” Rohan said. “They all seem to be converging at this moment of time between this extraordinary growth we’re seeing and the development and need for complex services.”