After battling supply shortages that pushed its completion back by about a month, Exceptional Community Hospital-Maricopa opened its doors to residents at 7 a.m. Dec. 22, within hours providing emergency services that otherwise would have required a transfer to an out-of-town medical center.
“The City of Maricopa has needed a hospital for the last 14 or 15 years, based on their population, and so we feel honored and blessed to be here as part of that process,” said Dr. Tim Johns, medical director.
The state-of-the-art facility at 19060 N. John Wayne Parkway (State Route 347) includes a specialty internal medicine hospital, a 24-hour emergency department, digital imaging, an in-house laboratory, and about 20 outpatient and inpatient hospital beds for acute admissions and overnight observation of patients, all in 21,000 square feet.
It also has Maricopa’s first helipad for when patients need to be transported to other facilities, which saw its inaugural aircraft touch down later that morning.
Exceptional Healthcare, a Texas-based hospital making its first expansion into the Arizona market, also owns Exceptional Pets Maricopa, found farther north on 347 at Smith-Enke Road. A city employee suggested it look into building one of its hospitals there while the veterinary and pet-boarding facility was being developed.
Chief Medical Officer Dr. Frederick Johnson said the hospital will expand the range of health care services available locally.
“The City of Maricopa has lacked a significant amount of high capability (care) in the community, only having primary care and urgent care. So we’ll have the ability to do quite a few things from media CT scans to taking care of serious problems like heart attacks, broken bones, and things of that nature that aren’t typically available in a community like this without a hospital,” he said.
Maricopa’s first hospital is creating 60 to 100 jobs for a city with 1,200 health care workers who commute at least 30 minutes to work, according to a City of Maricopa-commissioned labor study. With more plans for hospitals and other medical care facilities in the community there will soon be additional employment options for this workforce, city officials said.
Image courtesy of Exceptional Healthcare