As part of an ambitious $100 million-plus expansion plan, Olathe Medical Center broke ground today on a new $25 million cancer center.
The 25,000-square-foot facility, expected to be completed next year, will consolidate the hospital’s currently fragmented cancer outpatient services in one place.
It’s the latest project in a frenzy of construction at the hospital’s 250-acre medical campus near 151st Street and Interstate 35. The last year has also seen the opening of a new hospice house and the start of construction on a neonatal intensive care unit.
“It furthers our continuum of care on our campus, Olathe Medical Park, so basically our concept is to have a continuum of care from birth to death,” says Frank H. Devocelle, Olathe Medical Center’s president and CEO.
The new cancer center will have plenty of nearby competition. Further north along the I-35 corridor, Shawnee Mission Medical Center and The University of Kansas Cancer Center boast state-of-the-art cancer facilities.
The hospitals are meeting a growing need; the American Cancer Society estimates that nearly half of all males and nearly a third of all females in the United States will develop cancer.
“In our service area – primary and secondary service area – there are at least 3,200 cases annually that are diagnosed, cancer-related, and we feel those people should have the opportunity to be cared for close to home,” Devocelle says.
Olathe Medical Center’s primary and secondary service areas embrace Johnson, Miami, Franklin and Linn Counties.
The hospital’s cancer services currently are fragmented among the various medical buildings on its campus. The new building will bring together medical oncology, radiation oncology and chemotherapy suites under one roof.
This story has been corrected to refer to The University of Kansas Cancer Center rather than the The University of Kansas Medical Center.
Dan Margolies, editor of the Heartland Health Monitor team, is based at KCUR. You can reach him on Twitter @DanMargolies.
