A study currently underway will determine whether Silver City’s Gila Regional Medical Center should add to its current facilities or put up an entirely new hospital altogether.
Located on the north side of the city at 1313 E. 32nd Street, the hospital traces its roots to the opening of what was called the Ladies Hospital in the 1880s, becoming the Silver City General Hospital in 1957.
Not until 1983 was the 68-bed hospital on 32nd Street completed, at the same time that the institution was given a new name: the Gila Regional Medical Center, reflecting a growing southwest New Mexico patient base.
Responding to that growing patient base, hospital officials have said that the facility needs more care and treatment space, although concerns about funding remain constant.
Now, members of Gila Regional’s Board of Trustees have voted to approve a contract with the Albuquerque-based Dekker architecture firm to put together a study weighing the relative merits of facility renovation and/or new construction.
Neither option, Robert Whitaker, chief executive officer of Gila Regional, will be “small in terms of both dollars and time.”
As quoted in the Silver City Daily Press, Whitaker said he anticipates that the Dekker study will also suggest issues beyond facility matters. “There’s a little bit of future planning of where health care is going, and how do we make sure we appropriately allocate for that.”
According to public records, Gila Regional last year treated nearly 82,000 patients and had an operating profit of some $1.7 million.
By Garry Boulard
