In 1959, Park Falls and the surrounding communities built a hospital for $375,000.
Nearly 70 years later, modernization of those facilities cost about $35 million.
Marshfield Medical Center held a grand opening for the newly improve Park Falls Hospital.
The recently renovated Marshfield Medical Center in Park Falls now features an updated physical therapy gym, an outpatient pharmacy, reliable heat, A/C in the inpatient rooms, and a relocated urgent care to name a few of the upgrades.
The partial hospital replacement was announced in 2021.
Seeing staff and community members gather to celebrate the changes Tuesday was an exciting moment for Laurie McEwen, the Vice President of Operations and Patient Care Services at Park Falls.
McEwen says her favorite moment so far was watching the reaction of a patient moving from the old unit to the new one.
“To watch just his surprise and the elation so the room he came from had no air conditioning, it was summertime, it was built in 1979 it shared a bathroom, into a brand new state of the art facility. He was elated,” said McEwen. “When I think about this project, that day really warms my heart. That's what it's about. It's really about those patients, getting them into a comfortable room, feeling comfortable, knowing that it's not just the best care they're getting, but they're getting it in the best facility.”
One of McEwen’s favorite changes is the café. The old one used to be in a lower level that was hard to find.
“It wasn't a place a lot of people met. They would go down there, get their food, and kind of bail,” said McEwen. “To now have such a beautiful space and so welcoming. I really hope that the community even comes and uses it, because that definitely is kind of the pinnacle of a change for us.”
In addition to improving hospital stays and visits for patients. Marshfield is hoping the state of the art facility will help attract health care workers—something that’s been a growing challenge especially in rural areas.
“When you look at the state of Wisconsin from a geography standpoint, Park Falls is in an area that is more rural than others. The next closest hospital is probably 50 to 60 miles in any direction, and so to ensure that we have access for people in park falls around the area to high level medical care, it was really needed to reinvest in our facility here, and we were able to do that,” said Ty Erickson, the President of Marshfield Medical Center Park Falls.
Of the $35 million put into the project, $20 million came from Wisconsin’s Healthcare Infrastructure Capital Grant program that launched during the pandemic.
Governor Tony Evers called the Park Falls Project “one of the crowing achievements” of the program.
