Veterans' health care center changes name: Center makes progress toward expanding
Posted on Saturday, November 29, 2008
The newly named Veterans Health Care System of the Ozarks (previously known as the Fayetteville Veterans Affairs Medical Center) is inching its way towards breaking ground on a 144,000-square-foot addition.
Jacque Long, facility planner, said the center has selected a contractor, but it is not ready to announce which contractor yet. She said the announcement will come at a pre-construction press conference in the first week of January. She said the center will also break ground on the expansion project in January. The construction phase will take about 36 months to complete.
The expansion was announced in September 2007. The project will nearly double the size of the current facility. At that point the VA was in the development design phase for a new clinical addition, which will be built on the northeast corner of the campus. Long said the center has been waiting on financial appropriations from the U.S. Congress, which it has now received, though she wasn’t allowed to say how much was given. Kathleen Fogarty, the center director, has said the funding needs for the project are estimated at around $62 million.
The addition will provide space for clinical services such as ancillary testing. It will be dedicated to outpatient services. Such services are currently offered off site in space that the VA has leased. Patients are sent to clinical space on Sunbridge Drive for audiology, dental, optometry, women’s health and mental health services. The addition will allow the VA to bring those services back to the campus, Fogarty said. It will also provide space for specialty services such as cardiology, radiology and neurology.
The Veterans Health Care System of the Ozarks serves veterans in 22 different counties covering Northwest Arkansas, southern Missouri and eastern Arkansas. Long said that in fiscal year 2008 the center will serve around 48,000 veterans at its various locations throughout the 22-county area, which include the Fayetteville location and five community-based outpatient locations.
The widespread coverage the center offers to the region was part of the reason the name was changed, Judy McKee, assistant public affairs officer for the center, said.
“We’re no longer just Fayetteville, Ark.,” McKee said.
She used the several community-based outpatient locations as examples of how the center has branched out and noted that the center plans to open two more community-based outpatient locations, one in Jay, Okla., and one in Ozark.
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