New hospital facility planned for Jefferson, Texas

JEFFERSON, Texas - After decades without a dedicated medical facility or local doctor, residents in Marion County, Texas, are on track to gaining local healthcare.

The plan is to build a new hospital with access to primary care, mental health services and an emergency room.

Jefferson, Texas has been without an operating hospital for nearly 40 years. The Marion County Hospital closed in 1988.

“Right now, my understanding is that it’s kind of like a medical desert. You have to travel pretty far for specialty pharmacy medication and medical care. And so, this will just allow people to get care local to them,” said Dr. Miles Raizada, Jefferson, Texas, who is the hospital medical director.

The new "micro hospital” will be built by Houston-based operator Apexum Health Systems.

The plan is to demolish the old vacant hospital on North Walcott Street and rebuild a new one in its place.

“To get a specialist to be in Marion County, delivering care can be kind of hard. It's a high overhead and I think telemedicine really bridges that gap and allows it to be more accessible so people can go near home and still get specialty care,” explained Raizada.

Raizada is an emergency room doctor who also owns and operates a telemedicine company based out of Dallas.

“We see patients in El Paso, Amarillo and Brownsville. And so, telemedicine is really bridge that gap where just because you're in a rural area doesn't mean you can't get specialty care that you might need,” said Raizada.

The micro-hospital will feature 10 patient ER beds for acute care that’s unscheduled. Two of those beds will be used for people experiencing mental health crises.

“Well, we are told is based on the demographics and the needs of that area that they thought a few psych beds would be beneficial to the community. And so that's the plan is to tailor care to the community,” said Raizada.

Raizada believes the Jefferson hospital has the potential to become a model for dramatically improving access to healthcare in other rural communities.

“It's something that I think is a very interesting model. I think if it is successful, it can really be reproduced not only all over Texas, but all over the U.S. I think that would be amazing to be able to have access to care to pretty much everyone,” said Raizada.

A start date for construction has not been set, but once started, the project is expected to take less than two years to complete.