Health Care and the Life Sciences

The KC region has more going for it as a health center than its size would suggest.

As with real estate, the three keys to building up a concentration of health-care services is location, location, location.

Greater Kansas City is the regional center for delivery of health-care services by simple virtue of its being the only major metropolitan area for 200 miles in almost any direction. Health care goes where the people are.

As a result, the metropolitan area’s hospitals draw patients not just form Kansas and Missouri, but large portions of Iowa and Nebraska as well. This market position alone accounts for the sizable number of large hospitals and medical institutions here.

Residents, though, are blessed not just with access to health services, but major providers for specialized medicine, and academic research centers, as well. In addition, the region is poised to raise its profile with the planned 2011 application by the University of Kansas Cancer Center for designation as a National Cancer Institute research site. If approved, cancer medicine in this part of the United States would be revolutionized.

The cancer center, though no longer a subsidiary of the University of Kansas, is part of the sprawling campus near Midtown Kansas City. Combined, the center and adjacent University of Kansas Hospital form a research nucleus that gives this region instant credibility as a life-sciences center.

That’s just the start of the health-care contribution made by this region’s institutions of higher learning. Nationally leading specialists in several fields are drawn by teaching and research institutions in Kansas City, and operating in conjunction with the major universities from each state.

The KU Medical Center is a complex institution whose basic functions include research, education, patient care, and community service at state and national levels. It has undergone major expansions in several areas of care delivery in recent years, including a new $77 million Center for Advanced Heart Care.

Similar education-related centers include the University of Missouri–Kansas City schools of medicine and dentistry. Outside the immediate area, but still a vital regional research cog, is the University of Missouri–Columbia, which includes several health research facilities.

Driving change in the overall health-research sector is the regional life-sciences push. Major components of this trend are the Kansas City Area Life Sciences Institute, the Stowers Institute for Medical Research, and the emerging Johnson County Research Triangle. Regional efforts incorporate not only the KU medical and cancer centers, but Kansas State University’s Olathe Innovation Campus, which opened in early 2011, and programs through Johnson County Community College.

Other, more focused groups are also working separately in each state. Although emergence of each sector in the life sciences—a broad category defined by research into plant, animal and human interests—is a story unto itself, all play an increasingly important role in raising the level of health care in metropolitan Kansas City and surrounding areas.

Overall, metropolitan Kansas City boasts nearly three dozen area hospitals that, combined, provide more than 5,000 beds. A history of leadership in areas such as medical ethics, mental health and private research remain part of the region’s growing health care scene.

HCA operates more hospitals here than any other organization, following its purchase of area facilities from Health Midwest. The $1.125 billion deal led to several expansions and additions, including the $250 million Centerpoint Medical Center in Independence.

In recent years, though, virtually every major community has had a hospital or large health care expansion under construction. Johnson County, Kan., may lead the list. Among the largest developments, Shawnee Mission Medical Center added an $84 million extension of its 383-bed hospital. Shawnee’s Center for Women’s Health also received national attention when it was listed as one of the best hospitals for women in the country. Menorah Medical Center has undertaken a five-year, $45 million capital expansion of its Overland Park campus. That work includes a new two-story ambulatory surgery center and two 60,000-square-foot medical office buildings.

Saint Luke’s South, also in Johnson County, has opened the $1.7 million Goppert Center for Breast Care in the Southridge Medical Building on the hospital’s Overland Park campus. Earlier, Saint Luke’s completed a $1 million expansion of a neonatal intensive-care unit.

Overland Park Regional Medical Center underwent a $16.5-million renovation of its inpatient and outpatient women’s services. Also in Overland Park, the first two buildings in the new $40 million Corporate Medical Plaza at 107th Street and Nall Avenue have been completed in recent years, as has the 6,000 square-foot Deer Creek Surgery Center at 129th Street and Metcalf Avenue in Overland Park.

One of the fastest-growing areas is the Kansas City Northland, including Clay and Platte counties, where delivery of health care has followed the new rooftop. Those additions include a $9 million outpatient clinic at Excelsior Springs Medical Center and at the Center for Women’s Care at Saint Luke’s Northland, part of a $75 million campaign for Saint Luke’s Health system.

Liberty Hospital undertook a $14 million expansion to add 40 more beds, bringing its total to 275. It added two floors to house private medical and surgical patient rooms, some with remote electronic monitoring equipment.

The Excelsior Springs Medical Center has added a two-story, 28,000-square-foot Outpatient Clinic and Wellness Center, bringing its total medical campus to more than 150,000 square feet. The project doubled the size of the Emergency Room and provided more specialists in the Outpatient Clinics, while housing Rehabilitation Services, Wellness Clinic Pharmacy, Human Resources administrative and medical staff offices, and Community Outreach meeting area.

One of the largest local expansions, though, demonstrates the medical community’s drive to become players on more than just a regional scale. Children’s Mercy Hospitals and Clinics is several years into its largest expansion ever, an $800 million, 15-year program to dramatically extend its Downtown campus and outlying satellite facilities. On the main center Downtown, a three-phase project will add 216 inpatient beds for a total of 476. It also will add hundreds of thousands of square feet of new outpatient clinics, offices and clinical lab space.

The Children’s Mercy project will also include extensive development of its research capabilities.