Brownwood News – Hendrick Health System celebrated the completion of a new surgery center in Brownwood with a ribbon cutting ceremony this morning. Mayor Stephen Haynes, Dr. James Fowler, Hendrick Trustee Paul Waldrop, and Hendrick CEO Tim Lancaster, spoke to a crowd of more than 200 people gathered for the ceremony.
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“This is an exciting day for us,” said CEO Tim Lancaster as he began the ceremony held at the new Hendrick Surgery Center, located at 2401 Crockett Drive. “We wanted to have a place where people could come if they needed outpatient surgeries, and this facility here gives them an option.”
Tours of the facility were offered before and after the ribbon cutting ceremony.
“It’s important for us to be good community partners,” said Lancaster as he spoke of several local companies utilized during the construction of the new surgery center, including Kirby Cabler Enterprises, Brasher and Company for landscaping, Roberts and Petty for site utilities, Ribble Land Construction from Zephyr for concrete work, Early Glass and Brownwood Door, and Grimsley Electric.
“We’re very appreciative of those people and they did an outstanding job,” Lancaster said. The 13,400 square-foot facility includes three operating rooms and 13 pre-op/recovery rooms, and is scheduled to open Thursday, May 18th.
The surgery center is a joint venture with Abilene and Brownwood physicians and will offer same-day surgery for specialties including otolaryngology (ENT), gastroenterology, orthopedics, podiatry, urology, gynecology, ophthalmology, pain management and plastic surgery. The four Brownwood area physician investors include Dr. Bohn Young, Dr. Michael Neal, Dr. Daniel Stewart, and Dr. James Fowler.
“We knew this was something that would greatly benefit the Brownwood community,” said Dr. James Fowler, who was credited as a frontrunner for the inception of the project three years ago.
“Having a facility that we can be proud of, that we know is state-of-the-art, and staffed with the best nurses, it allows us to feel like we’re offering care that Brownwood deserves,” Dr. Fowler said.
Brownwood Mayor Stephen Haynes was also present during the ceremony and noted the Brownwood High School HOSA (Health Occupations Students of America) group attending.
“I want you to look at what can be achieved when locally-minded people focus on their community,” the mayor said as he spoke to the students. “You’ve got a group of doctors who believed in our community and said, ‘this is home, this is where I want to stay,’ and instead of leaving and going to a metropolitan area to have the very best, they brought the very best to you. And what I want you to hear is that you can do that too. You don’t have to live in a metropolitan area to have the very best or be the very best.”
“Today Brownwood has the very best that medicine can offer in this type of facility and we’re very thankful to God and to those people who brought it here,” Mayor Haynes concluded.