Two of the 50 private rooms inside the new hospital across Hartford Avenue from Amazon will cater specifically to morbidly obese patients.
Inside the pair of specialized rooms await a double-sized wheelchair, ceiling lift, reinforced bed and wider bathroom facilities for bariatric patients who may not comfortably fit inside the average hospital room.
The rest of the rooms will eventually be occupied by those recovering from strokes, post-amputation surgeries and a wide range of other complex medical issues.
Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital of Johnston is set to open to patients Thursday morning, July 25.
Outside the freshly constructed building last week, a long row of 32 handicapped parking spaces still sat clean and vacant, awaiting the in-patient physical rehab’s first batch of clients.
“We have 50 beds; all singles; private showers in each room,” said Chief Executive Officer Daniel Parkinson. “Which is really what people are looking for now, when you’re sick …”
State-of-the-art
The facility is self-described as “a state-of-the-art inpatient rehabilitation hospital that features 50 private rooms, a spacious therapy gym, activities of daily living suite, on-site dialysis, therapy courtyard and advanced rehabilitation technologies. The hospital will serve patients recovering from conditions such as strokes and other neurological disorders, brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, amputations, complex orthopedic conditions and cardiac pulmonary conditions.”
“We don’t have any other line of service,” Parkinson explained. “We don’t have SNF (skilled nursing facility) beds. We don’t have outpatient. It’s just going to be in-patient physical rehab.”
The CEO clarified that the hospital caters to a specific type of patient.
“We don’t do addiction or behavioral health,” he said. “Sometimes people think of ‘rehab’ as a place to come for drug addiction or alcohol addiction, and that’s not what we do.”
Parkinson and the hospital’s Director of Business Development, Joy Helgerson, led a “sneak preview” tour last week, exclusively for the Johnston SunRise.
“The residents of Johnston and the surrounding areas know that we’re here,” Helgerson said. “We are an acute rehab hospital providing rehabilitation services to those who have suffered major debilitating events. Such as a stroke; maybe some orthopedic things; any kind of medical complexities.”
While the facility ultimately has the capacity to care for 50 patients at a time, a much smaller number will start moving in for short stays following the July 25 opening. Gradually, the number of patients will grow, maxing out at 50 (the number of single-bed private rooms)
The Stay
“We have a very short length of stay compared to what a nursing home would be,” Helgerson explained. “So our average length of stay for patients recovering from these illnesses or debilitating events is about 12 and a half days. So much shorter.”
“Measured in weeks, not months,” added CEO Parkinson.
While the Ocean State has its share of nursing and rehab facilities, Parkinson and Helgerson said the Johnston hospital will provide a much-needed service to the region.
“Lots of times right now, some of these patients are leaving the state to get … high quality (inpatient rehabilitation),” Parkinson said. Patients looking for this sort of care “may go to a place like Braintree Rehab or Spalding (Rehab), up in Boston. Now they have an opportunity to stay in the state by having high quality cutting-edge technology. So they’re traveling pretty far, often, for that kind of physical rehabilitation.”
According to Parkinson, a high percentage of future patients will arrive “after a stroke; a brain injury, traumatic or non-traumatic injury; spinal cord injury, both traumatic or non.”
“And there are others here, in the state, but they often don’t have those kind of programs for spinal cord or brain injury,” he explained. “And then we see what we call ‘complex ortho’ — right, so patients that are otherwise healthy that maybe had some osteoarthritis that had their knee replaced, they won’t come here.”
Those who check in will be suffering from a wide range of complex medical issues. The facility has a unique set of assets to aid most of its patients back onto the road to eventual recovery.
“But patients who had orthopedic surgeries where there might have been some complications; or perhaps someone who has simple joint replacement but have a lot of co-morbidities,” Parkinson explained. “Maybe they’ve had a stroke in the past, or have Parkinson’s Disease, or maybe significant cardiac disease. That’s what we mean when we say ‘complex-orthopedic’ — as well as just ‘complex medical.’”
Long Road
The facility faced several challenges over the past three years, as it sought licensure from the state and gained all the needed approvals prior to construction.
Rhode Island’s former Department of Health Director Dr. Nicole Alexander-Scott initially approved the $42 million project application in 2020. After that early-stage approval, an argument broiled over whether the facility was “in need” in the Ocean State.
Its competitors claimed the hospital would damage local nursing homes and similar healthcare providers. In 2021, a state hearing officer released a 21-page decision finding that Encompass had not proven the need for the facility in the region. The case went to Rhode Island Superior Court and Encompass ultimately prevailed.
The company behind the facility insists the Johnston hospital will complement “local acute care services.”
“In addition to 24–hour nursing care, this hospital will offer physical, occupational and speech therapies to restore functional ability and quality of life,” according to a 2023 Encompass press release. “Care will be provided by highly specialized nurses, therapists and physicians. The hospital will feature all private patient rooms, a spacious therapy gym with advanced rehabilitation technologies and an ‘activities of daily living suite,’ cafeteria, pharmacy and therapy courtyard.”
The suite includes a mock apartment, complete with kitchen, washer, dryer and a bathroom, so patients can practice “living” before leaving the facility, under the guidance of professionals.
The building at 2109 Hartford Ave. opened to its host of recently trained, newly hired employees on July 5. The management behind Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital of Johnston planned an open house and ribbon-cutting for July 25.
An invitation to the Open House announces: “Before we begin serving patients in late July, you’re invited to get an exclusive sneak peek of the newest addition to the Rhode Island healthcare community.” Small group tours will be offered from 3 to 6 p.m. Thursday.
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