ARDEN – Mission Health opened a standalone emergency facility in southern Buncombe County on Tuesday, Nov. 19, that it says will alleviate pressure on its main campus in Asheville and cut patient travel and wait times.
The facility at 2512 Hendersonville Road in Arden includes 11 emergency rooms, 24-hour emergency care and onsite diagnostic imaging services. Unlike an urgent care center, the emergency department will be staffed by board certified physicians and emergency-trained nurses who can treat patients suffering all kinds of ailments and injuries.
“We can take care of the sickest of the sick patients,” said Wyatt Chocklett, the chief operating officer for Mission Hospital. “We can see patients that have heart attacks, stroke-like symptoms and the most acute episodes.”
The building was formerly an urgent care operated by Mission, which has been owned by Tennessee-based for-profit HCA Healthcare since 2019. It has been about one year since plans got started to transform the facility into an emergency department with the addition of a state-of-the-art CT scanner, resuscitation room and a chemical shower, Chocklett said.
He said the facility can treat patients of all ages, from “cradle all the way up through end of life.”
Patients who need to be admitted for additional care such as surgeries will be transported to Mission’s main campus in Asheville, which is equipped with multiple operating rooms.
“We can do a lot of procedures here but obviously there are some things that we can’t do,” Chocklett said. He added that across all of HCA’s free-standing emergency rooms, less than 8% of patients who seek treatment get admitted.
“It’s primarily for patients that are going to be discharged back home,” he said.
HCA sought the construction of the Arden emergency department, as well as an additional ER in west Buncombe County, in an effort to reduce stress on the hospital’s main campus in Asheville, which sees between 250-300 patients each day.
“We are so excited to be able to fill this need that has been longstanding in western North Carolina, specifically here in South Asheville,” Chocklett said.
New ER opens as HCA faces multiple lawsuits
The Arden emergency facility comes as HCA faces lawsuits from North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein (now governor-elect) and Buncombe County that include allegations of emergency room bed shortages and long wait times.
Late last month, HCA Healthcare asked a judge to dismiss a federal lawsuit filed by Buncombe County. The county’s lawsuit argued that its EMS workers were “acting as unpaid labor” and that HCA should pay upwards of $3 million.
The county in court filings has accused HCA of gutting its emergency care facilities since its acquisition of Mission Health in 2019. The county said over the years, HCA “intentionally understaffed” the ER facilities and caused them to “deteriorate dramatically.”
The county was denied earlier this year from joining Stein’s breach of contract lawsuit against HCA, which includes accusations of staffing issues and long wait times at the Mission Hospital emergency department as well as a “manufactured” bed shortage.
HCA said Buncombe County is trying to get paid twice for the same care, calling the lawsuit an “unjust enrichment claim” in a recent court filing. HCA/Mission has repeatedly denied allegations made by Stein and the county and has vowed to defend themselves in court.
Christopher Cann is a journalist with the USA TODAY Network reporting for the Asheville Citizen Times in the wake of Tropical Storm Helene.
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