Methodist Celina welcomes community, begins treating patients
For radiology manager Stacy Condon, her work means being able to take care of her community.
The Pilot Point resident is part of the staff of Methodist Celina Medical Center that welcomed the community in for tours on Saturday and its patients for service on Monday.
“I can help my neighbors,” Condon said. “It’s health care. We’re a healing center. It’s for my community because there’s not something north of 380.”
Prior to opening, the nearest full hospitals were in Prosper, McKinney or Denton.
“We’re right in the middle, so it’s perfect,” Condon said.
Methodist Celina also means a promotion for her, as this is her first time to be a radiology manager in her 21 years of experience.
Hers is one of 200 jobs created with the opening of the hospital.
From 5-8 p.m. Saturday, the new hospital opened its doors to residents from Celina and the surrounding communities to see a peek at the new facility.
Hospital President Cody Hunter took visitors through the hospital tour, sharing details about both the services available at the start as well as additional services planned for the future.
“We’re not going to do everything out of the gate, but we’re really going to focus on those time-sensitive diagnoses, especially stroke,” Hunter said. “That’s where 10 or 15 minutes, or even 5 minutes, is the difference between getting better or not.”
The building itself is built with growth in mind.
“Anywhere where you see that stucco material— it’s actually called EIFS— that part of the building is designed to come off and expand,” Hunter said.
Upcoming plans include an additional 100-bed tower at the north end of the building with a helicopter pad at the top of the building and an expansion of the south tower.
“Eventually we’ll have 300 beds here at the hospital,” Hunter said.
The northern expansion will also allow the hospital to increase the number of operating rooms it will have available.
One of the early expansions of service will be a fullservice labor and delivery department as early as this fall.
“We want to make sure we have everything worked out in the hospital before we start inviting families to deliver babies on purpose,” Hunter said. “Our ER is ready to deliver babies on accident.”
With 43 acres available on the campus, the medical center will also feature outpatient offices and other doctors’ offices.
For Cpt. Cliff Brooks of the Aubrey Fire Department, having a new hospital available east of Aubrey’s service area means the possibility of saving more lives.
“Our patients … are going to have the ability to have critical care and acute interventions that we might take 30 to 45 minutes to get to now in 15 minutes,” Brooks said. “The distance … to our east side is really going to make a difference.”
He chatted with his Pilot Point colleagues Matt Lollar and Eleanor Beltran during the event between visits from the people touring the hospital.
Within sight of the ambulances sat a CareFlite helicopter.
The helicopter crew welcomed people—especially kids—into the cabin to see the controls up close and to pose for photos, including pilot Hope Seibert.
She patiently answered questions from the public about the conditions in which they have to fly and what her favorite part of flying is— 'the view”—and least favorite—' yesterday’s wind.”
Following the tours, the hospital staff directed the crowd to head to the courtyard area of the hospital, where band The Flatbed Trailers was playing.
Additional staff were on hand to distribute information and giveaways, and food trucks lined the area near the courtyard.
As the band wrapped up for the evening, the emcee encouraged the crowd to move to the front of the hospital for the drone show.
With his toddler Lacey in tow, Celina resident Mathew Eberius said it was good to see the hospital that he and his family may need.
“Her growing up here, it’s going to be important that we have a hospital with all the latest tech and everything she’s going to hopefully not need,” he said. “It’s just exciting and a big thing. When we moved here, they didn’t have street lights on Preston and now they’re opening a giant hospital.”
