ChristianaCare wants to build two micro-hospitals in Delaware County

Two micro-hospitals, each with 10 patient beds and a small emergency department, are coming to Delaware County next year under an expansion announced Tuesday by ChristianaCare, the largest health system in Delaware.

The locations for the two hospitals have not been finalized, ChristianaCare said. Its partner in the development is Emerus Holdings Inc., a Texas company that is also collaborating on ChristianaCare’s reopening of Jennersville Hospital in western Chester County as a micro-hospital.

The new micro-hospitals will be open 24-7 and offer emergency services for things such as heart attacks and strokes, but some of the care will be virtual, ChristianaCare said. The hospitals will also provide diagnostic services, such as ultrasound, computed tomography (CT scans), X-rays, and laboratory testing.

The micro-hospital announcement underscores ChristianaCare’s intent to expand its reach in Delaware County even after deciding not to go through with its proposed acquisition of financially struggling Crozer Health in 2022. Depending on where the new hospitals are located, they could reduce the number of patients who seek care at Crozer-Chester Medical Center and Taylor Hospital.

“Neighborhood hospitals will enable us to provide access to high-quality care in a way that is sustainable and right-sized to meet the needs of local communities,” ChristianaCare’s CEO Janice Nevin said in a news release.

Micro-hospitals, designed to fill coverage gaps in areas that can’t support a full-scale hospital, are also a relatively low-risk way for hospital systems to expand market share in communities outside their core markets while drawing patients for high-level care to their flagship hospitals.

They are relatively new to Pennsylvania, with Allegheny Health Network opening four of them in Western Pennsylvania in 2019 and 2020, also in partnership with Emerus. Emerus is also partnering with WellSpan Health, a nonprofit health system in central Pennsylvania, to open three micro-hospitals in Cumberland and York Counties.

Lehigh Valley Health Network is building micro-hospitals in Douglass Township, Montgomery County, and in Macungie, in the Lehigh Valley. Its partner is a company with roots in Emerus, Community Hospital Partners LLC.

» READ MORE: Southeastern Pennsylvania is getting its first micro-hospitals

ChristianaCare has added about a dozen primary-care physicians in Jennersville, West Grove, and Kennett Square since 2020. They have about 25,000 patients. The health system also opened Concord Health Center, a multi-specialty clinic on Route 202, near the Delaware state line, in 2014.

While doing due diligence on Crozer, which has busy outpatient facilities in Broomall and Brinton Lake, ChristianaCare did a “deep dive in Delaware County” and liked what it saw, Jennifer Schwartz, ChristianaCare’s chief strategy officer, said in a January interview.

“We’re really excited about what we can provide to that portion of the state. Our strategy is about bringing care to these communities, equitable, affordable, cost-effective systems of care,” she said.