Latest / WIXN AM 1460 - Shaw Local Radio / Talk Line: Mick Welding shares the latest updates from Morrison Community Hospital

Transcript

Talk Line: Mick Welding shares the latest updates from Morrison Community Hospital · WIXN AM 1460 - Shaw Local Radio

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Good morning, Sock Valley. You're here with the Waking Crew
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: on FM ninety five one and AM fourteen sixty w
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: i X and I'm your host, Brandon Clark, and it's
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: now eight sixteen on your Monday morning, and you know
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: what that means. It's time for talk line. And I'm
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: joined today by our good friends from the Morrison Community Hospital.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Mick Welding is joining me this morning. Mick, how are you, sir?
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Hey, good morning, Brandon. Glad to be on. We appreciate
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: you guys reaching out to us and let us know
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: what's or we'll want to let everyone know what's going
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: on over here.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, always always happy to share this kind
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: of news and just grateful for you know, the work
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: that any healthcare worker is doing, but especially the fantastic
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: job that you folks have when it comes to local
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: healthcare and Morrison and the surrounding areas. And you are
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: just going to we're starting the show on some good news.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: You've got some new surgeons in the building.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, my gosh. We had a surgeon that I think
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: is pretty well known around around the listening area. His
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: name is doctor David Powers, and doctor Powers is joining
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: us in fact Wednesday this week April First, it's not
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: a joke. It's he's coming and we are excited to
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: have him here. I've met with him just briefly. He
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: has been in kind of getting with acclimated with all
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: of our departments, and I had a chance to, of
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: course snap a picture and say hello. But you know
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: the magic of Facebook, I put a post on Facebook
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: saying that he was going to be joining us, and
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: you're able to look at analytics on Facebook and see
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: how many people viewed that, what their ages are, you know,
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: how many people normally follow the hospital, how many don't.
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: And this had to blow any record. Well, I know,
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: it's been any record that I've ever seen in the
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: thirteen years I've been here. And he's had seventy three
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: thousand views. Wow, that's a pretty well known person and numerous,
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: I mean over one hundred and fifty compliments, you know comments.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: And that posted last Thursday. And on Friday I went
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: down and I was walking through our family care clinic
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: where our family practice practitioners are, and they had six
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: new families that merged over this direction. So I said,
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: and I thought, well, you know, it would be unusual
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: for somebody to switch because of a surgeon, because you know,
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: you never anticipate when you're going to need surgery. But
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: those folks who are saying that we must be doing
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: something right to get a man of that caliber, and
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: so we're very blessed to have him here.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: A surgeon and a social media rock star. This guy
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: needs to save some swagger for the rest of us.
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: Man. Well, you know, it was funny when I talked
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: to him. He's a man. A few words his you know,
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: his resume was pretty pretty basic, and I said, hey, Doc,
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: I need a little more than this, you know, to
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: to kind of introduce you in our newsletter that's going
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: to be going out to let people know. And he goes, well,
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: make you know, I hate to I don't mean to brag,
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: but he says, uh, I think I'll kind of sell myself.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: I've been doing this for a long time. I've operated
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: on people all the way, you know, past Rockford, a
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: lot of them from the quad cities. So he pulls
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: people from some of the larger metropolitan areas and so
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: he says, I think it'll kind of sell itself. And
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: I don't you know, I didn't think that was braggadocious.
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: At all. But I thought, my gosh, you know, my
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: phone is just you know, lighting up with it. Told
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: me every time we hit a ten thousand mark, you know,
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: when when people ten thousand people viewed it him, my
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: phone was beeping and it was going pretty fast, you know.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I mean it's it's it's exciting to know
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: when and you've got quality people that can help you
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: in most any area, you know, when you're going out
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: to seek professionals, but none so more important than health right,
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: And I mean, oh yeah, and it just seems to
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: be the same, like you know, will I will wait
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: an extra couple of days so that I can have
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: my barber, same thing for my car. I'm with you,
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: why would you not do that for your health care?
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: And it's true, and you know, and a lot of people,
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: I think the quality of the doctors that we have here.
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: You know, we're now up to eighteen in the thirteen
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: years I've been here, and we didn't have any when
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: I started, So this is a nice change to have.
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: And I think that the quality of the docs we have,
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: you know, we're really emphasizing the fact that you don't
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: have to travel really far, you know, to get quality
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: care and we feel like, you know, the smaller hospitals
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: and you know Sterling Dixon Free, you know some of
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: those areas that's important, you know, where people don't have
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: to travel very far to get care. So that's a
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: big one for us absolutely.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: You know, being able to stay local, knowing that you
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: have great talent in the area so that you're not
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: going to have to go looking later in life, that
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: you're covered literally for the span of your life. Knowing
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: that you can stay within the same healthcare institution is
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: fantastic news for anyone. And you know, the good news
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: is that the good news doesn't stop here. You also
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: have another surgeon who can help patients with their leg pain.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: I understand.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, doctor Maddix. Now this is something he's been doing
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: for a long long time. And as soon as you know,
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: I was talking to his wife, Maria is one of
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: his main nurses, and she says, you know, maybe it's
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: time to kind of remind people that he does do
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: a lot of vein work, you know. So I said
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: of Verico's veins, those types of things, and she goes,
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: I don't think people realize how many times the light
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: pain could be related to something with you know, a
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: blockage and some veins, and so it's a relatively minor thing,
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: and so let's throw it out there. And so as
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: I visited with her. Now of course he's also he
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: partners with doctor Powers and we'll do colonoscopies and endoscopies
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: and you know, some of the basic surgeries as well,
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: hernia surgeries, but to add the vein component. And then
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: as soon as that that got out and I sent
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: out an email or put another Facebook post out there
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: which has hit over twenty thousand hits. But I had
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: people responding to me saying, oh my gosh, what a difference.
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: I don't I can't believe I waited as long as
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: I did, you know, to call him, and the relief
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: was immediate, you know. So we love to hear testimonies
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: like that.
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, And you know it that seems to be
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: too uncommon of a thing of people just kind of waiting,
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: almost thinking they can live with it, and you know,
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: unfortunately sometimes not even you know, knowing what's available to them,
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: so they just kind of assume that it's not. And
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: this is just really good news. If you're out there
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: and you're listening to this, If you're suffering from it
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: or know someone who does, please refer them over to
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: the Morrison Community Hospital. They have the right people to
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: help them out. And another great bit of information you're
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: going to share today. And I love this because I
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: actually got to cover the ribbon breaking for it when
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: I was still a reporter for Shaw Media. You've got
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: some updates on the new expansion at the hospital.
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: As a matter of fact, that groundbreaking when you were here,
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: you remember it was a cold, cold d October and
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: we actually had to place dirt on top of the
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: dirt because I said, it's a groundbreaking, not a shovel
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: break ceremonial. So so but yeah, that was we were
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: off and they started working on that, and it was
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: since it's a standalone expansion and they just connected, you know,
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: toward the end. It was a relatively quick project and
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: so it'll be a couple of floors and it's going
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: to be open. It was a fourteen million dollar expansion
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: and we are on par to have that thing open
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: in May of twenty sixth, so just a few weeks
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: from now, and we're really talking about having a ribbit
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: cutting for that probably mid June. So we want to
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: invite people to come and take a look and see
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: what it is. But it's going to have twenty two
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: more exam rooms, some care station, some additional procedure room
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: in there. The second floor above that is going to
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: be right now, it's kind of a shell, but I
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: think you're going to see some announcements here fairly quickly
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: that with the volume of doctor Powers and some of
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: our other surgeons that we have, I think we're going
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: to see that we're going to need to use that
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: for some medical surgical uses and remain open for outpatient services.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: So I believe that's going to be coming pretty quick.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: And then the nice thing about it is when you
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: pull into that edition off of Knox Street, which is
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: to the south of our hospital, you'll pull into a
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: parking garage be about eighteen spaces in there, So patients
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: that are coming in to see doctor Foad or doctor
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: Yeger or doctor Caliah will be able to pull in
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: there and take an elevator up to get to those floors.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: But you'll also be able to get in be able
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: to access that third floor once that is utilized. So
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: we're just one of those where it's time to it's
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: time to build for future use, and as has happened
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: before we did an expansion, we had an area designated
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: for future use. Within a year, it was already done,
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I mean, this is a fantastic project. It
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: means so much in terms of patient care, accessibility and
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: increasing you know, the availability to be able to see
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: more people, the convenience housing these great professionals that you're
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: bringing in here. Yeah, it's how long had you guys
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: been planning this?
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: This planning. We did an expansion that we broke around
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: in twenty nineteen and that was completed in twenty twenty one,
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: and honestly, Brandon, I thought that would probably be it,
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: you know, I thought we had addressed you know, that one.
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: We added another operating room in fact, and then a
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: second one since then, and we added eight more brand
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: new medical surgical rooms for patients that need to spend
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: the night after they've had surgery or maybe some longer
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: term care. We knew that the radiology department would have
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: to be expanded because the patient base would be bigger,
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: so we'd have to add some additional areas and employees
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: to do some scans. We now have a portable MRI
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: truck that comes in on Mondays and Fridays. And our
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: emergency room, which in the old days was really kind
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: of dated, you know. We added five new emergency rooms
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: and then the lab had to be probably tripled in size,
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: and they're already now pressed for space, you know, because
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: when you have when you do surgeries, it affects a
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: lot of other departments. And so that growth was already
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: we thought we anticipated growth and had accommodated for that. Well,
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: the volume is just continuing to grow brand and I
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: mean back in seventy two we did an expansion. We
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: were seeing about four thousand patients a year. A couple
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: of years ago I went up to fifty eight thousand,
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: and it just keeps growing. And so we're getting a
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: lot of patients from the Quad City area. So apparently
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: we're doing something right. And and little little do we
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: know that the volume was you know, when you walk
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: through the doctor's offices and the support staff that they
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: need for nurses. I told Pam our CEO, I said,
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: we may have to come up with some type of
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: a bunk chair, you know, arrangement, because those folks were
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: so tight, you know. And Sola said, well, let's let's
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: blow out another end on the south side and build
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: it up on some pillars and make room for some
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: more exam rooms, some doctor's offices, and let's see where
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: we go from here. So I never anticipated it, but
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: it's happening, and.
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: Who knows, yeah exactly, who knows? Who knows or the
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: next ten twenty years will take us.
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: I know, you think that you could look out that far,
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: but healthcare needs are a little bit shorter term than that.
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: And in fact, it was interesting we were doing some
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: statistics when we were planning that addition, and we found
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: that about twenty we get a lot of patients also
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: from Carroll County. You know, years ago they had a
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: hospital in Savannah and it closed. Well, you know, a
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: lot of about twenty percent of the Carroll County residents
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: over the age of sixty five are facing chronic health conditions,
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: and we're seeing those folks. You know, So when you
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: look at research like that and some of the ages
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: of the population in Whiteside County, Lee County, so in
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: even Clinton, you know, some folks coming over from there.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: So it's just all of that kind of accumulates into uh,
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: let's uh, let's do another expansion.
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: Absolutely and Unfortunately, there's there's areas of the country that
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: end up with healthcare deserts, and you know, thankfully, you know,
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: with services like yours expanding, folks that are that are
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: close enough have somewhere they're they're able to go. You know,
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: that is still a reasonable distance for them and they
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: know they're going to have everything taken care of for them. Mike,
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: I thank you so much for sharing all this. We're
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: about out a time problem, but I do know you
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: wanted to direct people to your new website to let's
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: know about an event.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Morrisonhospital dot com. Again, it's Morrisonhospital dot com. It
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: is a brand new website that just launched on March
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: the fifth, so uh, it's it's kind of clean, it's nice.
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: So you can look at the events and look at
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: some of the things that are coming up, like a
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: blood drive and we have a foundation event up in
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: May seventh, so click on there, get some additional information
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: and order tickets. You also have that ability and also
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: search for our providers and read a little bit about them.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: So it's all on there.
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: There you go, folks, head on over all the information
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: you need better yet, give them a call, get on
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: over there. Get your health taken care of the day.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: It's never too late.
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: Nick.
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much, not only for sharing the information,
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: but just for everything you folks do for our healthcare
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: in the area.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: It's a pleasure to be on and support your station, Brandon,
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: thanks a bunch.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Nick,