Union Hospital in Elkton plans to partner with the University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Health
The partnership would include behavioral health, an area that is seeing its resources and hospital emergency rooms strained by a nationwide addiction epidemic.
Northeastern Maryland has also seen population gains with Harford County experiencing growth arising from the BRAC restructuring that moved researchers and contractors to the area around the Army’s Aberdeen Proving Ground.
The plan, rolled out last week, includes building a $100 million-plus outpatient medical campus in the Bulle Rock area west of Havre de Grace, MD to replace the University of Maryland Harford Memorial Hospital in downtown Havre de Grace.
Hospital beds would be moved to Upper Chesapeake’s hospital in Bel Air, MD, with a behavioral health facility at Union Hospital going to the Havre de Grace site.
Havre de Grace is across the river from western Cecil County, an area where many residents went to Harford Memorial Hospital.
To the east, residents have been served by Union Hospital in Elkton and to some extent Christiana Hospital near Newark.
The new medical campus is projected to open in 2020.
The University of Maryland system will work with regional health care providers, with the goal of increasing access to care and avoiding duplication of services, a release stated. Another factor in the reshaping process is the Affordable Care Act and efforts to control health care costs.
For example, The University of Maryland Health’s Upper Chesapeake Health and Union Hospital in Elkton are collaborating in some specialty areas including cancer, weight loss surgery and behavioral health services, a release stated.
The expansion of the University of Maryland health care system into Harford County and areas of the Eastern Shore had been leading to speculation over an outright merger with Union or an affiliation by Union with neighboring Christiana Care Health System in Delaware.
The reshaping would include consolidating inpatient hospital services, with the exception of behavioral health at the University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Medical Center with a $60 million expansion.
The new medical campus will be known as the University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Medical Center – Havre de Grace.
Services offered at the 190,000-square foot facility will include observation beds for short-stay medical patients, emergency services, imaging, cardiology testing, pharmacy, lab and public education/conference space in addition to rehab (physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy), chemotherapy/infusion, mammography/bone density, physician office space and prevention/wellness services.
The university health system will work with the- City of Havre de Grace, Harford County and the State of Maryland on identifying new uses for the Harford Memorial site.
“ The care provided currently by UM HMH and Union Hospital needs to be expanded to meet the current and projected demand for behavioral health services in our community,” a release stated, noting the higher rate of substance abuse that is triggering an uptick in demand for emergency services.
In Harford County alone, since 2008, there has been a 47 percent increase in the number of emergency department visits that are drug/alcohol addiction related.
The project will require approval from the Legislature and health care regulators.
The University of Maryland health system has been proposing big changes as it acquires smaller hospital systems.
To the south, it is proposing a restructuring of health care services in the Easton area that could make the small hospital in Chestertown, MD into an outpatient facility.
