“Our region looks to Baptist Health Paducah to provide the latest, most comprehensive treatments and services for our families,” said president William A. Brown. “Just as we built the heart center in 2007 to pull together all related services in one convenient location, we will develop the cancer center in 2015. Likewise, demand for the region’s only neonatal services has grown since we began in 2011, so our expansion will allow more families to benefit from this service close to home.”
While plans are under way for both projects, Baptist Health will share more details and answer questions at meetings in the Baptist Heart Center auditorium on Thursday, Nov. 20. Cancer center info with Q and A at 6 pm and NICU at 7 pm.
“We need the community’s input and support to bring these needed services to fruition,” Brown said.
These expansions, as well as other growth initiatives, such as the development of recently-announced clinics in Calvert City, are all part of Baptist Health’s focus to help people be healthier by providing services to prevent, shorten or manage illness, as close by and as conveniently as possible.
“Our mission has always been to enhance the health of the communities we are privileged to serve,” Brown said. “While we continue to make advances to provide excellent care at our hospital with projects like the cancer center and expansion of our NICU, we also are working harder to help people prevent illness, as well as manage chronic disease. Our goal is to keep you healthy and out of the hospital as long as possible.”
Cancer Center
Baptist Health, the Paducah area’s only nationally-accredited cancer center, treats about 1,200 patients a year, including about 110 outpatients daily for radiation and chemotherapy. Projections call for those numbers to grow, as Kentucky has the highest cancer rates in the nation.
To meet the growing need, Baptist Health Paducah already has retained an architect, made site visits to other cancer centers and conducted focus groups with physicians and patients to determine their needs for a new center.
Preliminary plans call for the center to be developed adjacent to the current radiation therapy area on the northeast end of the campus on the Broadway side. It will bring together radiation therapy, outpatient chemotherapy, lab, rehabilitation, research, education resources, palliative care, dietary counseling, complementary medicine and retail space – with nurse navigators to assist patients and their families as they go from diagnosis through treatment. “Patients coming in for treatment or consultation can get everything they need in one location,” Brown said.
Plans are still being developed, pending further study, including the public meeting.
Meanwhile, renovation of existing space is under way to house the latest treatment.
New radiation equipment can shorten treatment from weeks to days
The hospital recently invested $3.1 million in new technology that can shorten radiation treatments from weeks to days. It is expected to be installed by March in the current radiation therapy area.
Stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) and stereotactic body radiosurgery will be available through the new Varian Trubeam linear accelerator, which will replace one of two linear accelerators currently in use. (Stereotactic means imaging markers are used to guide the beam of radiation or the surgeon to the precise spot needing treatment.)
Since it first installed cobalt treatment in 1967, the hospital has a tradition of offering the latest treatment and diagnostic equipment, ranging from da Vinci robotic surgery in 2009 to 3-D mammography in 2014.
“Sometimes our patients will go to academic centers, such as Vanderbilt, and the specialists there will say to them, “Why are you here? There is no need for you to leave Paducah,’ ” Brown said.
With five medical oncologists, two radiation oncologists and a variety of surgical specialists, including brain and spine surgeons, the advanced expertise is available locally, along with the advanced equipment.
Neurosurgeon Thomas Gruber, MD, said the new stereotactic surgery equipment represents a major advance. “Brain tumor patients treated at Baptist Health have tripled since we have added the neurosurgical staff to handle them locally, and this is a non-invasive way to treat them,” he said. “For brain tumors, it truly is a paradigm shift.”
Radiation oncologist Peter Locken, MD, said Baptist Health’s latest technology is changing cancer treatment. “Hopefully, we cure cancer, and for those not cured, then we are managing their cancer more like a chronic disease, keeping them functional with less toxicity while we keep the cancer under control,” he said.
Dr. Locken has been at Baptist Health since 1990, just three years after the Earl Feezor Radiation Therapy Center opened in 1987. “This represents another step in being a comprehensive cancer center, which is good for our families who can be near their loved ones during their treatment,” he said.
NICU
Baptist Health Paducah delivers about 1,400 babies a year, about four times the number of its closest competitor. A small percentage of those babies, especially those born prematurely, require intensive care before they can grow large enough or get strong enough to go home.
Baptist Health Paducah opened a six-bed Neonatal Intensive Care Unit in 2011. Kentucky’s Cabinet for Health and Family Services recently approved a certificate of need for the addition of four licensed beds, bringing the total to 10.
“We look forward to being able to meet the needs of more families who would have had to travel several hours away to be with their babies,” Brown said.
The expansion will be conducted in phases over two years, first involving the relocation of some physician offices in Doctors Office Building 2 to make space available.
Since 2011, more than 700 babies have been able to receive special care in Paducah, rather than requiring their families to travel to distant NICUs.
“Sometimes babies need to stay for days, sometimes for several weeks,” said neonatologist Ed O’Neill, MD. “Before we opened, families had to leave their jobs, the support of their families and friends, and sometimes their other children, to be with babies for extended stays in other cities.”
Paducah’s NICU allows babies born at a minimum of 28 weeks or 2.2 pounds.
Information provided by Angie Kinsey Timmons, Baptist Health Paducah.
