If the application and licensing processes go smoothly, FirstHealth Richmond, partnering with UHS-Pruitt Corporation, will have a new nursing home facility in Rockingham by Oct. 1, 2011.

“That’s the proposed timeline anyway,” said Sarah Maret Haislip, health planner for UHS-Pruitt. “But it could expand out further depending in the approval process.”

FirstHealth and UHS-Pruitt filed their Certificate of Need for review Monday for the construction of a new, 51-bed nursing facility. It comes one year after FirstHealth closed an in-hospital nursing home facility — Palmer Hinson Care Center.

“I think that they wanted to keep the hospital just a hospital, like an acute-care setting, which is why they approached us for the 51 bed facility,” Haislip said. “There is a need, not a huge, huge need, but they wanted these beds available to the community.”

She said from research and experience, they have found people prefer a separate nursing facility over a hospital.

Haislip said the new facility will be just a mile and a half up the road from the hospital.

Haislip explained that 51 beds was the number FirstHealth was licensed for at the Palmer Hinson Care Center. Not wanting to lose or waste a license they’d already obtained for this kind of service, they reached out to UHS-Pruitt to figure out a way to maintain the 51 beds.

UHS-Pruitt has 10 nursing facilities that it operates and/or manages in North Carolina, including Rockingham Manor. UHS-Pruitt owns the nursing facility of Rockingham Manor but does not actually operate/manage the facility, though Haislip said they will in a few years.

The way this new deal will work, according to Haislip, is that FirstHealth will own the nursing facility, but UHS-Pruitt will build it and manage it.

“They’ll own it for a while and then sell it over to us,” Haislip said. “That’s why it was a dual CON (certificate of need) application, because it’s their beds and they’ll own it.”

Haislip said this will benefit all parties involved.

“It will benefit them (FirstHealth) because they wanted to deliver acute inpatient services at the hospital because that’s their core mission, but they didn’t want to get rid of the 51 beds because the community will need them at some point,” Haislip explained. “Somehow they heard of us and initiated a development agreement to move beds to a skilled nursing facility. It’s really a benefit to the community because they will have a more modernized, home-like facility.”

In an e-mail, John Jackson, president of FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital said, “FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital will be transferring its 51, currently vacant, nursing home beds and UHS-Pruitt will be transferring 49 nursing beds from its Rockingham Manor facility to the proposed new 100-bed facility. UHS-Pruitt will be managing the facility. They have been providing nursing home services in North Carolina since the late 1980s and they have a strong reputation for providing quality health care services. The new facility will enhance the quality and delivery of nursing facility services currently available to patients in the Richmond County area.”

Haislip explained that the transfer of the 49 beds from Rockingham Manor is phase two of this project.

“The 49-bed transfer will be submitted in a separate CON application in the future,” Haislip said. “The skilled nursing facility will start off as a 51-bed facility and then we will transfer 49 beds from our Rockingham Manor to add a wing onto the new 51-bed facility, making it a 100-bed facility.”

Haislip stressed that the additional 49 beds must be approved under a separate CON application before phase two of the project can happen.

Haislip said this move, when it does happen, will also be a plus for Rockingham Manor.

“It will allow us to create more private rooms and residents will then have a choice to stay at the current Rockingham Manor location or to relocate to the new facility,” which will be named UniHealth Post-Acute Care-Rockingham, Haislip said.

Rockingham Manor is a 120-bed facility.

Staff writer Eren Tataragasi can be reached at (910) 997-3111 ext. 19 or at etataragasi@yourdailyjournal.com.