Plans for new medical facilities in Beaufort spark questions and concerns
A plan by Novant Health to build a 17,000 square-foot medical complex on an undeveloped wooded lot in Beaufort, the backyard of competitor Beaufort Memorial Hospital, ran into complications this week.
Novant’s move into Beaufort comes amid a major expansion into the South Carolina Lowcountry by the North Carolina-based health care provider. A Novant Health official said the Beaufort facilities — which include an acute are emergency department with ambulance access and a separate primary clinic — will help meet the region’s growing demand for facilities that are closer to home.
That may be, but the preliminary sketch of the project, discussed by the Beaufort Planning Commission Monday, sparked concerns and questions about the design and future expansion plans. Members of the advisory board peppered Novant with questions including:
How would the large medical facility affect traffic on busy Robert Smalls Parkway? Would the design fit in with Lowcountry architecture? What was this “emergency” facility being proposed? What other kinds of medical facilities will be built in the future on the 14 acre-site?
Novant’s location and the plans
The medical campus will be located at 396 Robert Smalls Parkway, or Highway 170. The site sits along a major commercial corridor near the Robert Smalls Parkway and Parris Island Gateway intersection. Walmart is to the northeast of the property, and a new apartment complex just to the west. Robert Smalls International Academy is to the north of the proposal.
The plans call for constructing two buildings. One would be an 11,620 square-foot, 24-hour “freestanding emergency department,” where ambulances could drop off patients. The second building would be a 5,750 square-foot primary care clinic.
At this time, just 3.61 acres of the 14.4-acre property are being developed.
Adam Pegan, senior director of planning for Novant Health, said Novant is focused on bringing more health care to the community, which “continues to be a need.” Other “medical assets” could be added to the property eventually, he said.
“This is kind of our first step in the area,” Pegan said. “We do have a number of physician offices here, but this is what I call acute care service. And what we want to see is how we are going, what the needs of the community are, what type of patients we see and that will help guide our plans for the rest of the property.”
What will be built in the future?
City officials want a master plan that shows how the initial plan for the emergency department and clinic will integrate with the entire 14 acres and possible future buildings before signing off on the first phase.
The commission unanimously voted to table the project until Novant returns with revised plans.
“It would be interesting to know what will happen with the rest,” said Christopher Klement, a planner in the city’s Community Development Department. “How will that by tied into this request for a medical clinic?”
Commission member Kimberly McFann, pressed Pegan about the kinds of “medical assets” that might be built in the future.
“I don’t know if there’s any precedent in terms of other developments of that nature,” she said. “Maybe start with a freestanding emergency department and patient-care clinic and the next thing you know the rest of the site has a new hospital on it or whatever. It would be of interest to me what kind of medical assets you were thinking about might go in there in the future.”
Novant’s Pegan said it’s too soon to say what will end up on the property. A medical office building has been discussed. Other possibilities are specialty clinics and an imaging center.
“As the community grows, we need to always look at demand,” he said. “So yes, it could be a number of things.”
What is the emergency department?
The freestanding emergency facility and primary care clinic arrangement also perplexed some Planning Commission members.
“It’s an interesting concept to me,” Chairman Mike Tomy said, “but I want to make sure we’re helping to make it work right.”
The emergency department will operate 24 hours, seven days a week and have a full-time staff with physicians on site, Pegan said. It will operate separately from the primary care clinic.
Many people don’t have a primary care doctor, Pegan said, and their first interaction with the health care system is an emergency. If they choose, those who visit the emergency department could later see a primary care doctor at the clinic located next door. The primary clinic will be staffed with at least two doctors, he said.
The facility, licensed through Hilton Head Hospital, will be capable of treating trauma from gunshots to stroke victims. But most people who need the emergency department will arrive on their own with 5% arriving by ambulance, he said.
Novant runs a similar emergency facility called Tidewatch Emergency Department in Bluffton. It is affiliated with the emergency department of Coastal Carolina Hospital in Hardeeville.
What is Novant Health?
Novant Health is a Charlotte- and Winston-Salem-based not-for-profit healthcare system with 900 locations in North and South Carolina and Virginia. That includes 19 hospitals, more than 750 physician clinics and urgent care centers.
As part of a major expansion into the Lowcountry of South Carolina, in February 2024 it spent $2.4 billion to acquire East Cooper Medical Center in Mount Pleasant, Hilton Head Hospital in Hilton Head and Coastal Carolina Hospital in Hardeeville. It also acquired 27 physician clinics in Beaufort and Charleston counties and the Tidewater freestanding emergency department in Bluffton and the Bluffton Okatie Outpatient Center.
Earlier this year, Novant Health announced plans to build a 100-bed hospital in Bluffton and additional outpatient campuses, citing the need with too many residents in Beaufort and Jasper counties.
It’s also building a hospital in Bluffton.
Novant says the expansion is driven by demand, with too many residents traveling 30 minutes or more from home to receive health care.
Novant is competing with Beaufort Memorial Hospital to meet the region’s growing need for health care facilities, especially in fast-growing southern Beaufort County.
Beaufort Memorial is investing more than $100 million to build its own hospital at the corner of Bluffton Parkway and Buckwalter Parkway.
In November, Beaufort Memorial broke ground on an emergency and urgent care facility on William Hilton Parkway on Hilton Head Island.
Traffic and design concerns
Planning Commission members also raised questions about the design of Novant’s emergency department and clinic in Beaufort.
Clinton Hallman called the architecture a “non-starter.” “It very much looks like a square box you could unload from a truck and stand up,” he said.
Tomy, the commission chairman, said it may be true that the traffic analysis showed the project will have minimum impact but “we’re already over capacity” on Robert Smalls Parkway.,
“I just think at some point in time we as a city need to look at what the capacity of what are roadway systems actually are, what they are trying to handle now,” he said.
Conor Blaney of Ward Edwards Engineering, which is working with Novant Health, said he would work with city staff on refining the plans. New renderings already have been developed but were not submitted in time for Monday’s meeting, he said.
