The new Marshfield Clinic Stevens Point Center opens Nov. 4 to patients, giving Portage County residents access to a health care experience unlike any other in central Wisconsin.
The distinguishing building feature of the Stevens Point Center – meant to improve patients’ experiences – is immediately noticed. Rather than checking in and then sitting in a waiting room, staff will guide patients directly to their exam rooms. This new self-rooming approach is designed to reduce waiting times and improve patient privacy.
A public open house including self-guided tours, highlighting this self-rooming concept, is scheduled from 5-8 p.m. Oct. 29 at the 55,000-square-foot center, 4100 State Highway 66, Stevens Point.
“Marshfield Clinic providers have cared for Portage County residents for decades, both at our centers in surrounding communities and through our oral surgery and cancer services already based in Stevens Point,” said Dr. Brian Ewert, Marshfield Clinic president. “This new Center brings care closer to home and will help meet growing health care needs in the community, in Portage and surrounding counties.”
The building design concept, new to central Wisconsin and one emerging throughout the U.S., uses an easy-to-understand system that identifies each clinic wing with symbols, such as a butterfly or pine tree. Patients simply match the symbol and color given to them when they check in with the coordinating hallway.
“We realize how busy patients are with work, children and other responsibilities,” said Jim Petersen, Stevens Point Center manager. “We want to make their visits as seamless as possible, from the moment they walk in the door until their appointment concludes. We took time to study other facilities and learned the benefits to patients from this building design.”
Each room also features two doors – one for patients to enter and the second for providers coming into the room from a different hall. This design means staff and providers can move and communicate seamlessly and efficiently with one another, all without disturbing patients.
“Efficiency is the key word. We want to maintain and build on a high level of quality care, while continually searching for innovative ways to lower the cost of health care. We’re confident this approach will benefit patients and enhance the quality of care,” Petersen said.
Family medicine and more than 20 specialties, including cardiology, dermatology, nephrology, ophthalmology/optometry, oral surgery, podiatry, rheumatology, physical therapy, lab and infusion therapy, allergy, endocrinology, orthopedics, obstetrics/gynecology, pediatric subspecialties, plastic surgery and urology, will be available. The center will house up to 17 providers at any given time with about 50 employees.
Marshfield Clinic Cancer Care – Medical Oncology and Radiation Oncology practices as well as palliative care will remain at Ministry Saint Michael’s Hospital.
The Boldt Co. of Appleton, which has offices in Stevens Point, built the Center.
The new facility includes an array of artwork from 14 Portage County artists. A commissioned piece created by Stevens Point resident Mike Godell is among the artwork to be featured in the building. The sculpture, "Sincere Resonance," was inspired by the rings of waves that occur when dropping a pebble into water. Each ring within the sculpture uses different varieties of wood, which after being stained and treated, show differences in grain and color.
"This piece commissioned with Mike and the other Portage County artists’ work within the new facility will help bring artwork that’s meaningful and engaging to the Center's patients and staff,” said James Machtan, assistant director of New Visions Gallery, based at Marshfield Clinic Marshfield Center. “Bringing great art to the new Center was easy, because Stevens Point and Portage County have wonderfully vibrant artists.”
The Marshfield Clinic system provides patient care, research and education in more than 50 locations in northern, central and western Wisconsin, making it one of the largest comprehensive medical systems in the United States.
