ChristianaCare’s new micro hospital in West Grove is opening in August

The first of three micro hospitals ChristianaCare plans for the Philadelphia suburbs will open in Chester County in August, testing a model that could help close healthcare gaps in communities where full-service hospitals have closed.

The hospital, located at 1015 West Baltimore Pike in West Grove, will feature an emergency department with 10 beds, plus another 10 inpatient beds for patients who need extended care. It also includes advanced imaging and lab services, including ultrasound, CT scanning, and X-rays.

ChristianaCare’s so-called “neighborhood hospitals” are designed to manage the vast majority of emergencies, while stabilizing and transferring patients who need more advanced care, such as people who have been in a car accident or who experience an extreme heart attack. Each hospital is accompanied by a health center, with services that have been selected based on the community’s needs and feedback.

With its neighborhood hospital model, hospital administrators are making a bet that they can succeed where cumbersome full-service hospitals failed.

For its West Grove facility, ChristianaCare overhauled 20,000 square feet of the former Jennersville Hospital, which Tower Health closed in 2021.

Two more hospitals are planned for Aston and Springfield, where Delaware County lawmakers and health systems have been scrambling to shore up health services after the county’s largest provider, Crozer Health, closed in May.

“We want to be here to stay,” said Vinay Maheshwari, physician executive for growth and strategic partnerships at ChristianaCare. “We wanted to make sure whatever we put here was something we could sustain.”

Micro hospitals can’t handle all types of emergencies, particularly traumas like car crashes or gunshot wounds, meaning those patients may still experience delays in accessing care.

But health systems increasingly see them as a way to expand their footprint without taking on the financial burden of a full-service hospital.

Lehigh Valley Health Network, which is owned by Jefferson Health, opened a micro hospital in Gilbertsville in northern Montgomery County last year. And Prime Healthcare’s Suburban Community Hospital downsized to a micro hospital with a small emergency department before converting in July to a specialized psychiatric hospital.

ChristianaCare’s new micro hospitals are part of the Delaware system’s broader effort to expand into the Philadelphia market. The health system, which operates a flagship hospital in Newark, Del., recently won the bid for five outpatient sites formerly owned by Crozer.

» READ MORE: Here’s Delaware County’s plan for addressing emergency response shortages following Crozer’s closure

Tower Health left a significant care gap in Chester County when it closed two hospitals, Jennersville and Brandywine, in 2021.

The next closest hospitals — Penn Medicine’s Chester County Hospital in West Chester and Christiana Hospital in Newark, Del. — are more than 15 miles from West Grove.

Administrators considered reopening Jennersville as a full-service hospital, but ultimately decided a neighborhood hospital would be more financially sustainable, while meeting the vast majority of medical needs.

ChristianaCare expects the new micro hospital to see between 15,000 and 20,000 patients a year, and says it will be able to treat a majority of medical issues that bring patients to hospitals, including mild heart attacks, strokes, broken bones, and even emergency childbirth.

The facility does not have an intensive care unit or operating rooms, so trauma patients and anyone needing surgery will be transferred.

Across the street, the West Grove health center includes primary care offices and cardiology services. The health center will also offer mammograms, ultrasounds, and X-ray services.

ChristianaCare based its health center offerings on feedback from community members, who expressed concern about a shortage of primary care providers in southern Chester County.

The hospital, expected to open in mid-August, will be a test run for the model that ChristianaCare plans to expand in nearby Delaware County.

The health system was already planning two more micro hospitals in Delaware County before the demise of its largest health system, Crozer Health. Crozer’s bankrupt owner, Prospect Medical Holdings, announced earlier this year it was closing its remaining local hospitals, Crozer-Chester Medical Center and Taylor Hospital.

Delaware County elected officials are optimistic that the new micro hospitals will relieve pressure on nearby hospitals. Riddle Hospital in Media and Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital in Darby have both seen a dramatic spike in emergency patients.

The Aston hospital, expected to open in 2026, will have primary care and cardiology services on a second-floor health center. ChristianaCare officials are still finalizing what specialty services will be featured at the Springfield hospital’s health center, Maheshwari said.

He acknowledged that the hospitals won’t be able to address all the community’s needs.

“Our neighborhood hospitals might not be able to meet all the demand, but we can help,” Maheshwari said.

For example, Crozer operated the county’s highest level trauma center, and was just minutes away when EMS responded to a gunshot victim in Chester.

Trauma victims now must be taken to Philadelphia or Wilmington, and emergency responders are starting blood transfusions in the back of the ambulance to improve the chances of survival.