CONWAY, Ark. – After more-than two years of construction and preparation, Baptist Health Medical Center-Conway officially opened its doors today at 7 a.m. for patients.
Baptist Health Medical Center-Conway Vice President and Administrator Joanie White-Wagoner spoke to hospital employees via the intercom system shortly before 7 a.m. and the hospital’s chaplain, Laurie Cox, led the group in prayer before White-Wagoner started a ten-second countdown ending with cheers from employees. Within 12 minutes, the emergency department had seen its first patient.
“This is the culmination of a lot of hard work and preparation to open our doors to care for patients in this community,” said Joanie White-Wagoner, vice-president and administrator of Baptist Health Medical Center-Conway. “It was special time this morning to have a prayer, and then it was exciting to be able to countdown the seconds leading up to 7 a.m. for us to officially open. We’ve planned for this a long time and the time is now.”
Construction on the hospital began in July 2014 when a ground-breaking ceremony was held on the 37-acre site off of Interstate 40 in Conway. The $150 million, 260,000-square-foot hospital includes 111 beds and eight operating rooms.
Baptist Health is an Arkansas-based, locally owned and managed, not-for-profit, and faith-based health-care organization. Baptist Health is also Arkansas’ most comprehensive health-care organization with more than 8,840 employees operating nine hospitals. For more information about Baptist Health, call Baptist Health HealthLine at 1-888-BAPTIST.