AdventHealth South Overland Park officially opened its doors as a full-service hospital on Oct. 7, 2021. The hospital is the fourth of AdventHealth’s hospital campuses in the Mid-America Region, which include AdventHealth Shawnee Mission and AdventHealth Ottawa, both in Kansas, and AdventHealth Durand in Wisconsin.
The hospital is located in Overland Park’s growing Bluhawk development at 165th and U.S. 69 Highway. About 120,000 residents live within five miles of the hospital. Approximately 11,000 housing permits were issued in the past two years. The population in the area is also expected to increase by about 25,000 with 7,000 new homes projected.
“In the early 2000s, this area was a field in Johnson County, but there was an awareness that growth was occurring,” says Alan Verrill, MD, chief executive officer for AdventHealth South Overland Park. “Since then, that’s certainly what’s happened, including new middle schools, high schools, retail, fire departments, and sports facilities. There is a definite need for medical services to serve this community close to home.”
The new hospital includes surgical services, heart care, an intensive care unit, and a birth center with maternity care services. The new facilities add to the already existing emergency, imaging and laboratory services onsite that opened in 2017.
“We’ve already seen growth in our existing services in the ER and medical offices since 2017,” says Dr. Verrill. “We now have thousands of visits per year, which has indicated the increased need for medical services in the area.”
The new facility is the first full-service hospital to open in the Kansas City metro in 15 years. Governor Laura Kelly was at the ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the opening.
“Opening a hospital is a relatively rare event. We were honored to have Governor Kelly with us to mark the occasion,” says Dr. Verrill. “Our community turnout and support were remarkable as well, and we’re excited to help bring health care services to this growing area.”
AdventHealth’s mission is Extending the Healing Ministry of Christ. With the new hospital, that means bringing health care that helps to heal the whole person—body, mind and spirit.
“Christ saw the people He encountered not just as physical beings but tended to them on spiritual and mental levels as well,” says Dr. Verrill. “It’s our mission to center on whole care. We’re hiring physicians who practice that whole-person care and making sure our hospital is designed with a healing environment.”
The new facility has been designed to incorporate that healing and mindful environment. AdventHealth partnered with HKS Architects for the design and GE Johnson for the construction.
“As you enter the lobby, you’ll notice natural light plays a role in the design,” says Dr. Verrill. “Bringing sunlight into the environment has aesthetic benefits and can help with that feeling of wholeness as well.”
The lobby also includes a “Creation Walk” to help create a sense of peace for visitors. It starts with artwork that represents Day 1 of creation and visual representations of the next six days that continues down the hallway to the chapel.
Dr. Verrill says that the goal for the AdventHealth South Overland Park campus is to offer whole health care that meets the needs of the area and to become an integrated part of the community.
“It’s our hope to be able to share in the good times and tough times, whether that’s new beginnings in the Birth Center or a need for healing,” he says, “We’re continuing to grow our mission that started in the KC region almost 60 years ago.”
