Healthcare System Overview

An In-Depth Look into the Healthcare System

We are a 25 bed (no ICU) Level 4 Trauma Center with a Critical Access Hospital (CAH) designation. A CAH must be 25 beds or less, there must not be another CAH within 35 miles, the patients can’t stay more than 96 hours before being transferred, and the hospital receives cost reimbursement on any patient that does not have insurance or the ability to pay.

We have PT, OT and Speech Therapy

Our Emergency Room is covered by a group Emergency Medicine residency trained physicians, except for one older Family Medicine ER doctor. The EM doctors work in 8-hour shifts covering the full 24 hours a day. We have PA’s and NP’s support from 11a-8p, and we have an hour overlap of shifts. If it gets really busy, another physician will be called in. The group covers our locations in Redmond, Prineville and Madras. We have close to 14K annual visits. The community does not have an urgent care clinic. We have two wound care nurses, who see patients 5 days per week.
We are the first hospital from about 2 hours to the north and quite a bit to the east. To the west is the Cascade Mountains which serve as a barrier to the Willamette Valley on its western side. About 30 minutes to the south, we have our sister hospital in Redmond (Level 4) and 30 minutes south of Redmond is our other hospital in Bend (Level 2). We have a helicopter that averages 2-3 flights a week to Bend or in some cases OHSU in Portland.

Statistic-14.9% of emergency department (ED) visits at St. Charles Madras in Oregon resulted in hospital admission. In comparison, 13% of all ED visits in the United States resulted in admission.

We have an iPad interpreter service and about 70% of our MA’s speak Spanish. Dr. Lewis, Dr. Irvine and Dr. Savage (worked in ED for 20 years) all speak Spanish

Radiology-We have a 64 slice-Siemens CT and conduct about 1000 studies a year. This is due to our location on a major highway and the motor vehicle accidents in the region. We have Dexascan on Wednesday and a MRI (1.5T) mobile unit comes on Fridays and Mondays. We have mammography available 3 days a week and do about 300 screening reads a year. We don’t do any diagnostics or follow up mag views, or stereotactic biopsies. We let our mammography patient know that they are going in for a screening. If they have an abnormal mammogram, we tell the patient right away and they move forward with scheduling the Diagnostic. We have Radiologists onsite on Tuesday afternoons and Thursdays. The rest of the time studies are read remotely, including overnight. The radiologists also do overreads with our providers during the day to double check the teleradiology service. The interventional, and exams that require involvement, are mostly Barium work but we can do paracentesis, thoracentesis and ultrasound. We can do lumbar punctures and hip injections but most of those go to Redmond or Bend.

Central Oregon Community College is located less than one mile from the hospital. They broke ground on an 8000 SF expansion to the school.

We expect the construction to be completed in the fall of 2025. This new building will include a nursing program, an MA program and a CNA cohort. Our local residents that want to join the program will be given priority for these slots. St. Charles will be the training partner for COCC. This will help us put a focus on the education of our future providers and grow and keep them locally.   

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