Catholic Health has launched a new ambulatory and urgent care center in Melville that provides both walk-in and multi-specialty care.
The walk-in urgent care portion of the facility, which officially opened Wednesday, offers pediatric treatment, rapid testing, vaccines, occupational medicine and other services, according to Catholic Health.
The ambulatory center offers primary care and specialty care, including cardiology, which is affiliated with St. Francis Hospital & Heart Center in Roslyn. Clinicians from across the Catholic Health system also will provide treatment for orthopedics, pain management, pulmonology, spine care and sports medicine, officials said.
The 13,000-square-foot ambulatory and urgent care facility at 610 Broadhollow Rd. cost $7 million and has eight full time staff, with plans to increase to 10 to 15 employees, site manager Liana Roveda said.
The facility is Catholic Health’s latest outpatient care center on Long Island, following a trend that experts say gives patients more one-stop options for their treatment.
“If you’re looking for a specialist, if you’re looking for a new primary care internist, we have those providers here,” Roveda said. “If you’re looking for a cardiologist connected to St. Francis, we have that here. It’s all under one roof.”
Connecting an urgent care and ambulatory center was key to the vision for the center, said Dr. Patrick O’Shaughnessy, Catholic Health president and CEO.
“So many times, people come in for an urgent care visit and need follow up,” O’Shaughnessy said. “Our strategy is to co-mingle those services, so that when patients come in, we can actually begin to facilitate care at the same location.”
O’Shaughnessy said there are plans for more ambulatory centers on Long Island in the future, but declined to comment on specific locations.
“We’re looking at where we have deserts,” he said, referring to areas with a dearth of health care options for patients.
O’Shaughnessy said there are 22 outpatient Catholic Health sites throughout Long Island and that Catholic Health also has a joint-urgent/ambulatory center in Centereach. There are five other Catholic Health ambulatory centers throughout Long Island, according to hospital officials.
Catholic Health has six hospitals on Long Island and is the third largest employer on Long Island, with 17,500 employees across the system, according to its 2024 annual report. Its cardiac-focused hospital, St. Francis Hospital and Heart Center, was ranked as one of the top hospitals in New York State by U.S. News & World Report in July.
More efficient care
Multiple standalone health care facilities have been opening throughout Long Island this year.
Mount Sinai recently opened a multi-specialty center in Wantagh, while Stony Brook Medicine opened a freestanding emergency room center in East Hampton earlier this year.
Experts say they make medical treatment more convenient for patients.
“Public policy and health insurance companies have been pushing hospitals to [open] more outpatient settings for a long time, because it can be more efficient,” said Wendy Darwell, president and CEO of the Suburban Hospital Alliance of New York State, a nonprofit health care advocacy group. “That brings the care closer to the patient.”
Darwell said, “It’s not an accident that you’re seeing this kind of development in the outpatient market. But the important thing for patients to know is that it’s driven by advances in treatment and technology. Some of the procedures that can very safely be done on an outpatient basis now would have been unheard of a generation ago.”
These centers help people get treatment closer to where they live, Darwell said, adding “It makes for more efficient care.”
The ambulatory center is open Monday through Friday by appointment only. The urgent care is open seven days a week, 8 a.m.-8 p.m. Monday through Friday and 8 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.
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