Kaiser Permanente and Providence Southern California are working together on a $750 million hospital to replace the aging Providence St. Mary Medical Center in Apple Valley, Calif., according to the Daily Press.
Under the partnership, 65-year-old Providence St. Mary will be closed and replaced with a 260-bed hospital in Victorville, Calif., the organizations said June 3. The hospital will be a full-service acute care facility and may include a medical office building and other ambulatory services. Providence would operate the hospital.
Providence St. Mary's is closing because it doesn't meet California's new seismic requirements slated to take effect in 2030, according to the Daily Press. It would cost about the same to retrofit the hospital as it would to build a new one, hospital leaders told the newspaper.
Erik Wexler, Providence's president of operations and strategy–South, outlined to the Daily Press what the Renton, Wash.-based health system's affiliation with Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser will look like.
"Health care delivery has become very complex, and Providence has found that affiliations truly benefit the communities we serve, particularly areas with significant rates of serious health risks," he told the newspaper. He added that the partnership with Kaiser will allow the hospital to offer "more high-end acuity level types of care."
The new hospital, which requires regulatory review and approval, is expected to open in 2026.