Huntsville Post-Acute & Rehab to build Scott County's first dialysis center
Dialysis center will initially be for in-patient use only, but hopes are that services can eventually be expanded to include out-patients
HUNTSVILLE | Scott County is getting its first dialysis center.
Huntsville Post-Acute & Rehabilitation Center announced Tuesday that it will build a dialysis center, which will be located on its existing campus in Huntsville and will connect to the 300 hall.
The 2,124 square foot facility will feature six stations, which can run two shifts each day and accommodate up to 24 patients, according to Administrator John Norris. It will initially be an inpatient facility, but hopes are that it will eventually become an outpatient facility, as well.
Grainger Smith, the facility’s Vice President of Life Safety, said they’re shooting for a June 1 start of construction. He admitted that might be a bit optimistic, but said the ultimate goal is for the new addition to be placed in service by Spring 2026.
David Herskowitz, CEO of Huntsville Post-Acute & Rehab’s parent company Plainview Healthcare Partners, said the addition of the dialysis center came about after a conversation with Scott County Mayor Jerried Jeffers.
“This is the first community and the first facility we are trying this in,” Herskowitz said. “If it works and is well received, then we will try it in other facilities. But we would not be here if (Jeffers) hadn’t suggested it.”
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Jeffers said that Herskowitz went to the trouble of reaching out to him to see how the healthcare facility could help Scott County.
“The first time we met, he came in my office and once we got through the formalities the first thing he asked was, ‘What can I do to help the people of Scott County?’” Jeffers said. “I was kinda floored by that. You don’t often get questions like that from a CEO. I asked him if he could help us get a dialysis center.”
Jeffers said he knows first-hand the struggles faced by dialysis patients who are required to travel to outside communities for treatment.
“My father had renal disease,” he said. “I know the struggle. You just never know what the Bermuda Triangle of I-75 is going to give you day to day. I hope this will help people not only in Scott County but Morgan and Fentress counties and maybe McCreary County. I think this will be a great blessing to this community”
Jeffers said a dialysis center in Scott County could also benefit travelers.
“People on vacation, if they’re on dialysis, have to map out the closest facility,” he said. “People who come to the Big South Fork have to know where the closest dialysis center is.”
Although people who currently travel to Caryville or Knoxville three days each week for dialysis won’t immediately benefit from the forthcoming Huntsville center, Scott Countians who could benefit from inpatient care will.
“When someone falls and breaks a hip or something, when they make those referrals (to rehabilitation centers) they’re looking for some place that can do the dialysis on site,” Norris said. “Not many skilled nursing facilities can do it on site.”
Dialysis will be just the latest service added by Huntsville Post-Acute & Rehab, which has just begun outpatient occupational therapy, physical therapy and speech therapy for all ages.
Carla Buttram, Plainview’s chief operations officer and a Scott County resident, said the addition of a dialysis center had been “a dream for a long time.”