Loyola Brings 'Marquee Name, Excellent Services' to Burr Ridge

Despite a short delay this summer from a strike by construction workers, the Loyola Center for Health at Burr Ridge is on schedule to be completed by January 2011, and operational by March of next year, bringing needed care to the Burr Ridge area.

The Burr Ridge facility will focus on orthopaedic care and rehabilitation. The facility will offer an immediate care center, a sports medicine program, pain management, a sleep center, an infusion center and a laboratory. Neuroscience services, which treat conditions affecting the brain, spine and nervous system, will also be available. In addition, a long list of medical and surgical specialists who partner with the physicians offering these services will be accessible to patients requiring consultation. Therapeutic and rehabilitation services will include aquatic therapy and day rehabilitation.

Mayor Gary Grasso is pleased and thinks the effect on the community will be positive.

"I'm ecstatic about it," he said. "It's everything and more than I could have imagined it to be when it was first proposed."

Grasso said it is fortunate for Burr Ridge to get a project in such a tough economic climate.

"It's a great location, a marquee name and excellent medical services—it's a perfect fit for our special village," he said.

Dan Post, senior vice president of ambulatory programs at Loyola, said the day rehab in particular will be of benefit to residents and one that it is in demand in the area.

"The day rehab facility is a novel concept," he said. "It serves patients who need extensive physical therapy but don't need to stay in a hospital. Patients can come in for six or seven hours of therapy, go home, eat and sleep and then come back the next day."

Cardiac rehabilitation as well as traditional physical, occupational and speech therapy will also all have a home at Loyola's new center.

Leading-edge diagnostics, including CT, diagnostic radiography, ultrasound and MRI, will help to support the specialists on site, but will also be available to patients who just require the diagnostic services.

"Loyola's vision for the future includes enhancing care for the communities we serve and bringing Loyola programs closer to patients in convenient and comprehensive ambulatory centers," said president and CEO of the health system Dr. Paul K. Whelton in a press release. "This new facility will allow us to broaden access to specialists in these two key service lines as well as offer patients ancillary services and testing in one convenient location."

Post said Loyola chose Burr Ridge because there was a real need for these services in the area.

"A lot of people [from this area] said they really liked the services but they had trouble commuting all the way to Maywood," he said.

Loyola will lease 70,000 square feet (the first two floors) of the entire 100,000-square-foot building. Other tenants have not yet been determined.