By Clint Wolf
For StatelineBusiness

JANESVILLE - A new 50-bed hospital is being planned for Janesville that could open in 2010.

The hospital, planned to be built near the intersection of Interstate 90 and Highway 11, is to be built on a 50-acre site with a cost of $140 million. It is a joint venture of Dean Health System and SSM Health Care, which is the parent company of St. Mary's Hospital in Madison.

Dr. Craig Samitt, President and CEO of Dean Health System and Mary Starmann-Harrison, CEO of SSM Health Care of Wisconsin announced plans to develop the new hospital campus in Janesville Thursday.

Plans are to build the 50-bed hospital and an adjacent Dean physician office complex. The number of beds may expand as patient needs are further assessed. The new campus will offer patients, doctors, nurses and local employers a choice in health care services, inside technologically sophisticated facilities.

"Janesville residents are asking for - and deserve - more health care options closer to home," Samitt said. "In partnership with SSM Health Care of Wisconsin and St. Mary's, we have been listening to, working with and investing in communities in Wisconsin for nearly 100 years. We are proud of our roots in Janesville and committed to developing a medical campus that meets the growing needs of the area."

"Quality patient care is our priority," Starmann-Harrison said. "It always has been, and it always will be. We are looking forward to serving the broader health care needs of the residents of Janesville."

The hospital will have approximately 344 employees.

Dean's new physician office complex, also scheduled to open in 2010, will offer a broad array of services comparable to those already provided at Dean's Riverview Clinic. Procedures currently performed at the Riverview Surgery Center, jointly owned by Dean and SSMHC/WI, will be performed at the new hospital. Services will include an emergency room, outpatient surgery, radiology, cardiology, endocrinology, gastroenterology, general surgery, gynecology, neurology, obstetrics, oncology, orthopedics, pediatrics, pulmonology, a sleep lab, urology, vascular medicine, ears, nose and throat treatment and more.

Dean currently operates the Northview Clinic/Dean Therapy Center at 2540 Humes Road, and the Riverview Clinic/Riverview Surgery Center at 616 N. Washington St., Janesville. Procedures currently performed at Riverview Surgery Center will be performed at the new hospital. Dean Health System is studying the needs of Janesville residents to determine the role the existing facilities will play in the future. More information about how the existing clinics and new facility will integrate will be provided later, Dean officials said.

The Northview Clinic opened in 2003. Dean Health System has been affiliated with Riverview Clinic since 1994. Prior to that, Riverview Clinic had served the Janesville area for 75 years.

Approximately 20,000 Janesville area residents are participants in Dean Health Plan and they will receive services at the new hospital complex..

Dean Health System is a multi-physician specialty health care delivery system based in Madison, and includes approximately 500 physicians providing care at almost 60 locations throughout southern Wisconsin, including Riverview, Northview, Milton and Delavan Clinics.

SSM Health Care of Wisconsin operates St. Mary's Hospital in Madison and St. Clare Hospital in Baraboo, as well as two nursing homes.