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MIDDLEBURG – HCA Florida Orange Park Hospital brought together local EMS, elected officials, caregivers and other community stakeholders Tuesday to make their mark on the final metal beam that will be placed inside a new freestanding emergency room.

HCA Florida Middleburg Emergency, located at the crossroads of Blanding Boulevard and Everett Avenue, will be an 11-bed 10,820 square foot ER with on-site imaging and lab services and is set to open this fall.

Attendees were invited to sign their names on the final beam that was air by a crane and carefully lowered and guided into place atop the new structure. The “topping out” ceremony is a long-standing tradition of construction workers to commemorate the completion of a building’s structure.

The ER will be the third freestanding emergency room for Orange Park Hospital. The hospital’s HCA Florida Park West Emergency located on 103rd Street and HCA Florida Normandy Park Emergency located on Normandy Boulevard in West Jacksonville treated nearly 70,000 patients last year.

“The experience had with our physicians, nurses and other clinicians is just one of the reasons why families continue to choose our freestanding emergency rooms,” said Dr. Shilpa Amin, Emergency Medicine Physician and Medical Director for Orange Park Hospital’s freestanding emergency rooms. “They also really like the short wait times and personalized experience they get from being in a smaller ER.”

The emergency room will operate daily, providing care by board-certified physicians, along with nurses and staff specially trained to treat adults and children for emergency care.

Patients will have quick access to HCA Florida Orange Park Hospital’s team of specialists for maternity or women’s care, advanced cardiovascular, neurology, critical and surgical care. The ER will be open 24-hours a day with lab and radiology services.

“We are excited to expand to meet the needs of the growing community in Southern Clay County,” said Dr. Amin. “It’s why we do what we do. We want to bring emergency care closer to where people live so that they don’t have to travel far to get help when they need it quickly.”

The emergency room will be conveniently located to provide quick emergency care access to those living in Middleburg, Lake Asbury, Green Cove Springs and Penney Farms.

County commissioner Betsy Condon, who represents most of Middleburg and south to Keystone Heights, said her constituents now will be no further than 25 minutes from receiving care.

In late 2021, HCA Florida Orange Park Hospital announced a $37 million expansion that included the construction of two new inpatient units that will add 48 private patient rooms.

In addition, the project will include the building of a new 20-bed intensive care unit (ICU), adding to it’s existing 28 ICU beds.

Last month, they opened a new three-story 60,000 square foot medical office building located on the East side of the hospital that houses six of their physician practices and a new outpatient imaging center.

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