News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Cookeville Regional CEO Buffy Key told the hospital’s planning committee Tuesday that planning has begun for a new South Tower addition.
Key said the project would include an all-new emergency room on the first floor and additional levels that could serve a variety of purposes. Key said the addition is much needed as the hospital has been at capacity for several years.
“On that second floor it’ll probably be more of a procedural outpatient type of area or observation, something like that,” Key said. “And then third floor will probably be another inpatient unit. We’re still trying to determine what’s best, the needs for our community and region for that.”
Key said planning meetings for the tower are in progress with architects, the project manager, and hospital leadership. Key said the project is expected to begin construction in the first half of 2026.
“You’re looking (at) ’26, ’27, ’28, probably even ’29, I don’t know how long that will take but we’re just excited about movement,” Key said.
Key said the hospital is planning fourth, fifth, and sixth levels of the tower as well. Key said if those floors are not going to be patient rooms, they may end up being shelled in depending on cost.
“I think our architect told us when we built the north tower it was about three hundred dollars per square feet,” Key said. “Last year about this time it was eight hundred dollars per square feet.”
Key said the goal will be to prioritize getting the first floor emergency room set up and then moving onto the rest of the tower. Key said preliminary estimates project the new emergency room to have sixty to sixty five beds.
“Included in that, what’s very important to us, is a behavioral health, mental health area,” Key said. “For those people so that they’re not in the hallway. To me that’s a travesty and I think that we have to give them their privacy.”
Key said the old ER space will be used to expand other departments but it is too early to know exactly what will go there. Key said the new tower will be located straight out from the hospital’s east entrance.
“We’ll be taking I think fifty parking lots out of that space to build that tower,” Key said.
Key said discussions around the project started moving forward while the hospital recovered from the pandemic in 2023.
“With hospitals, especially inpatient, when you get around eighty-five percent capacity you’re probably not moving things as quick as you can or should be able to,” Key said. “And we’re seeing that with our ER people having to hold to wait to go upstairs for those folks that can be discharged to be discharged.”
