Despite its financial losses, Providence is still choosing to expand. The Washington-based health system announced plans on Monday to invest $712 million into facilities in Orange County, California. It said the investment will help increase access to acute care services in the southern region of the county.

Delivering services across seven states, Providence is a 52-hospital health system. With this announcement, the health system is adding two new medical centers, as well as a new patient tower.

The tower will provide about 100 private patient rooms for Providence Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, which currently has 504 beds. The expansion will also allow the hospital to build operating suites with more space and enhanced technology, said Seth Teigen, the hospital’s chief executive. The clinical areas that will benefit most from the new operating suites are neuroscience, cardiovascular and maternity, according to Teigen. 

Providence Mission Hospital’s expansion will also include a new on-campus multispecialty ambulatory surgery center. The health system expects the center to draw in new physician partners, as well as make surgical care more streamlined for patients.

The two new medical centers will be erected in San Clemente and Rancho Mission Viejo. 

The San Clemente community has lacked access to high acuity and urgent care for several years — the city’s only hospital closed in 2016.

“Our new multispecialty health center will be centrally located near the Outlets at San Clemente and will vastly improve convenience and access to care,” Teigen said. “One of the ongoing concerns among San Clemente residents has been the travel time to high quality healthcare services.”

The medical center will offer urgent care services provided by emergency medicine physicians, a full-service imaging and diagnostics center, and a multispecialty clinic with primary care physicians, OB/GYNs and other specialty care providers. 

Providence will build a similar, but larger, health center in Rancho Mission Viejo. This community is growing — 16,000 new homes will be built there over the next 15 years, according to Teigen.

“Residents in Rancho Mission Viejo are even further from high acuity urgent care, so this health center becomes even more important to the community’s overall health and wellness,” he said.

Tiegen called all of these expansions “vital,” saying that Providence wouldn’t be able to support all of its Orange County patient base without these new facilities.

The new expansion comes amidst financial woes — Providence’s most recent quarterly report revealed that it ended the first two quarters of this year with an operating loss of $934 million. To respond, the health system announced this summer that it had adopted a new operating model that calls for “a leaner executive team and a nimbler administrative structure.” 

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