Northern Arizona Healthcare Embarks on New Strategy to Address Regional Needs
In the wake of community resistance to a previous hospital proposal, Northern Arizona Healthcare (NAH) has unveiled a fresh five-year strategic plan. This initiative comes two years after Flagstaff voters rejected the controversial idea of constructing a new healthcare facility south of the city.
Last week, NAH CEO Dave Cheney emphasized a shift in approach, stating, “We’ve spent almost a year doing nothing but listening, listening to the community, listening to our medical staff, listening to our 4,000 employees.” He added that the feedback gathered was instrumental in shaping the new strategy.
Recent discussions involving Cheney, NAH administrators, and local officials from Coconino County and the City of Flagstaff have highlighted the necessity for a larger and more modern medical center than what the current Flagstaff Medical Center offers.
NAH is considering five potential sites for expansion, including the possibility of enhancing their existing facility. However, Cheney pointed out the challenges of expanding in the current location, particularly because of the limited access to alternative medical care in the area.
“One of the big differences is we could shut down our hospitals in Phoenix or northern California and patients could quickly maneuver over two miles, three miles, at most five miles, go to a different hospital,” Cheney explained. “It’s not that we can’t build a new hospital on this site, it’s that it’s not feasible. I’m not willing – unless the community tells me to – to shut this hospital down for two and a half years while we knock everything down, close services.”
Future public meetings are planned to discuss the hospital hill property, with NAH’s board set to deliberate on a new facility by year-end. A notable change in the proposal is the exclusion of the ‘medical village’ concept, which was a point of contention in the 2023 plan. This concept included residential and commercial developments alongside the hospital, which did not resonate well with the community.
Cheney remarked, “We heard loud and clear: ‘We do not like the idea of the village concept. That does not resonate with us. We don’t like our hospital system getting involved in real estate development.’ We’ve eliminated the village concept out of wherever we put this new hospital. The village concept is no longer there.”
Cheney also stressed that any new facility must serve the broader region and not just Flagstaff. He clarified that the Flagstaff Medical Center serves as a regional referral center rather than just a local hospital. “At one point in Northern Arizona Healthcare’s history, Flagstaff Medical Center was a community hospital,” Cheney noted. “Somewhere in the past 10 years or so, we have transitioned into this regional referral center. And it’s important because when I go to the outlying communities and I talk to the mayors […] they totally get it. And the mayors are saying, ‘That’s our hospital too.’”
He further explained the hospital’s critical role in emergencies, where patients from nearby areas like Cottonwood or Sedona are often transported to Flagstaff for specialized care. “[When] someone gets into a car wreck in Cottonwood or Sedona and they go to the emergency room, and they realize ‘Hey, this person has internal bleeding. They need to get into surgery right now. They have to be in a level one trauma center.’ They’re going to refer that patient, probably by a helicopter, into Flagstaff.”
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