CEO Update: Hospital expansion and renovation, phase 2

CEO Update Hospital Expansion
• 18 June 2026

Michael Calhoun shares the latest happenings at CMH in his monthly CEO Updates. He is the CEO/executive director of CMH and the Citizens Memorial Health Care Foundation.

Our hospital expansion opened in April, and we immediately started phase 2 of the expansion and renovation project. The renovations will take place over the next year. Steve Retherford, who is our director of design, joined me to discuss phase 2.

Continue reading the blog post or watch the video to learn more about:

• The two project phases
• What is included in 2A
• What is included in 2B
• Providing the highest level of care

The project phases

Retherford: We have 2A and 2B. 2A is the biggest piece and is underway now with demolition activities. They're cleaning the area out for the new construction to be added back. That process is going on and will conclude by the end of this year.

We'll be able to mobilize those spaces in 2A: A new pre and post area for surgery, PACU, as well as OR 4 and our cath lab suite. 2B is the the support areas for surgery. That will start after the first of the year and conclude by the end of May 2027.

Additionally to phase 2, we've added a CT scan room, which is close to the Emergency Department. That is underway right now and will be operational by the end of August or first of September.

Calhoun: We only have one CT machine right now. Getting a new CT room by the end of August will give us a second CT. It builds in redundancy so that we can take care of emergency patients at the same time we’re taking care of more routine images.

You might notice if you needed a CT in the hospital that it was a little bit longer journey from the ED to imaging. This puts it right up next to the ER so there’s not the transport back and forth.

What is included in 2A

Retherford: We're converting our surgical space, as well as the former Birth Place, into our new pre and post area for surgery, along with six PACU recovery areas. The other big piece is that we’re going to develop a new endoscopy room embedded in the surgery area, along with moving the cath lab into this area, where the former Med/Surg nurse station and support areas were. That's going to become our cath lab suite. So we’ll end up with two fully functional cath lab procedure rooms.

Calhoun: The pre and post surgical areas are places for our patients to be able to go before surgery and then after surgery. Right now, we have a lot of utilization of our Med/Surg floor or some temporary recovery areas that we have made, but that’s going to give us adequate space for patients after their surgery is completed and before their surgery takes place to prepare and then recover from their surgery in place within the surgical unit.

What is included in 2B

Calhoun: Then we move into phase two B, and that's where we address the OR rooms specifically. We make them larger, and we have additional space.

Retherford: We do have three existing ORs as part of that scope. We will upgrade those with some new finishes, and we’re going to grow OR 2 and make it a better room. Our new OR 4 that's part of 2A is where we’re going to put the robot. That’s our biggest room, which actually helps the physicians and the staff be able to use that room a lot more efficiently.

2B also is where we enhance all our support services, where we’ll be able to combine and enlarge our central storage area for surgery, as well as the support areas for anesthesia and make the flow into that unit a lot more functional than what we currently experience today. All roads now lead into surgery, where we have the OR, we have recovery space and we also have the cath lab. And, of course, part of the 2A is an endoscopy room, which is a large room we don’t currently have that we’re developing for those procedures. It is also embedded inside surgery so that, for families and patients, they only have to go to one space and not have to be in different areas of the hospital for that care.

Providing the highest level of care

Calhoun: The goal is you couldn’t go anywhere else and get a higher level of care. You couldn't go anywhere else and get a more qualified physician or better equipment. We have that right here at CMH, and it's such a gratifying thing for me for us to be able to complete this project.

After phase 2, we're not actually finished renovating the hospital. We still have other spaces within the hospital after this project is complete that we have in our forecast. But phase 2 is going to address some really pressing needs that we have. This is going to be an exciting time for us to finish this up and have a great space for our patients to receive care.