Tori J. Ross A state-of-the-art medical clinic is proposed to be built on 26 acres of undeveloped forest land at Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, which the base says will improve medical care for its 5,000 personnel and avert future care shortages. health.
It is offered south of the main gate at the base of US Highway 21 north of Beaufort.
“We actually have a medical clinic on MCAS Beaufort,” Captain Thomas Jones said, “but it’s outdated.”
A draft copy of an environmental assessment (EA) of the work is out and MCAS Beaufort, where fighter jets and 4,931 active duty and civilian personnel are based, is asking the public to comment on it at BFRT_JPAO@usmc. mil. An open house is scheduled from 4-7 p.m. on April 12 at Tabby Place at the Beaufort Inn, 809 Port Republic St.
A two-story, 155,189-square-foot ambulatory care center, separate from a military hospital, would provide ambulatory care, day surgery, and emergency care. Jones called it “state of the art”.
The cost of constructing the new facility was not immediately available.
Five buildings forming part of the current clinic, which are in poor condition, would be demolished.
Without the new center, a shortage of healthcare space will occur at the base in the future, according to the EA.
The center would enable planned future expansion and growth and modernize ambulatory care support for active duty personnel, family members and other eligible beneficiaries within the Beaufort military community, MCAS Beaufort said.
Patient services would include: primary care, flight medicine, dental care, behavioral health, orthopaedics/podiatry, physiotherapy, occupational health/audiology, optometry, pharmacy, radiology, outpatient clinics, outpatient surgery, and health care administration.
In 2028, according to the EA, 11,885 eligible beneficiaries would be enrolled for care at the new clinic, which would require a staff complement of 382.
Forest would be cleared on 15 acres of the 26-acre site. The project could affect northern bats, a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act, according to the draft EA, but are unlikely to cause adverse effects on them.
The project includes 323 staff parking spaces and 237 patient parking spaces in two separate lots.
This story was originally published April 1, 2022 4:55 a.m.
