Hospital CEO's Plans Give Community a Jolt

As part of its due diligence, Saint Anthony Ministries, a holding company that owns the hospital and which will operate the campus, worked with community leaders to find out what they needed that wasn't currently being offered in the area, and also worked with Jones Lang LaSalle, a company that manages retail malls, to vet and design the concept.

Additionally, it solicited philanthropic interests who said they would donate to a concept like the community campus where donating money for a replacement hospital would be a tougher sell, Medaglia says.

The model attracted interest from academia. It was recently the subject of a research study conducted by University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Public Health, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Architecture, and HDR Architecture to help Saint Anthony Ministries better understand the needs of the Southwest and West Chicago area community.

Researchers employed several tactics to ensure a complete representation of the population, including key informant interviews, a community cross-sectional survey, focus groups and a spatial analysis with the Geographic Information Systems analytical tool.