New west Wichita hospital makes residents feel safer

July 25, 2010|By Cliff Judy | KWCH 12 Eyewitness News

(WICHITA, Kan.) — Thousands got a first look at a new west Wichita hospital over the weekend, and some visitors say having emergency care closer to where they live is comforting.

Via Christi's new hospital just off west 21st Street is expected to begin accepting patients next month. During a two-day open house this weekend, more than 4,000 people came out for tours of the 68-bed facility.

Virginia Breitenbach and her husband, Victor, say the new building makes them feel safer. Virginia has fallen twice before requiring hospitalization. The Colwich couple has been waiting for closer emergency room access, worried about even more serious injuries.

"I mean, it's happened already," says Victor Breitenbach. "We drove like a son of a gun to get there, and this way, we've only got five miles to go. So that's a relief there."

The hospital has one more inspection to go before accepting patients.

The land it sits on holds a special place in Wichita medical history, which is one reason Via Christi may have gotten it in the first place.

John Strunk had repeatedly refused to sell the land, which has been in his family for generations, to other potential buyers. At first, he also told Via Christi the land where his farm sits wasn't for sale.

However, Strunk knew his grandparents believed in helping the community.

"If that was anything other than a hospital," Strunk says, "it'd still be farmland."

In 1912, Strunk's grandmother had complications during childbirth at the farmhouse. She was driven 15 miles by lumber wagon to Via Christi's St. Francis Hospital, where she became the first woman in Wichita to survive a Caesarean Section.

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