Insider Only News Health Care New Castle County

Select Specialty moves to ChristianaCare

November 28, 2022 |By Katie Tabeling

Select Specialty Hospital has moved from St. Francis Hospital to ChristianaCare’s Wilmington Campus. | DBT PHOTO BY KATIE TABELING WILMINGTON — Select Specialty Hospital has moved its Delaware Critical Illness Recovery Hospital to ChristianaCare’s Wilmington Hospital, which comes with a small downsize in beds. Select Speciality completed the move to the

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Select Specialty Hospital has moved from St. Francis Hospital to ChristianaCare's Wilmington Campus. | DBT PHOTO BY KATIE TABELING[/caption] WILMINGTON — Select Specialty Hospital has moved its Delaware Critical Illness Recovery Hospital to ChristianaCare’s Wilmington Hospital, which comes with a small downsize in beds. Select Speciality completed the move to the ninth floor of the ChristianaCare facility earlier this month, relocating more than 130 employees from Saint Francis Hospital in downtown Wilmington. The relocation to a 25,492-square-foot facility leased space will mean that Select Speciality will go from 35 beds to 33 beds. “The primary purpose for this relocation is to move in a newer, state-of-the-art space while providing the high level of quality care the Wilmington area is accustomed to receiving from [Select Speciality Hospital Wilmington],” wrote Select Medical Corporation Chief Development Officer Brian Williams in an application to the Delaware Health Resources Board, which oversees changes in the state’s medical care services and facilities. The ninth floor of ChristianaCare Wilmington was shell space, leased out to the “hospital within a hospital” for 10 years. Renovations were estimated to cost at least $4.5 million, and the total expense on the project was projected at $7.5 million. Select Speciality is a long-term acute care hospital that specializes in treating patients recovering from critical illnesses. Patients are typically referred from hospitals after an intensive unit stay or are those suffering from chronic illnesses, ranging from severe infections, complex wounds, respiratory and heart failure and more. Select Medical is based in Mechanicsburg, Pa., and operates more than 100 specialty hospitals. It has operated one out of Saint Francis since 1999, and the next closest long-term acute care facility is more than 20 miles away in Havertown, Pa. Over the course of the last two decades, Select Specialty received patients from both ChristianaCare, Saint Francis, as well as Bayhealth, Upper Chesapeake Medical Center in Bel Air, Md. The highest volume of patients live in Elkton, Md., as well as New Castle, Wilmington, Dover, Elsemere, Bear and Hockessin. From March 2020 to March 2021, more than a quarter of the Select Speciality patients come from ChristianaCare, while only 7% come from Saint Francis, according to documents filed with the Health Resources Board. Patient volume is expected to remain relatively the same with the move, and Select Medical expects to add upward of 30 employees with the move, although some undisclosed services will be contracted with ChristianaCare.