SEQUIM — Olympic Medical Center commissioners have approved putting out for bid an estimated $7 million construction contract for expansion of its cancer center on North Fifth Avenue.
The board unanimously agreed Wednesday to seek bids for the project that would add about 4,000 square feet to the cancer care center and about 7,500 square feet for primary care service.
The expansion also would allow OMC to expand its primary care offerings in the area, Olympic Medical Center CEO Eric Lewis said.
“Our number one priority is primary care access,” Lewis said after the board’s meeting at the Sequim Medical Services Building at 840 N. Fifth Ave.
The board also agreed to an additional $597,000 in funding to Coates Design Architects to complete its work on the expansion project, bringing the contract to about $1.4 million.
OMC chief financial officer Darryl Wolfe said he expects to receive bids in the next couple of weeks and to bring the board a proposal in July.
The Olympic Medical Center Foundation is raising money for the expansion of the cancer center, said Bruce Skinner, executive director of the foundation.
“Counting pledges from donors, we have now raised over $1 million towards the cancer center expansion,” Skinner said.
The foundation also presented the hospital with a $150,000 donation to purchase a nuclear imaging camera for cardiac stress testing.
Hospital commissioners also approved Wednesday a contract worth a little more than $140,000 with InSight Telepsychiatry to provide services for the next three years for mental health services.
Lewis said OMC has two full-time mental health care specialists in Port Angeles and envisions integrating more mental health services into primary care offerings.
“This nation has a mental health crisis, in some ways more than a crisis with opioids,” board Commissioner Jim Leskinovitch said.
“You can see it in the streets; people are unserved and under-served. It’s a good thing … to provide these services.”
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Michael Dashiell is the editor of the Sequim Gazette of the Olympic Peninsula News Group, which also is composed of other Sound Publishing newspapers Peninsula Daily News and Forks Forum. Reach him at editor@sequimgazette.com.
