The new Wahzhazhe Health Center, a $50 million construction project to house primary care, physical therapy, X-ray and lab services, dental, optometry, specialty care, and a pharmacy, has been delayed to the fall of 2025.
Previously, scheduled to open in summer of 2024, the new health center was delayed due to lengthy and complex financial negotiations in the post-COVID 19 market. CEO Mark Rogers assures patients, however, that they will not have to wait on specialist care, which includes nine areas of medicine, and counting.
The changing financial landscape of the post-COVID market meant high-interest rates, a difficult search for the right bank lender, and rapid fluctuations in quoted materials and labor costs. Additionally, the WZZHC had to update its building plans. CEO Mark Rogers said his team had a hard time getting stable cost quotes: “It was volatile. We couldn’t lock them down.”
The tribe also urged the Si-Si A-Pe-Txa to go back to market and shop more banks, until finally they settled down to three, and began to work with financial service advisors to get the best interest loan rates from banks. After the ON Congress approved the financials, the clinic adjusted its timeline from 2024 to the fall of 2025.
“Market forces had a culminating impact on all projects, both regionally, state-wide, and nationally,” said Rogers, who cited the conditions which complicated financing as increases in costs of square footage, supply chain issues, inflation, rising and unstable market interest rates, a tight labor market, and ongoing governmental adjustments. “These were un-forecasted events,” said Rogers. “Now that the construction has started, the project opening date is firm, and the project is on schedule for the fall of 2025 projected opening.” Additional causes of delay, which Rogers noted occurred amidst this market storm, included extended feasibility studies conducted by the health system—as well as the tribe—for the clinic, as well as further research into USDA, BIA, HUD, and IHS funding.
For the six-time hospital manager Rogers, making over the Wahzhazhe Health Center has been akin to making “pistachio almond ice cream,” he said, “versus just having chocolate at Absentee Shawnee …” where he worked before coming to the Osage. “But, it’s all ice cream,” he added. Rogers plans to retire in a couple of years and is motivated to leave the Osage health system in prime condition.
Complex market challenges of high interest rates and material and labor costs have not distracted the clinic from rebuilding its relationship with patients who had suffered under prior clinic administration changes since 2021. Presently, the existing WZZHC is up 40 employees from the prior year. “We’re trying to be better, faster, stronger,” said Rogers, “and we measure ourselves constantly. Patient satisfaction is the prime focus.”
At the last Si-Si A-Pe-Txa meeting, the board emphasized the need to create more patient space to reduce wait times for specialty care, which have ranged from three to four months long. On a follow-up call, Rogers clarified that these wait times are not for urgent health issues, however. Wait times for any remotely urgent issue will be anywhere from one to thirty days, Rogers said, and whenever there’s a more acute need, patients are sent out to Bartlesville for immediate attention.
Primary Residential Treatment Center Campus (PRTC) still on track to open
The new women’s counseling center is still on track to open this year, as part of the larger primary residential treatment center (PRTC) campus to house men’s, women’s, and adolescent treatment, as well as transitional housing, and administration—all in one single location west of town on Elks Lodge Road. The PRTC campus has remained on schedule and will open in June 2024.
In addition to the new counseling center, which will be at a campus near Pawhuska, patients can look forward to the opening of four additional buildings, including elder services, which is adjacent to senior housing in Hominy; mobile service clinics, operational throughout Osage County with schedules updated via the WZZHC website and Facebook; the new health center due in 2025; and the Civic Center, which is slated for renovation to house optometry, tentatively, as well as public and community health representatives, support staff, and shipping and receiving.
Rogers said he prefers to lease rather than buy in order to make space while the community awaits construction so that the WZZHC can avoid a trail of empty buildings in their wake. The Nation helped alleviate facility shortages by signing over the Civic Center to the WZZHC and is working with them to authorize a 90-day renovation. Currently, the building is being used to house the clinic’s grant programs and public health, procurement, shipping, and receiving. By the time of this article, there was no confirmed start date for construction, which is on hold due to “issues being addressed by the Tribe and City,” said Rogers.
The task of finding room to house patient specialty services requires a balancing act for the WZZHC budget, said Rogers, and this has created some stress. “We’re kind of robbing Peter to pay Paul. We’ve had some help from the tribe with that, and we’ve also had some extended discussions, because there’s different thoughts from different people on where we should be, space-wise.” For instance, at the last Si-Si A-Pe-Txa board meeting in December 2023, board member Timothy Shadlow expressed frustration about community members making recommendations about where patient services should be.
Also at the board meeting, Shadlow and Vice Chair Michael Bristow discussed the failure of the Osage Nation to turn over information the board needs to keep their finances tidy and up-to-date. Citing their status as a non-profit, which disallows any lagging on numbers, as they did at the close of 2023, Bristow said, “These numbers have been promised and not delivered.” Shadlow insisted the board work to find out who was responsible for the delay. “We’re being held back,” he said. Acting Osage Nation Treasurer Tyler McIntosh has not sent the numbers over, and the health system cannot finalize their budget forecasting, cost modeling, and financial projections until they receive the needed financial numbers from the tribe.
While working to resolve financial concerns, Rogers and Chief Medical Officer Dr. Tony Little are still in the process of earning back the trust of its former general patient population, who have witnessed dramatic changes in healthcare quality since 2021. The clinic is still in a restorative period of trust-building, says Rogers, and this is their prime focus: “That’s all we do, that’s our focus. Patient satisfaction.”
The clinic, which was once accused by numerous patients for not picking up the phone, now offers same-day appointments to establish care. Text and phone reminders now help to remind patients of their appointments, and even as spaces continue to grow and shift, Rogers affirms that the WZZHC will make sure that patients know where to be and when.
“Just come in and bring your tribal ID, we will get you verified for eligibility, then you’ll get your first appointment to establish care either on a same-day opening or at most within two weeks.” From there, the clinic will arrange necessary appointments with their list of specialists.
For those who want to visit the WZZHC and receive care, start at the existing Wahzhazhe Health Center on the Osage Nation Campus on Grandview Avenue. Additionally, Behavioral Health is located downtown, across the street from the US Post Office, and has counseling services available for all tribal citizens, including talk therapy for a variety of emotional and behavioral needs. The residential counseling center for men is in Barnsdall, and the new counseling center campus opening in May/June 2024 near Pawhuska will be for women. The addresses of men’s and women’s residential counseling in Barnsdall and Pawhuska are not publicly disclosed, due to the need to protect those who may be vulnerable, and to prevent friends and family from trafficking any items to residents.
The full list of specialty care currently available with the Wahzhazhe Health Center is:
- Cardiology
- Neurology
- Endocrinology
- Nephrology
- Emergency Medicine
- Orthopedics
- Psychiatry
- Podiatry
- Infectious Disease
Questions?
Health Center Main Phone: 918-287-9300
COVID-19 Hotline: 918-287-0028
Pharmacy Patient Line: 918-287-9373
Physical Address: 715 Grandview Avenue, Pawhuska, OK 74056
Hours of Operation The Wahzhazhe Health Center is open Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. The Center is open every Wednesday afternoon for staff training/meetings and during Osage Nation-recognized holidays. On every 4th Wednesday of the month, the Center is open 7-11:30 a.m. and then closed the rest of the day.
Link: Hours of Operation
CORRECTION: In a previous version of this article, the Women’s Counseling Center is part of the Primary Residential Treatment Center Campus that is still on track to open in 2024. The Osage News regrets the error.
