Jefferson Regional, Others Rethink Cancer Hubs

The $12 million Jones-Dunklin Cancer Center at Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Pine Bluff is now seeing patients. Like other Arkansas health care providers, JRMC has put all its cancer treatment services in one place.

Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Pine Bluff is overhauling the way it provides cancer services.

It recently opened its $12 million cancer center at 1609 W. 40th Ave. to consolidate all its cancer services under one roof.

The Jones-Dunklin Cancer Center has been seeing patients for a few months. A grand opening is set for January, but an exact date hasn’t been scheduled. JRMC also broke ground in November on a 8,800-SF radiation center for the Jones-Dunklin facility, according to a news release.

The radiation center will feature a radiation therapy vault that’s being built by Veritas Medical Solutions of Harleysville, Pennsylvania. Construction is expected to be completed in March. The radiation facility also will have two exam rooms, a consultation room and physician office, according to a JRMC news release.

The 12,000-SF Jones-Dunklin Cancer Center is located on the second floor of JRMC’s professional building. Services at the center include physician visits, an infusion center, a breast center and imaging services, said JRMC CEO Brian Thomas.

The contractor was CDI Contractors of Little Rock, and the Nelson Design Group of Pine Bluff was the architect.

JRMC has provided cancer treatment services “for decades,” Thomas said. But JRMC decided about two years ago to put all the cancer services in one location, as other hospitals are doing.

In the past, a patient would have to see the medical oncologist in one location and go to another location for radiation and still another area for infusion. Now all those services are in one place at the hospital, “so that the patient experience and the whole episode of care can be that much better,” Thomas said.

JRMC has a cancer treatment team that includes surgeons, oncologists, pathologists and primary care physicians who meet weekly to examine patient cases in order to “provide them the best level of care.”

Other hospitals are making similar moves. Baxter Regional Medical Center in Mountain Home has partnered with the Highlands Oncology Group of Fayetteville to build a $16 million cancer treatment center on the hospital’s campus. The decision was designed to put all the Medical Center’s services for cancer patients in one location.

Officials broke ground on the more than 33,000-SF facility on Aug. 28 with a goal to begin seeing patients in October 2022. Baxter and Highlands will own the center, and Highlands will operate it.

JRMC will be competing with CARTI of Little Rock, which is building an $18 million 25,000-SF cancer treatment center in Pine Bluff projected to open early next year.

JRMC’s center was named after the families of Livia and George Dunklin Jr., founder of the Five Oaks Hunting Lodge in Humphrey, and Bill and Sharri Jones and Bill’s mother, Sissy Jones. Sissy Jones is the founder of the jewelry retailer Sissy’s Log Cabin of Pine Bluff. The Jones and Dunklin families donated $600,000 toward the project.

JRMC’s Thomas said that there has always been a high prevalence of cancer in southeast Arkansas. JRMC typically detects about 1,500 cases of cancer each year.

He said he’s concerned, however, that with the COVID-19 pandemic patients have stayed away from doctors, resulting in them not being tested for cancer. “There’s a lot more out there that simply has not been detected,” he said. “So that’s something that we’re all fighting against on a daily basis in this environment.”