Sanford Health has announced that it would build a new standalone heart hospital in downtown Bismarck. The project is still in the early planning phase. This facility will be built around Sanford’s existing Seventh and Rosser Clinic, between Sixth Street North and North Seventh Street on the north side of Rosser Avenue. It will connect to the Sandford hospital via an existing tunnel and skywalk to the clinic. This will allow the largest health care provider in the state to have one main operation point for Bismarck, located downtown.

The new heart hospital will be in relation to the existing Sanford hospital. Dr. Michael LeBeau, president of Sanford Bismarck said that they thought having one hospital campus was more efficient. If they had decided to build a hospital away from all the main services, it would just add to transportation of patients.

The new heart hospital will consolidate all existing heart services scattered in several areas, into one building for cardiac patients. Services will include consultations; outpatient testing, cardiac cath labs, where doctors can perform minimally invasive tests and procedures on the heart and nearly all surgical heart procedures.

The only procedure that will not be performed at the heart hospital will be heart transplants. Sanford doesn’t perform heart transplants at any of its facilities. Those cases are sent to the University of Minnesota hospital in downtown Minneapolis and to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

This heart hospital will be unique for Sanford’s operations in North Dakota as it will house all cardiac services in a standalone facility, though Sanford Medical Center in Fargo last year announced the $200 million addition of a heart and vascular health center to its main hospital.