Hospital officials were at the open house on Wednesday to tour the new urgent care facility.
LENOX, Mass. — Berkshire Health Systems is gearing toward opening its new urgent care facility in The Center at Lenox.
On Wednesday night, BHS held an open house for people to come and tour the new facility before its opening on Monday.
The health system opened an urgent care at 505 East St. in Pittsfield in 2015. But annual visits doubled from just over 17,000 patients in 2020 compared to more than 35,000 in 2023.
"At the end of the pandemic, we saw an increase in our usage, community usage, of our urgent care. We found it a little difficult about the demand. Wait times are long, we're seeing as many people as we can, upwards of 115 120 per day in Pittsfield, but we realize that that's not it's not enough." said Rob Shearer, administrative director of urgent care services.
This led to BHS to expand to be able to help more patients more efficiently.
"We did a ZIP code analysis to see what the utilization was and where people were coming from," Shearer said. "And there's a large population that comes from South County so this just worked out to be a really perfect location. Hopefully, we'll offload a little bit of our volume in Pittsfield, bring those wait times down, and then we'll be able to manage both a little bit more efficiently than we are," .
The urgent care center at 489 Pittsfield Road will be about the same as the one in Pittsfield but occupational health will be designated there as well as predominantly having a travel clinic at this location.
"There's going to be some 'occ' health that's designated, as this is the site, and one of the things that we talked about, the travel clinic, we'll do that predominantly here just because we will have all the vaccines that you might need in one of the fridges," said Dr. Michael McHugh, chair of the emergency departments at Berkshire Medical Center and North Adams Regional Hospital.
Many residents who came to the open house to take a tour and ask questions of staff were amazed at the new place and excited for the convenience it will bring them.
"This is right between where I live in Lee and where I hang out in Pittsfield so it's very convenient," said Clark Nicholls. "And it's a great facility. The exam rooms are quite sizable; it looks like they have a lot of equipment, more than [the urgent care at] St. Luke's Square, so I look forward to if I need it I'll be coming here."
"We are about three minutes away if we needed to come, otherwise we will have to go to the hospital or Great Barrington or St. Luke's," Joe Sloane of Pittsfield said.
"We're just so thrilled that something's closer for us to get to because we always either go to Pittsfield or Great Barrington or wherever you have to go so now it's right here," said Lenox resident Nancy Thompson. "So you're going to get a lot more people I think in this location especially in the summertime with Tanglewood people, 'cause we don't really have anything that they can get to quickly as this is the place so, yeah, very excited."
Like the current location in Pittsfield, this facility will offer X-rays, sports physicals, vaccinations, and more including telehealth services. Patients can book online or inside.
Berkshire Health Urgent Care in Lenox will accept a wide variety of health insurance plans, including private commercial coverage, Medicare and MassHealth through the Berkshire Fallon Health Collaborative, all of which are also accepted at the Pittsfield Berkshire Health Urgent Care location.
The facility will open its doors at 8 a.m. Monday, March 17, and closes at 8 p.m. everyday; closed Thanksgiving and Christmas.
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