The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
CHH medical clinic to close
TORRINGTON — Charlotte Hungerford Hospital’s medical clinic at 1598 East Main St. is permanently closing on Sunday.
Hartford Healthcare Gohealth Urgent Care will open Monday. Its hours are 8 a.m. to 8 p.m,., Monday through Friday, and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday. It is located at the Shops at Sky Top, 996 East Main St.
Brian Mattiello, regional vice president for strategy and community development at Charlotte Hungerford Hospital, said the closure of the CHH clinic and subsequent opening of Go Health is a positive step for the hospital and the city.
“Hartford Health Care, as a system, is in a joint venture with Go Health,” he said. “Hartford Health Care decided that the best way for them to deliver urgent care services was to enter into a formal relationship with Go Health. So with us becoming
part of Hartford HealthCare, it was natural for us to stay in this urgent care business. That led to the re-establishment of our urgent care services under the GoHealth model.”
GoHealth Urgent Care facilities are located in Avon, West Hartford, Bristol, Newington, Southington, Wethersfield, Glastonbury, Manchester, Windsor, South WIndsor, Vernon, Enfield, Meriden, Norwich and New London.
This latest step furthers CHH and Hartford HealthCare’s partnership, Mattiello said.
“This past year has been the most exciting for me,” Mattiello said. “We’ve gone from thinking about our survivability to now focusing on our growth and development, all in the last 12 months. Frankly, it’s
been an awesome year of growth and development and thinking about our future.”
Charlotte Hungerford Hospital affiliated with Hartford HealthCare in November 2017; the partnership went into effect in January 2018. Since then, it has made a number of changes to its service locations in and around the city. It renovated its emergency room at the hospital, unveiling the revamped facility in November 2018. The $11 million, multi-year renovation and expansion began in 2010, with construction completed in phases during the last three years.
In August 2018, Hartford HealthCare Center for Healthy Aging opened its 10th location Charlotte Hungerford Hospital. The center provides resource coordinators and dementia specialists to work with families and caregivers,
with free assessments to establish proper care for a patient, including in-home care, medical alert technology, modifications at home, state programs and veterans services. Hartford HealthCare’s other aging centers are located in Bloomfield, Meriden, New Britain, Newington, Southington, Vernon and Willimantic.
In October, CHH announced its plans to build a new health facility at the end of Route 8 in Winsted, with all hospital services offered at the Winsted Health Center to be moved to the new building. The facility will include emergency services, behavioral health, a LifeStar helicopter landing pad, and primary care and specialty care services, including behavioral health.
Providing urgent care to the people of Torrington and the Northwest Corner is not a new idea, Mattiello said.
“We’re so proud to have been able to provide (urgent care) services to the community for so many years,” he said. “I stand on the shoulders of every nurse, every tech, every provider, and every registrar that has worked at that walk-in clinic since the 1990s.
“This is a transition for us, and on one level it’s a very exciting one, to know that the GoHealth model is coming here,” he said. “Hartford HealthCare is building on what has been a model and a reputation (of urgent care) that we’ve maintained for decades, of which we’re very proud.”
In case of an emergency, patients can visit the CHH Emergency Department at 540 Litchfield St. in Torrington or Hungerford Emergency at 115 Spencer St. in Winsted. Visit the hospital website to learn more.