DHR Health plans $17.2M expansion of its Brownsville hospital to meet demand

Doctors Hospital at Renaissance is expanding its hospital in Brownsville to keep up with patient demand for services, including more specialists in Cameron County. 

DHR Health Brownsville has worked with clinics in the city for the past decade. Nearly three years ago, it retrofitted an 80,000-square-foot, long-shuttered hospital that sits along U.S. 77 in Brownsville. 

DHR expects to renovate 14,000 square feet of the three-story hospital and spend at least $17 million to do that. The hospital, with 59 inpatient beds and an intensive care unit, is doubling the number of operating rooms to 12, adding six more bays in the emergency department, and expanding the ER waiting room. 

Plans also include retrofitted radiology, two catheterization labs, and enhanced equipment, including MRI and CT scanners. Plus, more specialists, from orthopedics to gastroenterology and surgery, are expected to work out of the Brownsville hospital in the coming months. 

The overall investment in the hospital since it was acquired as a vacant property several years ago, including asbestos remediation, has exceeded $48 million. In exchange, the city of Brownsville agreed to grant DHR $2 million to create at least 20 additional jobs and expand the hospital. 

“I think by partnering with them, incentivizing them, we’re able to create a win-win situation,” Brownsville Mayor John Cowen said. “That will produce property tax revenue over time, and add high-paying medical jobs.” 

DHR’s average starting pay is at least $15 an hour, hospital officials said. The goal is to bring more specialty care to the city so patients don’t have to travel as far for medical treatment, especially in emergencies. 

“It’s about increasing access to care, bringing world-class medical care to the populations that need it and deserve it,” said Dr. Carlos Cardenas, board chairman of DHR Health System. 

Aida Coronado-Garcia serves as an executive vice president and chief operating officer at DHR Health Brownsville. 

“We know that sometimes patients have difficulty getting to the appointments, which makes it harder for them to have procedures done in the hospital. So we looked into the area locally here, and we saw that this was available, so we purchased the building,” she said. 

“Since then, we’ve been expanding our services. Really, the community has been able to guide what the needs are. There’s such a shortage of physicians, and those are the specialties that we are bringing to Brownsville. We’ve already outgrown this building. We currently have six ORs [operating rooms], that’s not enough anymore.”