'On borrowed time': State presents schedule for closing Hiram W. Davis Medical Center

Yahoo

24-05-2025

The timeline for closing the Hiram W. Davis Medical Center by 2027 in Dinwiddie County has been made public, and its plans call for eventual moves of patients to either public or private facilities and an employee-relocation process the state hopes will limit layoffs.
A final process for shuttering the 50-year-old 150-bed facility on the campus of Central State Hospital still must be approved by the General Assembly and governor next winter. A meeting May 21 of the state Joint Commission on Health Care (JCHC) provided the first opportunity for review of that timetable.
There are currently 33 patients at the hospital, with three of them likely to be discharged by July. Of those remaining, half are expected to go to either the Southeast Virginia Training Center in Chesapeake, or into an intermediate-care facility or group home.
As for the 152 staff members at the medical center, some of them will transfer to the new Central State Hospital currently under construction along with some of the medical-center services. Others will be offered positions at other DBHDS facilities or retire.
Closure of Davis Medical Center became the only option after DBHDS determined that it costs more to renovate the old building rather than close it.
Its shortfalls became apparent when the building began having problems with its water system due to aging pipes. The center's design and construction did not allow for expansion or invasive renovations that would cause patient and staff relocations.
'It really is on borrowed time,' DBHDS Commissioner Dr. Nelson Smith told the JCHC. Temporary heating and air-conditioning units have been set up in the hospital's hallways, and at one point, staffers had to use bowls of water to bathe patients due to levels of legionella in the system.
'Thankfully, that has been mitigated,' Smith told the commission members, 'but that doesn't mean we're not at risk or out of the woods in the future.'
Simply put, Smith said, DBHDS patients deserve the highest quality of medical care, 'and this facility doesn't represent them.'
Another driving force for the center's closure, Smith said, is the trend toward private-sector healthcare taking over many of the services once only offered by the state. Those services allow patients to be treated closer to home than in one centralized facility.Smith said DBHDS is spending $1.5 million to upgrade the Southeastern Virginia Training Center in Chesapeake to accommodate up to 15 of the existing Davis patients. Most of the patients eligible for transfer to Chesapeake are likely to move into care settings closer to their homes, but DBHDS expects at least five of them to opt for SEVTC.
Smith estimated that two residences at SEVTC would have to be fixed up to accommodate the Davis transfers.
The term 'training center' is a misnomer, Smith said, because the center actually is made up of 15 five-bed living quarters, all under skilled care.
'It's more like a neighborhood,' Smith said.
At one point, Virginia had five training centers, including one adjacent to Central State Hospital in Dinwiddie. All but Chesapeake were forced to close as part of a federal investigation into care at these centers.
In the interim, Smith said, more opportunities for mental-health care in the private sector meant less of a reliance on the state for services.
Plans call for the final version of the timeline to be officially submitted to the governor and the General Assembly money committees by Nov. 1 in time for consideration in the 2026 legislative session.
Bill Atkinson (he/him/his) is an award-winning journalist who covers breaking news, government and politics. Reach him at [e-mail] or on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @BAtkinson_PI.
This article originally appeared on The Progress-Index: State gives timeline for closing Hiram W. Davis Medical Center