Emergency Medical Facility Planned for Small Corner in Tysons

As Tysons grows, it’s going to need access to medical care.

The Reston Hospital Center has an application, initially filed in late 2017 and still listed as “under staff review,” to build a freestanding emergency department at 2000 Old Gallows Road in Tysons.

“As Tysons continues to develop with additional office buildings and homes, it is essential that convenient and accessible health care services are available to meet the increasing need,” Reston Hospital Center, LLC, wrote in the application.

The emergency department would be located southwest of the Leesburg Pike-Beltway interchange. The proposed site is a triangular lot that closely abuts a residential development, which presents a number of development challenges.

The site is currently overgrown with foliage but was approved in 2002 to be developed as a drive-through bank. The application indicates that while the hospital would have a larger floor area, it would generate less peak hour and daily vehicle traffic than the drive-through bank.

“It will provide hospital-level emergency care in a convenient and accessible location and will be operated 24 hours per day,” according to the application. “Despite its capabilities and accessibility, the [freestanding emergency department] will accommodate far less patients than a typical emergency department operating within a hospital, allowing patients to receive necessary treatment quickly and efficiently.”

Though the facility would operate for 24-hours per day, patients would not stay overnight. The application notes that patients admitted to the building would be treated and discharged within hours of their admission or would be transferred to a hospital for higher levels of care.

HCA, Inc., which owns the Reston Hospital Center, operates a number of freestanding emergency departments across the country.

The application says that most patients visit these types of freestanding emergency departments between 9 a.m. and 8 p.m. and that an average of two patients are transported to the facilities via ambulance per day.

The growing need for emergency services in Tysons also prompted plans for a new fire station in Tysons East.

Image via Fairfax County Department of Planning and Zoning