Post and Courier47%
Novant Health opens doors to its new ER in Bluffton 21%
By Tony Kukulich0%
7/21/2026, 9:00:00 AM
BS Summary: This article contains 11 faulty reasoning types, including Appeal to Authority, Availability Heuristic, and Bandwagon, with Optimism Bias as the most egregious example at 14% saturation with 92 hits. Analysis detected 353 faulty-reasoning hits from 655 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 34.9% and a BS Rank of 21% (16,928 of 21,230 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 79.70% of the article peer group.
BLUFFTON — Bluffton’s 40,000 residents now have another option for 24-hour emergency care as Novant Health will begin to accept patients at its new emergency department on July 21.
The 10,000-square-foot freestanding facility is located on Bluffton Parkway and Parkside Road and features 10 treatment rooms and a trauma room.
It joins a spate of other medical facilities south of the Broad River that have either already opened or are planned to open in the not-too-distant future.
“As we look at the needs of the community, the growth of this community, one of our first investments as part of Novant Health was in access to emergency room care,” said Joel Taylor, president of Novant Health’s Hilton Head market.
The emergency department is adjacent to a 40,000-square-foot medical office building, which will offer cardiology, gastroenterology and primary care services when it opens near the end of the year.
Dr.
Erica McEnery, medical director of emergency services for the Novant Health Hilton Head Medical Center, said the newly added emergency services have the potential to lighten the load for some of the existing medical centers.
“It’s going to increase access to care locally, and it’s going to also help decompress potentially some of the local emergency departments that get really busy,” McEnery said.
Much of the emergency department traffic comes from patients who walk in, and not from patients transported by emergency medical services personnel.
Most of those patients won’t require emergency surgery or even admission to a hospital.
“They need treatment and follow-up care that comes later.
So the objective is to be in and out of this facility in 90 minutes,” Taylor said.
Patients who do require more substantial care can be transferred to a local hospital, according to McEnery.
Novant Health established itself in the Lowcountry in February 2024 with the $2.4 billion acquisition of Tenet Healthcare, taking over Hilton Head Hospital, Coastal Carolina Hospital in Hardeeville and East Cooper Medical Center in Mount Pleasant.
Since then, the health care organization has announced plans for a 50-bed hospital to be located a short distance from the new emergency department.
Approval for the $320 million project was granted by the state in March 2025.
According to spokesperson for the town of Bluffton, the project is still in the permitting stage, so no date has been set for the groundbreaking.
However, a 2025 press release from Novant Health indicates a 2028 opening.
In June, Novant Health announced plans for a $25.3 million medical campus on Hilton Head, following the purchase of the 4.57-acre former Modern Classic Motors site.
Novant paid $4.34 million for the property located at 355 William Hilton Parkway.
The move addresses a long-standing local need for accessible healthcare on Hilton Head Island and is expected to create roughly 50 jobs.
The project plan features a 25,000-square-foot primary building designed for urology, physical therapy and primary care, alongside 15,000 square feet of expandable office space.
In addition to Novant, the Medical University of South Carolina and Beaufort Memorial Hospital are making inroads south of the Broad River.
MUSC opened a 54,000-square-foot medical pavilion in June.
Also located on the Bluffton Parkway, it offers a range of medical services to Bluffton, including primary care, oncology, imaging, pediatrics and vascular care.
Situated across the street from MUSC, Beaufort Memorial Hospital’s 70,000-square-foot Bluffton Community Hospital is expected to open in early 2027.
Beaufort Memorial’s own freestanding emergency department, currently under construction on Hilton Head’s south end, is also expected to open in early 2027.
Both Novant Health and Beaufort Memorial Hospital are additionally involved with housing projects aimed at providing affordable workforce housing for the people who will staff these new facilities.
A greater focus on emergency care is a trend across the industry, Taylor said.
“It’s a response to people’s desire for care when they need it, as quickly and as close as possible,” he said.
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