'Luxury' skilled nursing facility plans 2020 opening in McHenry

A skilled nursing center is planned for McHenry.

Ignite Medical Resorts plans to construct an 84-room facility at the northeast corner of Bull Valley Road and Ridgeview Drive, adjacent to Northwestern Medicine McHenry Hospital. The center will be called Transformative Health of McHenry and would allow people to recover from medical procedures in a “luxury” medical environment, Ignite CEO and co-founder Tim Fields said.

“Our concept of a medical resort is the best of both worlds: uncompromising luxury and rapid rehabilitation,” Fields said.

The company plans to break ground in the spring and open the center by summer 2020.

The project will create 200 temporary construction jobs and 120 health care jobs, Fields said.

Amenities at the facility will include a bistro with a Starbucks, an on-site pharmacy, restaurant, chapel and spa. The site will staff physical, occupational and speech therapists and work with Northwestern Medicine to provide physician and nursing services, Fields said.

Transformative Health will operate out of a 55,000-square-foot, one-story building and offer 60 private rooms for short-term care patients and 24 shared rooms for patients who need to stay longer.

The average client for a short-term stay would be at the center anywhere from a couple of days to a couple of weeks, Fields said.

People recovering from strokes, heart attacks and orthopedic surgeries – such as hip or knee replacements – likely would be clients for the facility, Fields said.

The center will accept Medicare and private insurance, he said.

The city of McHenry and the Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board approved the plan last year. McHenry Mayor Wayne Jett, then-Sen. Pamela Althoff and McHenry County Board Chairman Jack Franks submitted letters in support to the review board.

Fields said the business would fill a gap in the area, which is why Ignite chose McHenry.

“There has been no new development for decades in our sector,” Fields said. “There is a very big need.”

Ignite operates similar facilities in Niles and Kansas City, Missouri, with more planned for South Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Independence, Missouri.