 The Lakewood Health System is celebrating the expansion of its Staples Clinic. Clayton Castle was at the ribbon-cutting ceremony today and has more. The expansion of the Staples Clinic took center stage for the Lakewood Health System this evening as a ribbon-cutting ceremony opened a new facility that will meet the growing health demands in the community. The newly expanded space provides increased capacity to meet the growing health care needs of our area, including women's health, specialty care, and mental health with 10 treatment rooms and one group therapy room. The expansion allows more room for medical providers to provide quality care to its patients. If it weren't for the providers having the right rooms and the right layout and so on, we couldn't provide the quality care that we're so proud of giving to our community and to our residents. In total, the project added 23,355 square feet of space, 37 patient rooms, and 9 double occupancy provider offices. Lakewood says that the expansion promotes its care team concept, provides better access to providers, and improves communication across the system. And all of this is a result of listening from those who will be served by the new space. Through the redesign, we listened to our patients who said we need access to care and that was so important. And so now we have this beautiful facility and we hope that it will provide all the access we need in the coming years. The expansion of the Staples Clinic is only one of many projects that Lakewood has been involved with in the past year and a half. We expanded the Pillager Clinic, we expanded our emergency department, we added an in-house MRI sweep, and then of course the Staples expansion. In the end, the Lakewood Chief Operating Officer says this is more than just building buildings. This is about affirming our commitment to this community and the surrounding area that you can and will receive the best care available anywhere right here at Lakewood Health System. With this phase of the project now finished, the Lakewood Health System will now look towards phase two of the project, which includes a full remodel of the existing building in Staples. Reporting in Staples, Clayton Castle, Lakeland News. The combined cost of all facility projects at Lakewood Health Systems totals around $23 million.