July 16-31, 2010

New medical services arrive in Aztec
By Debra Mayeux
AZTEC – Access to medical care will soon get better for residents of Aztec and Bloomfield. This comes with the July 12, 2010 opening of a new diagnostic center at 604 S. Rio Grande Ave., followed by the July 19 opening of a new urgent care facility at the same location.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held July 10 at the newly remodeled 4,600 square-foot facility, which was under construction since January.
“We stripped it down to the studs,” said Neil Stock, technology and facilities manager at Mercy Regional Medical Center. “Everything is brand new.”
Mercy Regional Medical Center owns the new medical facility housing the Durango, Colorado-based hospital’s diagnostic center.
Durango Urgent Care, which opened 4 years ago, is expanding its services to Aztec by renting space in the building. “We will have four exam rooms, one physician, a nurse and front desk staff each day,” said Suzanne Cartier Bowker, managing member.
“We decided to open Aztec Urgent Care because we saw a need in that area,” she said.
Mercy Regional wanted to meet that same need. “Keeping care close to home is one of our goals, and this will help achieve that for Mercy patients living in Aztec and other communities in San Juan County,” said Kirk Dignum, CEO of Mercy Regional Medical Center.
“We want to make medical care accessible and affordable to all,” said Mercy COO Nancy Hoyt.
The Mercy facility includes access to X-ray and laboratory services with additional clinic space available for lease to specialty medical providers. The services will be available seven days a week, with medical providers and hospital staff able to access the X-rays and laboratory data from the facility through an electronic medical records system.
“We care for a lot of Aztec residents. With this facility they can work medical care into their daily lives,” said Keith Newbold, president of the Mercy Regional Medical Center Board of Directors. “We are honored to be a resource to Aztec medical providers and medical providers in this region.”
The laboratory will be open from 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Walk-in X-ray services, with a physician’s order, will be available from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily.
The Aztec Urgent Care office, while sharing the building, is completely separate from Mercy Medical Center, Cartier Bowker said. “We’re here to support our community and the local medical community. We’re here to be a part of Aztec and Bloomfield.”
Aztec Urgent Care also will provide medical services seven days a week. The facility is open 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Sunday. “We have physicians on staff to meet your medical needs,” Cartier Bowker said.
Urgent care can be used to treat everything from colds and the flu to minor injuries, sore throats and ear aches to stomach viruses, with a great cost saving to the patient.
“Urgent care has become a very valuable service in the medical market,” Cartier Bowker said. “National benchmark studies say urgent care is 1/5 the cost of emergency room.”
If an emergency case, however, enters the facility, Aztec Urgent Care will refer the patient to San Juan Regional’s ER for treatment.
“Our focus is Bloomfield and Aztec, and we are here to support the local physicians and specialists in the area,” Cartier Bowker said. Aztec Urgent Care also will support the community by involvement in community events and by reaching out the businesses as a medical partner of sorts.
“We’ll be available to do flu shot clinics in the area to go out to employers,” she said. Flu shots also will be available at the clinic in the fall.
In addition to a focus on medical services, specific attention was paid to the building’s aesthetic appeal. Shanan Campbell Wells, owner of Sorrel Sky Gallery in Durango, was hired to coordinate the design and artwork into the building. “The theme is Aztec and New Mexico. … We did a lot of scenes and different images indicative of New Mexico.”
There are paintings of horses by Robert Davidson and numerous photographs of yucca, the state flower, turquoise and flowers.

Don’t bother knocking when
the library is rocking!
by Leanne Hathcock
The Aztec Public Library’s Digital Arts Program will now be featuring a sound design, editing and mastering program that will run two nights a week after hours from 6-8pm. There will also be one four-hour workshop every month. Jon Snead, a local musician, will be the coordinator for this program. Jon has been a musician since 1988. Since that time, he has become quite fluent in the more commonly used instruments in modern music, including drums, bass, guitar, vocals, auxiliary percussion, keyboarding, and composition.
Snead has been working with various recording programs since 2005, and has produced several singles for previous efforts as well as an E.P. album for his band "Sleep Siren," and is currently working in the studio on their second album. He has also been marketing and promoting his band via the internet and radio. With the experience of being involved in several film efforts, Snead brings a fairly well rounded knowledge of media writing, composition, and production to the table.
We are very excited about this new development in our digital arts lab and hope to grow the program to eventually include a digital sound booth and the ability to make music videos. We have expanded this program to two nights a week, Monday and Thursday from 6-8pm, after regular hours and one workshop a month for music theory.

Friday Night Bicycle Cruises
Friday Night Bicycle Cruises are back, from 7 – 8pm. Tune up your bikes and get out the helmets - we meet every Friday evening at 7 pm at the Pavilions in Minium Park in Aztec.
This weekly event is hosted by Aztec Trails & Open Space (ATOS). There’s a different route every Friday as we cruise through neighborhoods in Aztec.
For more info: www.aztectrails.com.

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