A new Veterans Administration health clinic is under construction in Rolla with the goal of improving health care for veterans throughout the region.
The new clinic will be 75,000 square feet, nearly 10 times as big as the facility in St. James it will replace. It will be able to accommodate 20,000 patients a year.
The clinic is projected to open in the summer of 2027 and will add more than a dozen specialty care areas not available in St. James, including oncology, optometry and dentistry.
“We expect this to be a significant improvement for veterans,” said Andrea Wiggins, associate director of the veterans hospital in Columbia. “Closer access is going to provide veterans more continuity of care.”
The continuity of care will include the new clinic working with other health care providers in the region, including the hospital at Fort Leonard Wood, about 30 miles west of Rolla.
“For example, if (a veteran) sees an orthopedic doctor in Rolla, then they would be able to do a surgery out at Fort Leonard Wood,” said Col. Angela Diebal-Lee, who oversees the Fort Leonard Wood hospital. “And then continue to see their doctor in Rolla for follow-up visits.”
The General Leonard Wood Army Community Hospital on the Army base is also building a new facility, now projected to open sometime next year.
Rolla has seen its medical community increase in size in the past decade, with more expansion of services in the works. VA officials believe that will create a symbiotic relationship with its plans to better serve veterans.
“Even though there are specialty services available in Rolla, we are still an underserved community as a whole,” said Dr. Nick Havens, chief of staff at Truman Veterans Hospital in Columbia. “I don't think there's going to be a single medical professional that would not want expansion of services available and more choices and more options for our community as a whole.”
The construction of the new clinic comes as there are growing concerns about the future of rural health care systems under the Trump administration.
The VA is confident that the funding for building and staffing the clinic will be in place.
“Without a doubt, we will have the resources to finish this clinic and staff it,” Havens said. “The money has already been appropriated. I don’t have concerns about that dissolving away.”
