Kootenai Health, MultiCare Break Ground on Post Falls Medical Campus

Kootenai Health and MultiCare Health System broke ground Tuesday on the Prairie Medical Campus, a 30-acre joint venture at the southeast corner of Highway 41 and Prairie Avenue in Post Falls that organizers describe as "one of the largest recent medical investments in northern Idaho."

Phase one will include a 25,000-square-foot micro-hospital with an emergency department, imaging services, and rooms for overnight patient stays, alongside a 65,000-square-foot multi-story medical office building initially home to an ambulatory surgery center, clinic offices, and lab services. The micro-hospital will feature a 12-room emergency department, and an advanced imaging center will be located within the hospital.

The medical office building will include space for both Kootenai Clinic and independent physicians, and is designed to attract new primary care providers, medical and surgical specialists to the region. Planned specialty services include OB-GYN, cardiology, primary care, and a pediatric specialty clinic.

"The Prairie Medical Campus in Post Falls is a transformational investment in the future of our region's health care," said Jamie Smith, CEO of Kootenai Health. "It is our mission to serve this rapidly growing part of our community. We are excited to partner with MultiCare; working together allows us to build on the strengths of both organizations for the benefit of our patients. It allows us to create something bigger, faster and better in the Post Falls to Liberty Lake corridor than either of us could alone."

The project is structured as a joint venture, not a merger or acquisition. Both Kootenai Health and MultiCare Health System will remain independent, non-profit, community-based health care providers, with Kootenai Health maintaining operational control as managing partner and holding primary branding for the campus. Parkwood Business Properties, a northern Idaho based commercial real estate company, will serve as the development partner.

Smith has been direct about why the partnership was necessary. "This campus, over time is going to need a lot of capital investment, and we just don't have the margins at Kootenai Health to support that over time," Smith said. "MultiCare is both a partner in the sense of mission delivery, but also in terms of the financial side."

The urgency behind the investment is demographic. The population of Kootenai County and eastern Spokane County is predicted to double in size over the next 20 years, accelerating the need for more comprehensive care in Post Falls, Hayden, Rathdrum, Liberty Lake, and surrounding areas. U.S. Census numbers indicate that Post Falls' population increased nearly 40% from 2010 to 2020. Smith told KREM that because of the campus's position between two growing markets, he believes "the Post Falls campus will eventually serve more patients than our Coeur d'Alene campus because of the fact that it's located in the center of both sides of the border."

Bill Robertson, CEO of MultiCare Health System, said: "Together, we are building a health care infrastructure that will support our communities for decades to come and ensure residents have timely access to the best possible care."

Construction completion is anticipated between late 2027 and early 2028. The campus has space to accommodate future phases, including the planned development of an expanded, full-service hospital, as the region's population continues to grow.

Tuesday's groundbreaking marks the latest chapter in a collaboration between the two systems that stretches back years. In 2020, Kootenai Health partnered with MultiCare on the implementation of the Epic electronic health record, and the two have since collaborated on two Indigo urgent care locations in Coeur d'Alene and Hayden. Smith, whose full name is Jameson Smith, was announced as Kootenai Health's CEO in January 2024, and the Prairie Medical Campus represents the most ambitious undertaking of his tenure to date.