Growth in healthcare rarely arrives on a predictable timeline.
For Mercy Health Perrysburg Hospital in northwest Ohio, it arrived overnight.
When a nearby hospital closed in 2023, Perrysburg experienced an immediate surge in patient demand. Emergency department visits nearly doubled. Surgical volume increased rapidly. A facility that had been operating as a smaller community hospital was suddenly serving as a primary access point for surgical care across the region.
For hospital leadership, the challenge was clear: expand access without destabilizing operations.
Scaling surgical capacity requires more than adding operating room time. It demands coordinated growth across surgeons, nursing teams, anesthesia coverage, and perioperative leadership, all while maintaining throughput, staffing stability, and patient safety.
At Perrysburg, that coordination was already in place.
The hospital had established an anesthesia partnership with NorthStar Anesthesia prior to the surge in demand. When surgical volume accelerated, anesthesia staffing and leadership support scaled alongside it, ensuring the operating room never became a constraint on growth.
“As the volume came, the team kept up with adding people and doing what they needed to do so we didn’t have to turn anyone away,” said Alison Avendt, President of Mercy Health Perrysburg.
The operational impact was significant. Surgical cases that once numbered in the hundreds per month expanded into a far larger program. Operating room utilization increased, and the hospital now regularly performs dozens of procedures each day while maintaining efficient patient flow.
But Perrysburg’s growth story is not solely about capacity.
Hospital leaders who work side by side with NorthStar Anesthesia describe a perioperative environment defined by collaboration rather than departmental silos. Surgeons, nurses, anesthesia providers, and administrators operate with shared accountability for access, efficiency, and patient care.
Daily operational huddles and case discussions help ensure resources are deployed effectively and schedules remain optimized.
“Everyone is of the same mindset. We have one team and one mission,” said Matthew Radwan, Chief CRNA at Perrysburg.
That alignment has become a differentiator in clinician recruitment and retention. Surgeons joining the medical staff frequently cite the efficiency and teamwork of Perrysburg’s perioperative environment as reasons they choose to bring cases to the hospital.
NorthStar provides hospital leadership with detailed monthly reporting across key operational and clinical metrics. This level of visibility allows executives to evaluate performance trends, anticipate staffing needs, and plan for future expansion.
“The amount of data I get monthly from the NorthStar team is much more robust than anything I’ve received before,” Avendt noted.
Looking ahead, Mercy Perrysburg expects surgical demand to continue rising as population growth and physician recruitment expand the hospital’s footprint.
Managing that growth sustainably will require maintaining the same operational discipline that allowed the hospital to navigate its initial surge in demand.
For Perrysburg’s leadership team, the partnership with NorthStar Anesthesia provides a key strategic capability. National recruiting infrastructure, clinical leadership support, and operational analytics allow the hospital to expand surgical services without overextending internal resources.
At the same time, Perrysburg’s experience demonstrates that outsourced anesthesia services can remain fully integrated within a hospital’s culture.
At Mercy Perrysburg, NorthStar’s anesthesia providers are not viewed as external vendors. They are embedded members of the perioperative team.
“We could not have accomplished what we did in growing that quickly without the ‘one team’ mentality and Northstar’s help,” Avendt summarized.
As the hospital continues its evolution from micro-hospital to regional surgical hub, that alignment between hospital leadership, clinicians, and anesthesia providers remains central to sustaining growth while maintaining high-quality care.
