Mason’s Lindner Center expanding patient care in $38 million addition
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Real estate and recreational development in Greater Cincinnati are booming. The Enquirer’s Going Up series is here to introduce you to need-to-know development projects around the region.
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The basics of the Lindner Center of Hope medical office building addition
Address: 4075 Old Western Row Rd., Mason.
Building type: Health care.
Developer/architect/contractor/consultants: Paul Hemmer Company, ATA Beilharz Architects.
Size: 75,000 square feet, four stories.
What you need to know about the Lindner Center addition: It will house treatment spaces and clinician offices
The Lindner Center of Hope is a nonprofit mental health facility that provides care to children, adolescents and adults. The center sees more than 50,000 outpatient visits a year and expects to see that number rise with its expansion.
The new building will contain more treatment spaces, wellness facilities, clinician offices, an addition to one of the center’s residential units and an expanded space for neuromodulation, a medical technique that stimulates nerves in the brain to help treat depression and other mood disorders.
“You have inpatient care, residential care, partial hospitalization care and outpatient care, all under one roof,” said Michael Groat, president and CEO of the Lindner Center. “That’s a very unique offering.”
While mental health providers in the U.S. have been moving in the direction of outpatient and partial hospitalization models, rather than inpatient, it’s important for the Lindner Center to offer patients the full array of options, said Groat.
“There’s a lot of evidence that after a hospitalization is the highest-risk time for suicide,” said Jennifer Pierson, the spokesperson for the center. “That partial hospital model is really very protective in keeping those individuals safe.”
Partial hospitalization not only provides critical support for patients who are transitioning from hospitalization to living at home, but it also allows others who want to continue living at home to avoid inpatient care, which can be expensive.
In addition, the expansion is meant to accommodate a staff of clinicians that has tripled in the past three years to meet a growing demand for mental health services, said Laura Nixon, the center’s chief financial and administrative officer.
“We went from about 30 medical staff to close to 90,” Nixon said. “We are out of space.”
Linked by ‘Main Street’
One feature of the expansion that excites Rob Humason, the architect of the project, is the connected first-floor lobby, which he calls “Main Street.”
“We’ve pulled Main Street from that lobby all the way through the new addition,” said Humason.
Main Street will allow patients who arrive through the existing lobby on one side, or the new pedestrian entrance on the other, to access an intake space, a wellness area and a conference room that can fit up to 300 people.
Humason said the addition of walking trails outside the building, which is surrounded by a lawn and some mature tree groups, allows clinicians to go outside during their breaks to decompress.
Where the project stands and how much it’ll cost
Construction will start in May and the old administrative office will be demolished first, according to Nixon. The project is expected to be complete by the fall of 2026.
Nixon estimates that the project will cost $38 million. The Lindner Center is raising $30 million in a capital campaign and hoping to receive $4 million in funding from the state of Ohio. The rest of the money will be paid out of operations, she said.
This story was updated to add a video.
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