WAUSEON - Nurse Angie McWatters swooped her arms in a half circle.

“Sure, there's room to play a game of half-court basketball in here,” she said.

She was standing next to an operating table, in a surgery suite of the Fulton County Health Center hospital's addition.

Around her were two ceiling-mounted television screens, a mobile monitoring station that looks as if it belongs in a space shuttle, a tower loaded with electronic/surgical equipment, and lots of empty floor space.

The room measures 30-by-30-feet, big by any hospital's standards.

“I doubt that you'll see bigger operating rooms, except at a major teaching facility,” said Ms. McWatters, a registered nurse who is unit manager of the surgical department.

The empty floor is for whatever high-tech equipment might come along to fill the space.

It's just one feature of the hospital addition and a just-completed Medical Office Building.

The 31,000-square-foot expansion of the 1973-built hospital opened in the last year.

It includes the ultramodern surgery center and the Rainbow Hematology Oncology Center.

The 27,900-square-foot Medical Office Building is now being furnished. Visitors can see it at a Dec. 2 open house.

The total cost, including some renovation of the original building, was $9.9 million, financed with $7 million in bonds and $2.9 million in commercial loans, said Dean Beck, who has been administrator for 27 years.

“Space was an issue in the old hospital,” he said. “The bigger surgeries are ready for all kinds of machines. We needed more room everywhere. Even areas where we do paperwork now are big enough.”

Most of the hospital's work is in outpatient procedures.

“I'd say 70 percent of our revenue comes from outpatient work, and now we can do that better,” Mr. Beck said.

The 75-bed hospital, office building, and a nursing home sit on a 28-acre campus.

A board governs the nonprofit health center. The county owns the hospital property but not the connected office building land.

“The expansion has allowed us to live up to the promise of being a health center, not just a hospital,” said Steve McCoy, director of marketing and planning.

The addition houses one of northwest Ohio's few hematology oncology centers, said Donna LaBarge, coordinator.

The section has many offices, examination rooms, a library, comfortable furnishings, and a bright and cheerful air.

It has been certified as a Community Cancer Hospital by the American College of Surgeons, accreditation given one in four hospitals.

In an open treatment room, there are eight reclining chairs for patients getting therapy. Each chair has its own private television and stereo music system.

“It's not as institutional seeming as some places,” Mrs. LaBarge said. “We love it. Patients love it. Physicians like it because it functions more effectively now.”

The oncology center had 3,700 patient visits last year, and averages 15 treatments a day, Mrs. LaBarge said.

The three-story attached Medical Offices Building will house physicians offices, two clinics, and other services, Mr. McCoy said.

The Multi-Specialty Clinic has physicians from northwest Ohio there to see patients. The clinic offers services in cardiology, gastroenterology, nephrology, neurology, urology, allergy therapy, pulmonary medicine, pediatrics, and more.

“This clinic operated from the third floor of the hospital before. Patients had to wait in a corner of a hallway. This is so much better,” said Kristy Snyder, the center's director of Human Resources.

The Medical College of Ohio operates a clinic on another floor, along with private offices of a Wauseon family practice physician, Dr. Kim Hagerman, and a general surgeon, Dr. Fred Weigand.

The office building's ground floor will remain unfinished until leased by a physician or other service provider, Mr. Beck said. “That way, we'll know just what plumbing and furnishings are needed.”

The office building has an outside entrance to a parking lot. Patients can enter there and take an elevator to other floors.

“Patients used to have to climb up a long walk to get to the hospital door,” Mr. McCoy said.

“We called it Cardiac Hill.”

First Published November 28, 2001, 7:49 p.m.