Texas Tech to consolidate operations

Residents in parts of Odessa will have to travel a bit farther if they want certain services from the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center Permian Basin Campus.
Later this month, Texas Tech will move services from clinics at 4241 Tanglewood Lane to its main Odessa building at 701 W. Fifth St., said Johnnie Jones, campus communications and market-ing director. The Tanglewood offices have provided obstetrician/gynecologist, family medicine and pediatric services.
The closure of the clinics is part of Texas Tech’s plans to consolidate its Permian Basin efforts into its Fifth Street location in Odessa and the new Jenna Welch Center in Midland, a 28,000 square-foot facility scheduled to open later this year in the former Allison Cancer Center.
Jones said no jobs would be lost in the transition and patients would be able to keep the same services they have now without having to go to Midland.
“They’re going to still be able to see the same doctors,” she said. “And soon, we’re actually add-ing a few new doctors.”
A Texas Tech satellite clinic in Midland will also close, Jones said.
“This transition will be very smooth,” she said.
The Tanglewood pediatric practice once belonged to Dr. Daniel Cepero. It was donated to Texas Tech after his death in 2003.
Jones said Texas Tech planned to transfer the records of Cepero’s patients and any others to the Fifth Street campus, and those patients wanting the records transferred to Midland can have them sent there, as well.
The consolidation will help Texas Tech better cover the entire area, while also letting the school move from leased facilities into university-owned buildings, said Dr. Virginia Rauth, Texas Tech’s assistant dean for clinical affairs.
“You need to put your resources, in these economic times, where (patients) need to be served best,” she said.
Patients have been notified of the changes, said Rauth, who currently works out of the Tangle-wood office.
“They’ve all gotten letters explaining to them that we’re closing the facility because we’re mov-ing to a new, updated facility,” she said.
The move will be a positive for the campus, Rauth said. The Tanglewood clinics also lag behind the university-owned buildings in technological areas.
“We’re not eliminating any services at all,” she said. “We’re hoping that for the patients it will be a very seamless move.”