Islandia approves plan to add SurgiCore Suffolk site

A surgery center chain with roughly a dozen locations in the region is expected to open its first Long Island facility in Islandia before 2028.

The 13,000-square-foot ambulatory surgical center, called SurgiCore Suffolk, will occupy the ground floor of an existing two-story building at 1050 Old Nichols Rd. Its namesake company, SurgiCore, manages at least 11 other centers in New York City and New Jersey, according to its website. 

The surgery centers provide local doctors the facilities and staff to perform outpatient surgeries, according SurgiCore attorney Benjamin Pinczewski. He said the Islandia location will accommodate minimally invasive surgeries such as epidurals and discectomies. More invasive procedures, such as those that fuse vertebrae, must be performed at hospitals.

"What happens is doctors from the area will decide to do their procedures ... at the ambulatory surgery center," he said. "What SurgiCore does, what any ambulatory surgery center does, is provide the operating room, the staff for the operating room, the anesthesiology group ... the nurses and the nonprofessional staff.”

Islandia's board of trustees unanimously approved plans for SurgiCore Suffolk last month. The project also secured approval from the state's Public Health and Health Planning Council in April 2023, according to New York Public Health Department spokeswoman Marissa Crary.

Pinczewski described SurgiCore Suffolk as a joint venture between his company and Community Medical Wellness, a pain management and orthopedic practice that currently operates one floor above the future surgery center. The practice also has offices in Melville and Port Jefferson Station.

Paul Cella, the chief administrator for Community Medical Wellness, said the practice has three orthopedic surgeons, one spine surgeon, two interventional pain doctors and one physiatrist that could use the SurgiCore Suffolk facility. The Islandia facility currently outsources those procedures. 

Cella, who is a part owner of the property through his role as a managing partner at Pratt Realty, added that the surgery center will also be open to other practices that need access to such a facility. 

The space that SurgiCore Suffolk will occupy previously housed a law firm that moved out last year, according to Cella.

Both he and Pinczewski expect the surgery center to open within roughly a year and a half. Pinczewski said SurgiCore is hopeful that construction will begin within the next three months.

By Sam Kmack

sam.kmack@newsday.com

Sam Kmack covers the Town of Islip for Newsday. He is a graduate of the University of Southern California and previously worked as a city watchdog reporter in the Phoenix metro area, as well as an investigative journalist at the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting.