A new emergency room center will soon be coming to Clearwater.

Largo Medical Center will open the satellite facility at 2339 Gulf to Bay Boulevard, just west of U.S. 19., on Monday morning.

The one-story 10,620-square-foot facility will serve Clearwater and North Pinellas County residents with 24/7 emergency care. The ER has 12 exam rooms and will initially employ 41 full-time staff members and six full-time physicians.

Plans have been in the works for a year to build the new $8 million emergency room.

"We really looked at this as an area that was underserved from hospital emergency level of care," Largo Medical Center CEO Anthony Degina said.

Degina said they are looking forward to opening the ER's doors to the community.

It's a necessity for many who are used to driving miles out of their way for emergency care.

"It's very exciting, actually," Clearwater resident Kristin Burns said. "I work for Fire and EMS so having one that's a lot closer that I don't have to go 20 minutes out of my way to drop off a patient or my son in case something ever happened is very convenient."

The ER also has some unique features, including security that allows staff to protect patients from harming themselves or others.  The facility also has separate CT scan and X-ray rooms to serve patients in need.

Part of Saturday's open house included tours of the emergency room. Heather Candia and her children were among those who took advantage of the opportunity.

"It's pretty neat to see everything, all of the equipment, because usually you don't get to see all this stuff," Candia said.

Even though the people who checked out the new ER hope they'll never have to use it, they say they are a little more comfortable knowing their neighborhood ER will provide the services they'll need should they ever need them.

Largo Medical Center is an HCA West hospital.