A doctor and his son are helping to fill a void in Grand Prairie. The city has more than 175,000 residents, but it has been lacking proper medical care for years.
Since Dr. Hasan Hashmi and his son, Suleman Hashmi, opened the Texas General Hospital at 2709 Hospital Boulevard in January, they've seen more than 1,000 patients.
"Nationally, Grand Prairie was on the map as one of the largest cities in the country without an acute care hospital," said Suleman, the hospital's President and CEO.
The hospital currently has 50 inpatient beds and it's currently in the plans to expand to 200 beds.
The Texas General Hospital has also brought a lot of jobs to the area. The facility has 125 doctors on staff, who can see up to 80 patients per day in the ER.
"The amount of impact that we have on the job market within Grand Prairie right now is about 500 people, and I think in the long term that will grow to about 2,000," said Suleman.
Suleman and his father are equal partners at the hospital. They invested about $85 million so far to completely regut the building and make it state of the art.
The Hashmi's said the number of technologically advanced equipment were meant for treating patients, as well as for training future medical professionals.
Hasan, who was educated at Harvard and Yale, said it was his desire to grow this hospital into an educational facility in the years to come.
"There is a certain joy in getting advanced hospital to a point that starts training people to do certain things," he said.
