EmergeOrtho has leased the first floor of a building on Oleander Drive to open a new location for appointments and to move the Wilmington office of AccessOrtho, its orthopedic urgent care services.

The new office for the growing orthopedic and spine specialists practice is expected to open April 2 at 4815 Oleander Drive, in the building formerly occupied by NextCare Urgent Care.

AccessOrtho, started in 2009, will relocate from EmergeOrtho's facility at 2716 Ashton Drive.

"By being able to separate it out, it gives it more visibility," said Stephen DeBiasi, CEO of EmergeOrtho. "We’ve gotten a lot of comments from people driving by and seeing the new sign."

The Oleander Drive office will be predominantly AccessOrtho but will also offer another place for patients with appointments to see physicians.

"We’re kind of bursting at the seams just from a growth standpoint and so this will be a good opportunity to kind of decompress some of our main offices," DeBiasi said.

The EmergeOrtho brand was created in 2016 when OrthoWilmington merged with three other independent orthopedic physician groups across North Carolina.

These days, EmergeOrtho has about 25 physicians in Wilmington and more than 130 across the state, DeBiasi said. The practice also has 27 nurse practitioners and physician assistants in Wilmington, he said.

DeBiasi said in a news release that the types of injuries seen at AccessOrtho include sprains, strains, broken bones and recently painful, swollen or injured joints.  AccessOrtho on Oleander Drive will be open from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays and 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fridays, with some adjustments based on seasonal demand.

“In 2009, the specialists of EmergeOrtho recognized the need for providing orthopedic urgent care and walk-in services as a less stressful and less expensive alternative to the emergency room,” DeBiasi said in the release. “We opened our first AccessOrtho at the Ashton Drive office in Wilmington, and we now operate three AccessOrtho orthopedic urgent care locations across the region and 19 across the state.”

In addition to the Ashton Drive office that is moving to Oleander Drive, EmergeOrtho’s other AccessOrtho area locations are at 5160 Ocean Highway West in Shallotte and at 2000 Brabham Ave., Suite 100, in Jacksonville.

“As New Hanover and our surrounding counties continue to grow, we will respond by expanding access to comprehensive orthopedic care, including specialized urgent care,” DeBiasi said in the release.