After 20 years, Adventist HealthCare has decided to close its Germantown Emergency Center effective July 1, 2026, due to declining patient numbers.  

The Germantown Emergency Center opened in 2006, when the 24/7 emergency room filled a gap in acute-care health services for patients in upper Montgomery County who might later be transferred for inpatient care in Rockville. 

Over the years, the healthcare landscape in Germantown developed substantial choices, and the community now has Holy Cross Germantown Hospital, an acute-care hospital within 2 miles on Observation Drive, along with numerous urgent care sites to serve residents. 

The full-service Shady Grove Medical Center is still 9 miles away at 9901 Medical Center Drive and offers residents comprehensive acute-care services, including adult and specialized pediatric emergency care, heart and vascular care, surgery, obstetrics, and pediatrics. The Center recently added the Horizon Tower, anchored by a new state-of-the-art emergency room. 

The closest emergency room at Holy Cross Germantown Hospital includes: a full-service emergency department for adults, seniors and children, trusted maternity care for mothers and their newborns, state-of-the-art diagnostic and surgical services, and emergency and voluntary inpatient psychiatric care. 

Take a moment to decide where to head with these Tips for Emergency Care Decisions: 

Call an ambulance if you or someone else has: 

  • Signs of a heart attack, such as chest pain that may spread to another part of the body 
  • Signs of a stroke, such as sudden weakness in the arms or on one side of the body, drooping facial features, slurred speech and severe headache 

Go to the ER if you or someone else has: 

  • Bleeding that won't stop 
  • Trouble breathing 
  • Loss of consciousness, or passing out 
  • Head injury or other severe injury 
  • Seizure 
  • Severe pain 
  • Suicidal thoughts or thoughts of hurting someone else 
  • Vomiting that won't stop 

Go to the urgent care if you or someone else has: 

  • Cold and flu symptoms 
  • Ear ache 
  • Minor abdominal pain 
  • Sprains and strains 
  • Sinus or upper respiratory illness/symptoms 
  • Urinary tract infections