After completing months of construction work, the Dallas County Dialysis Center welcomed members of the Selma city council and county commission to a ribbon-cutting ceremony of their branch office on Tuesday.

Located at 200 South Park Place behind the new Dunn Nursing Home, the facility was built to help alleviate the crowding of the growing number of patients who receive treatment at the Medical Center Parkway dialysis office.

Sheri Radford, area manager of the center, said “third shift” patients, who usually begin their treatments around 4:30 p.m., are being transferred to the Park Place branch.

This new building allows those 40 or so “third shift” patients to schedule appointments at various times throughout the day, freeing them from spending evenings at a medical office.

After the ribbon-cutting, visitors were able to tour the spacious building and take in the colorful floor tiles, original artwork and large windows.

The facility is also equipped with the latest dialysis technology, including a special perk that Radford says the patients will appreciate.

“Each chair has it’s on television,” Radford said. “In the other building, everyone has to share. When we found out they couldn’t put cable in here, we had a guy installing a satellite on the roof at midnight, right at the last minute before opening.”

There is also a large water filtering system in the back of the building that removes all the minerals from water before it enters patients bodies.

Dialysis performs the function of the kidneys, and people whose kidneys have failed cannot live without it. The procedure involves the use of a special machine to cleanse the blood of impurities by removing waste products and excess water from the body.

Once a person experiences kidney failure, the only way kidney function can be restored is through transplantation.

Radford said patients received dialysis treatment three days a week.