In declaring Riverina Day Surgery open, NSW Minister for Health Jillian Skinner praised private investment in Wagga's health facilities and said the new centre would complement public sector services available at the nearby Wagga Base Hospital, now well into a $282 million redevelopment.

Ms Skinner spoke of an optimistic mood in Wagga as health infrastructure improved.

"There is a buzz in the Wagga medical community," Ms Skinner said.

"I have been coming here for years and I have not seen anything like it."

Riverina Day Surgery (RDS) is the brainchild of Wagga surgeon Richard Harrison.

Built off Chaston Street and Meurant Avenue, RDS offers in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) as well as urology, ear-nose-and-throat, eye, arthroscopy, skin cancer removal, general surgery, orthopaedics and paediatric surgery.

In her opening speech, Ms Skinner said she looked forward to a close relationship between Murrumbidgee Local Health District (MLHD) and RDS.

Later, she said it was possible MLHD might use the RDS for public patients at times when there was a lot of demand for particular surgery, such as cataracts.

Each of the RDS operating theatres contains about $1 million worth of equipment, and in his speech Wagga general surgeon Henry Hicks described the centre as state of the art.

Mr Harrison told the 65 people at the opening he got a kick out of standing in the RDS foyer and being able to see Wagga Base Hospital's new clinical services block rising into the sky.

He said there had been controversy about where the base hospital should be built, but it was being built "where the action is and where it will stay".

Earthworks have started on a specialist medical centre to be built next to the RDS.

It will have three floors of rooms for specialists and allied health professionals as well as basement car parking.

The developers hope it will be open by this time next year.