Imagine the space above the ceiling of a typical emergency room. In that 5 foot space you are likely to find more than 35 separate and distinct utility systems running here and there and everywhere. This is what’s needed to deliver the modern health care we expect in our emergency departments.
Now contemplate an emergency room in the middle of a renovation. Except you can’t tell there’s a remodel going on because there is absolutely no interruption of service. When Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center asked us to update their facility, we had our work cut out for us.
Saint Al’s primary requirements included:
- No downtime, what-so-ever for this 24/7/365 facility
- A clean, quiet, warm and welcoming facility with all private rooms
- A friendly environment for all members of the public including senior citizens and those with mental health issues
- A plan which has at its core a “base line” of rooms and necessary support areas
- A layout of remaining spaces that allows staff to expand into wing areas as the need arises
- Modern trauma bays
- Interface with Life Flight and Ground Ambulance
The completed project of 26,700 SF includes two additions and a total of 35 state-of-the-art private patience care spaces. Six temporary exam rooms were built during construction to ease patient flow. Additional spaces include standard exam rooms, rapid exam rooms, triage areas, level 2 trauma bays, a resuscitation room, bariatric exam spaces, isolation, and observation exam spaces.
Design and the construction spanned several years as the project morphed through different iterations and funding cycles. CSHQA worked closely with the hospital staff and construction manager on one of the most challenging health care projects yet tackled by our firm.
We hope you don’t have occasion to “visit” the Saint Alphonsus emergency department, but it if you do, we hope that the fruits of our labor make your time there a little more enjoyable, a little less stressful. And we hope that our efforts reinforce that the health care you are receiving is world class.
