The Medical Center Operating Board recently approved a plan to renovate and expand the emergency department in order to allow for more patients and procedures.
The University Health System’s Emergency Department is responsible for evaluating immediate needs, stabilizing conditions of patients, providing immediate services and providing opportunities for follow-up care.
“[Since] many of our patients initially enter the U.Va. Health System through the Emergency Department, we want to create the best possible environment to receive care and for our physicians and other clinicians to provide high-quality care,” said Eric Swensen, the Medical Center’s Public Information Officer.
According to the UHS website, the Emergency Department sees over 61,000 patients a year.
The new plan includes designs for a patient bed tower that would allow the majority of the currently semi-private rooms to become fully private rooms. The renovation will include up to 80 beds, general Emergency Department improvements and additional observation and recovery.
“It's important to note that when we talk about the move to single rooms, we're talking about all inpatient rooms at the Medical Center, not just the Emergency Department,” Swensen said. “Right now, 52 percent of the inpatient rooms at U.Va. are double rooms — the bed tower we are building as part of this project will allow us to make virtually all of our inpatient rooms single rooms. U.Va. has a real need for single rooms due to the number of critically-ill patients with communicable diseases that require isolation. Moving to single rooms will also help us better protect patient privacy.”
Although these renovations are focused on the Emergency Department, the entire medical center is expected to benefit, as the Emergency Department serves as the initial entrance for many patients. The addition of rooms will also allow all rooms to become single patient rooms.
“In the Emergency Department, we have utilized additional beds in the hallways, which is not an ideal setting for our patients or our care team,” Swensen said. “In our inpatient hospital, U.Va. turns away over 60 patients a month who need to be transferred here from other hospitals in order to receive more advanced care. From July to Dec. 2014, 446 patients were turned away.”
The renovations are estimated to cost somewhere between $322 million to $394 million. The exact renovations will include the expansion of the Emergency Department on the location of the former ground helipad, the renovation and expansion for the procedural and recovery area and the construction of the bed tower.
The Board of Visitors discussed the plan earlier last week, and it is estimated that these plans will be completed in 2019. The meeting docket lists the plans as endorsed and resolved.
In a meeting with The Cavalier Daily, President Teresa Sullivan noted that building the tower could result in 1,195 construction jobs, in addition to the hundreds of health care jobs created in the long-term.
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