Our largest expansion project ever

 

Escorted by project director William J. Camille, we strolled through the expansive construction site wearing hard hats and sensible shoes. Stepping under concrete beams and across wooden planks, we startled at sparks flying and marveled at a matrix of copper piping flanked by lines constructed to serve a multitude of medical purposes.

 

Suddenly, as we set foot upon a cement staircase rising between Terrace level and Garden, Garden level and Main, we could imagine it. We could see how 12 years of planning and $153 million were going to play out in this massive Community Hospital construction project . . . in the mind’s eye, a shiny swath of floor tile slid under our feet and up the stairs.  Sheetrock completed the walls, and a fresh coat of paint decorated the surface. Curator Amy Essick’s hospital art collection enlivened the open spaces. Computers and other highly technical, state-of-the-art  equipment took their places in a warren of specialty rooms. The lights clicked on, and the bustle of lifesaving business swung into action before our very eyes.

It may have been the vitality of Camille’s narration or perhaps it was that the grand Pavilions Project is moving so efficiently from concept to completion. Whatever took place at the construction site that day, some kind of magic and a whole lot of work have contributed to the most dramatic development in Community Hospital history since it was built on its current site in the forest by the sea 44 years ago.

For those of you who won’t be staying here anytime soon or who have no plans to visit, let’s join Camille for a virtual tour of the Pavilions Project. 

“Let me start by giving you an overview of the project,” says Camille, a master’s-level architect who has served as a consultant overseeing the project since its inception. “The purpose of the project is to expand the hospital to meet the growing needs of the community. The scope of the project includes the South Pavilion, the Forest Pavilion, the parking structure, and extensive interior renovations of the existing hospital.”

The tri-level garage was completed first, to provide covered parking and to eliminate a small parking area needed to make room for the South Pavilion. The structure was designed with convenience in mind, a place where patients, guests, and staff can park their cars and access the hospital quickly and safely without worrying about the weather or the walk.

Since its 2003 completion, the garage has been serving the hospital community with 360 covered spaces, full-scale safety and security systems, and an elevator lobby with two glass-paneled elevators that carry occupants to the main level of the hospital.

The Pavilions Project adds 200,000 square feet, about equally divided between the South and Forest pavilions, and is modernizing another 90,000 square feet of existing space that will be completed in 2008.

THE SOUTH PAVILION
In 1962, the Emergency department at Community Hospital was designed to accommodate 12,000 patients per year. Today, the same facility handles 48,000, a number expected to increase to 55,000 patients next year.

In addition, intensive/critical care rooms considered spacious and modern when built in the 1960s are no longer adequate, largely because they are not big enough to accommodate the life-saving technology and equipment now standard in American medicine.

The new South Pavilion changes everything. Housing all critical-care departments, including 20 ICU rooms (twice as many as the hospital had before the expansion), the South Pavilion effectively centralizes critical-care facilities and related services while providing room to grow.

Main Level
“You can see,” says Camille, “as you arrive on the main level of South Pavilion, that it is an extension of the original glass arcade, which creates a waiting area for patients coming for surgery or cardiac catheterization, as well as patients arriving for imaging exams.” There is a large reception desk. Behind the reception area is a series of surgery prep rooms for those going into surgery. Continuing on, we come to a bank of recovery rooms and the nursing stations that serve them.  Both the prep and recovery rooms can be used for either function depending upon need as the day’s activities unfold.

What was the original Express Care Clinic and the Emergency department in the existing hospital will now be renovated to house two new cardiac catheterization labs and part of the new imaging department.

Behind the imposing doors that rise up between public and restricted areas, there are eight new surgery suites. Two are designated for orthopedic and neurological surgery, two are specifically equipped for cardiovascular surgery (including endovascular surgery), and the other four are for general surgery.

Garden Level
On the Garden level, the new Emergency department is accessed through the parking structure, enabling people to drive right up to the entrance and deliver their patient to emergency personnel before parking the car.

Once completed, the Emergency department will have quadrupled in size and will comprise a Clinical Decision Unit, an expanded Express Care Clinic, and additional support areas, all equipped with state-of-theart technology and equipment and all expected to be completed in 2008.

“More than 50 percent of our inpatients enter the hospital through the Emergency department and end up staying overnight,” says Camille.  “This is their introduction to the hospital, so it must be impressive; we must create a positive experience.  The challenge in creating atmosphere in an underground space was met by building skylights that open to the plaza and introducing color and lighting to create a soothing, positive feeling in the waiting area.”

“Upon arrival,” says Camille, “patients will be received in a triage area and then brought to a treatment room. The new ED hosts specialized rooms for behavioral health and obstetrics and is equipped with a dedicated CT scanner and Xray equipment, which allow for immediate diagnosis. It also has elevators ready to take patients directly to the surgical units one level above. It’s necessary and appropriate to have these facilities in close proximity.”

Because some of the new intensive/critical care treatment rooms look out — via windows — toward the ambulance drop-off area, the designers introduced a dividing wall enhanced by attractive landscaping to create an appealing garden view from the patient rooms.

Terrace Level
The Terrace level, which Camille calls the “back of the house,” includes the expansive new loading dock and a “spaghetti system,” he says, of underground utilities essential to hospital operations.

Just outside the building, a 6,000-square-foot mechanical bunker was built under a landscaped berm to house cooling towers, emergency generators, and electrical cogeneration equipment. The heat put out by the generators then heats the water used in heating the hospital.  “The 1.2-megawatt co-generation plant will save the hospital hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in energy costs,” says Camille.

The Terrace level also houses Environmental Services, the unit responsible for the housekeeping in the hospital, and the decontamination area, designed to wash and sterilize carts and surgical tools before they are packaged and stored for further use.

“One of the largest rooms on the Terrace level is the heart, the brain, the nervous system of the hospital,” says Camille. “It is the information technology room, which houses the network that enables the computers and other technical equipment to function. Because of the amount of heat this equipment generates, the room has a raised floor; this enables a cooling air flow that keeps all the cables stored underneath the floor from overheating. What is most amazing about this project is the incredible complexity of detail required to put it all together.”

The promise of the South Pavilion is that doctors, nurses, and technicians at Community Hospital will have the space and the technology to provide the most advanced and effective care for every patient before, during, and after surgery and other forms of critical care.

THE FOREST PAVILION
More than 40 years ago, Community Hospital became one of the first hospitals in the country to offer private rooms to virtually all patients. Today, the hospital remains a leader in providing state-of-the-art hospital rooms, and more of them.

Built in a wooded setting off the main Fountain Court, the Forest Pavilion is a tri-level structure built in two wings that frame a spectacular oasis of terraced foliage and a waterfall tumbling down a craggy slope to a pond that meanders around the building. To all who visit, this oasis is known as the “Healing Garden.”

The 100,000-square-foot addition houses 120 new patient rooms, which will result in a total of 205 private, acute-care rooms (some rooms in the older section of the hospital will be used for other purposes).

Private Patient (Acute-Care) Rooms
At each room, a cherry-paneled door opens to reveal a room spacious enough to house state-of-the-art medical equipment without crowding the aesthetics of the room or the people who use it. One wall is paneled in cherry and fitted with cabinets, one to house patient belongings and the other with space for a flat-screen TV, DVD player, and flowers or gifts.

The rooms are designed with private bathrooms and finished with Corian® counters and graciously lit mirrors. Beneath generous picture windows, which offer garden or wooded views, expanded window seats provide comfortable daybeds for visitors or family members who care to spend the night.

The only elements that shift appearances from hotel to hospital room are the hospital bed in the center and the state-of-the-art wall panel above the bed that houses things such as medical equipment and oxygen.

“Each room is equipped with an adjacent nurse’s counter,” says Camille, “which houses a sink and computer area. An adjacent linen closet provides a supply of clean linens and short-term storage of soiled linens. The wall panel is constructed with access to medical gases, telephone, and data outlets for medical equipment tied into the hospital network, as well as conventional power sources, bed adjustment, and a call button to tap into an enhanced nurse call system.  Everything is designed and located to be convenient to the patient.”

Every aspect of the design, says Camille, was created to give the rooms a more inviting, residential feeling than a traditional hospital setting. Every room is designed to provide comfort and state-of-the-art medical care to a larger patient community.

Common Areas
The area outside the rooms will be painted a “golden squash” color as part of Community Hospital’s commitment to introducing the healing effects of color to the setting. The staff area includes an expansive nurses’ station, utility and storage rooms, as well as offices and consultation rooms. There is an attractive day room with windows overlooking the water feature in the Healing Garden, which provides a change of environment for visiting family members and friends.