“You could say we annexed the specialty clinic,” said spokeswoman Nancy Thickel, who said the expansion would result in more rooms with vital sign monitors, oxygen resuscitation and other equipment upgrades.
The hospital’s emergency department now has 70 treatment rooms, but only 31 of those rooms have monitors. When the year-long project is completed in November next year, the department will have 81 treatment rooms with 74 beds with monitors, Thickel said.
The size of the rooms also will be expanded from about 80-90 square feet to approximately 140-160 square feet to accommodate more visitors and family members, said Bonnie Coalt, Miami Valley’s administrator of hospital operations.
“A lot of the rooms we use now are just too small,” Coalt said. “And we need the monitors because we’re seeing more elderly patients with a lot of co-morbid conditions” or multiple chronic conditions like diabetes coupled with cardiovascular disease.
Coalt said she anticipates the emergency department will see more traffic as a result of the expansion and equipment upgrades, but she said the hospital isn’t planning to add additional staff at this time.
Thickel noted the hospital is already has one of the busiest emergency departments in Ohio with 93,000 patient visits last year, resulting in 75 percent of adult admissions to the hospital.
“And we are a trauma center, so we do see the most severe cases here,” Thickel said, underscoring the need for the expansion.
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