NHRMC News - New Buildings Bring Big Improvements for Area Patients this Summer

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New Buildings Bring Big Improvements for Area Patients this Summer
06/25/2008
A trip to the hospital will be a whole new experience for thousands of patients and their families this summer. New Hanover Regional Medical Center is getting ready to open two buildings that will offer expanded and improved services for surgical patients, women and children. The Surgical Pavilion will begin seeing patients June 30. The Betty H. Cameron Women's and Children's Hospital is scheduled to open August 24.

'This is an exciting time,' said Jack Barto, President and CEO of New Hanover Regional Medical Center. 'With these impressive new facilities we are transforming the face of area healthcare.'

Surgical Pavilion
The 186,500-square-foot Surgical Pavilion will offer area patients the unique combination of immediate access to all the experience and specialists available in a major medical center with the convenience of a free-standing surgical center.

Situated behind New Hanover Regional Medical Center's main building and easily accessed by Savannah Court, the Surgical Pavilion is surrounded by nearby parking. Patients arriving for surgery will no longer need to check in at the main registration desk within the medical center. They will check in at the pavilion and process much of their paperwork within their patient room.

The 43 private patient rooms in the pavilion are built to be large and comfortable enough for family members to stay with a patient before and after surgery.

'The family plays an important role in a patient's care,' said MaryEllen Bonczek, Chief Nurse Executive for New Hanover Regional Medical Center. 'We are taking the family's needs into consideration in all our projects.'

The configuration of the operating rooms is also important to how the patient receives care. Each room is larger and more flexible than previous operating rooms. They can accommodate newer technologies and equipment, much of which will be suspended from the ceiling and on movable booms for optimal use.

'The new pavilion's biggest advantage is that it's going to make our operations a lot more efficient,' said Philip Brown, MD, vascular surgeon and chairman of the hospital's perioperative governance committee. 'It will allow us to remain on the cutting edge of all types of minimally invasive vascular surgery as well as more traditional vascular disease management.'

Patients will be coming to the Surgical Pavilion for inpatient and outpatient surgeries, including open heart, bariatric, plastic, spinal and neurosurgery.

Betty H. Cameron Women's and Children's Hospital

Taking shape in front of the New Hanover Regional Medical Center campus, the Betty H. Cameron Women's and Children's Hospital features an impressive glass front that will bathe the expansive interior lobby in light. The décor throughout the building was planned to create a naturally soothing atmosphere.

'The design for the Women's and Children's Hospital was truly a response to the community telling us what was important to them,' said Barbara Buechler, Director of Women's and Children's Services at NHRMC. 'We talked to former patients, community members and our own doctors and nurses to ensure we provided a healing environment.'

The result will be a 149-bed hospital that is both family friendly and medically advanced. Labor and delivery rooms and the mother/baby rooms will be larger and more comfortable for both the patients and their families. For newborns needing more advanced care, the neonatal intensive care unit will be available and redesigned to utilize the latest research on what is best for premature and critically ill infants.

The hospital will also offer comforting care and surroundings for women undergoing a difficult pregnancy or in need of gynecologic surgery. A 'healing garden' will be accessible to give patients and families a place to relax.

The biggest advancement in care will be the addition of the area's first pediatric intensive care unit. When it opens, children won't need to leave the area for advanced levels of care. Specially trained pediatric hospitalists and intensivists will be available at NHRMC 24 hours a day.

'The primary responsibility of the pediatric hospitalist is to care for children admitted to the hospital,' said Joseph Pino, MD, pediatric hospitalist. 'For families this means their child's pediatric hospitalist will be present in the hospital to respond immediately to any medical change in their child's condition.'

The public will be invited to come see the Women's and Children's Hospital before in opens at the end of August. Go to www.nhrmc.org/womensandchildrens for more information.

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