Five months of preparation at Henry Mayo Newhall Memorial Hospital came to fruition on September 19 with the Department of Health’s licensure of 27 medical-surgical beds, bringing the total number of licensed patient beds to 221.
“The community’s pressing need for more acute care hospital beds has been a strategic priority at our hospital for several years,” says Roger Seaver, president and CEO of Henry Mayo. “This is the biggest increase in acute care hospital beds since 2004, and with the addition of these beds, we will continue to improve care and meet the needs of our patients.”
The Med-Surg five unit will accommodate acute medical-surgical patients with conditions that require hospitalization, such as those requiring IV antibiotics or treatment of an acute medical condition.
“We’re looking forward to working in the new Med-Surg five unit, particularly because we know how desperately these hospital beds are needed,” says Susan Romero, RN, director of the hospital’s Med-Surg four and five units. “Our ER has too many patients waiting for a hospital bed, and that’s not fair to them, nor is it the best care we are capable of giving – they need to be on a hospital nursing unit, not in ‘holding’.”
The 27 med-surg beds are the result of converting the hospital’s transitional care unit for use by acute, medical-surgical patients.
Henry Mayo continues to move forward with several additional expansion projects. Construction crews recently began preparations for the installation of semi-permanent trailers adjacent to the hospital’s Pavilion on October 20. Administrative departments will relocate to the trailers to allow the construction of a new intensive care unit—increasing the current number of ICU beds from 12 to 18. Administration will remain in the trailers until the first medical office building is complete—construction of which is pending SCV City Council approval of the hospital’s Master Plan.
Upon completion of the new ICU, work will begin on Henry Mayo’s first neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). A dedicated cardiac catheterization lab is expected to be complete early 2009. The emergency department’s new patient lobby will be open in November and will include two triage rooms, registration areas with increased privacy, and a children’s area. When the final expansion phase of the emergency department is complete in the latter half of 2009, the number of emergency department beds will total 36.
Henry Mayo Newhall Memorial Hospital is a 221 bed not-for-profit acute care hospital serving the Santa Clarita Valley since 1975. Services include trauma, emergency, intensive care, maternity, surgery, nursing, wound care, behavioral health, and acute rehab, as well as cancer, cardiology, imaging, lab, digestive, respiratory services and physical and occupational therapies. Henry Mayo Newhall Memorial Hospital is located at 23845 McBean Parkway in Valencia.
For more information, visit www.henrymayo.com or call 661-253-8000
