Wellington Regional begins major
expansion of facilities

By ANGIE FRANCALANCIA
Neighborhood News Group
Posted Oct. 6, 2011

WELLINGTON — Wellington Regional Medical Center is embarking on the largest expansion in the hospital’s 25-year history. The $50 million, 103,000 square-foot addition will allow the hospital to add 80 new private patient rooms, including 16 designated as an ICU step-down unit, bringing the total to 233.

The new space also will house a new, larger pharmacy, new lobby and expanded kitchen and cafeteria.

Medical Center officials and community leaders put golden shovels into the ground in a ceremonial groundbreaking Sept. 14. Construction is expected to be complete in the spring of 2013.

“It’s a very exciting day for me as well as the community,” said Alan Miller, CEO and Chairman of the Board of Universal Health Services Inc., Wellington Regional’s parent company. “Twenty eight years ago there was nothing but a blinking light on the highway here, and we were able to pick any land we wanted.

“The people toward the beach did everything they could to stop this from happening,” Miller added, but he said he knew Wellington would one day be the central part of the county.

The three-story expansion is being added to the interior façade of the hospital near the existing outpatient entrance. Once complete, the new addition will become the main entrance to the hospital, according to hospital Chief of Staff Dr. Richard Hays.

It will provide easier access and better comfort to the patients, Hays said. “Those things are important for people. They’re already anxious, coming into a hospital.”

One of the biggest improvements the additional space will add will be the ability to move patients admitted through the emergency room more quickly into a regular room, Hays said. While Wellington Regional Medical Center’s emergency room was expanded in the past to 38 beds, patients often were spending too much time waiting for a regular room, he said.

“We’re the third-busiest ER in the county,” he said.

In 2010, Wellington Regional saw more than 40,000 patients in its emergency room.

“The technology needs of facilities are hard to retrofit, so this facility will be ready for them, Hays said. “Patients we care for on floors now used to be in ICU.” Individual patient rooms need to have space for more monitoring equipment today, he said.

In addition, the private rooms help reduce privacy issues and infection issues “and people in this community want that kind of service.”

With a focus on new technology, each of the two new patient floors will have multiple nursing stations, and each new room will have a computer station, allowing nurses and physicians to spend more time at the patient’s bedside.

The new tower will also provide space to expand ante-partum services that allows women with high-risk pregnancies who risk delivering early to delay delivery in the hospital as long as possible.

The expansion is expected to add 100 full-time positions to Wellington Regional’s staff.