A Smaller, Cozier Site: The Old Hospital is Shrinking – but It’s Going to Look Sharp

By Jennifer L. Boen, The News-Sentinel, Fort Wayne, Ind.

Jan. 5–Even as Parkview Hospital officials move their flagship site north to the complex near Dupont Road and I-69, they are putting $2.8 million into renovations at the old Randallia Drive facility to update it and make it more user-friendly.

“The investments being made demonstrate our commitment to the Randallia campus,” said Mike Packnett, president and CEO of Parkview Health.

The improvements aside, the transition of services to the Parkview North campus continues next month when the new Women’s and Children’s Hospital opens there. Other specialized services, including trauma care, advanced cardiac care and oncology, will move by 2011, when Parkview North — which could have a new name by then — expands to 524 inpatient beds.

The numbers tell a story of change. In 2000, 22,086 patients were discharged at Randallia; in 2006 that number was down to 17,955. At Parkview North and the Orthopaedic Hospital there, discharges totaled 3,269 in 2006, up from 2,736 two years before, said hospital spokesman John Perlich. Parkview North opened in early 2002.

Sometime after 2011, the main tower at Randallia will be demolished, along with the parking garage. What is now Parkview Heart Institute will become a 54-bed hospital with a 24/7 emergency department. At its peak, the Randallia site had 676 beds.

Since the announcement that the system’s Fort Wayne hub will relocate north, residents and businesses around Randallia and East State Boulevard have questioned the commitment of Parkview, the city’s only nonprofit public hospital, to continue to serve the residents of Fort Wayne’s urban core.

Parkview responded with $635,000 in renovations to the guest services, lobby, and first-floor areas, as well as:

–New flooring, paint, wallpaper and lighting in the emergency department, which will remain where it is when the Heart Institute becomes a primary-care hospital.

–The addition of valet parking at the Randallia and Heart Institute entrances.

–New artwork, plants and furniture.

–More short-term parking spaces.

–New handicap-accessible restrooms.

Still under construction are eight new private rooms on the second floor of the Heart Institute. The $1.5 million project, to be completed in March, will replace double-bed rooms in the main hospital tower used for monitoring cardiac patients, said Sue Ehinger, chief operating officer for Parkview Hospital.

Visitors and staff are now enjoying an updated cafeteria — a $600,000 project — with less stainless steel and institutional colors for a homier, more sedate setting. The cafeteria, however, is likely to be relocated closer to the Heart Institute when it becomes a free-standing primary care hospital, said Tim Ferguson, director for facilities engineering.

“We are focusing on the service and excellence piece,” Ehinger said. Gone in many areas is the square, institutional-look tile flooring. Even the emergency department has faux wood laminate flooring softer to the foot and more pleasing to the eye. No waxing is needed, saving maintenance hours.

Change is the rule, Ehinger said, as employees change sites, and decisions are made regarding the final look of the Randallia site and what services will or will not be offered there after 2011.

“Most likely, we will not do heart (catheterizations) here,” Ehinger said. The ER will be equipped to handle heart-attack patients, but once they are stabilized, if catheterization is needed to detect blockage or put in a stent, or if bypass surgery is required, cardiac patients would be transferred north.

Another change: Currently, if a baby born at Parkview North requires a stay in the neonatal intensive care unit, or NICU, the baby is transferred to the Randallia campus. After February, “that will be reversed,” Ehinger said.

Currently, Parkview North is not licensed as a free-standing hospital but as a satellite hospital of Parkview on Randallia. If the hospital chooses to apply for two separate licenses through the state — and Ehinger said no decision has been made — then each hospital will require a certain number of medical staff holding specific positions; a governing body for both facilities also would be needed.

As for whether the hospitals will be renamed — and to what — Ehinger said the decision will go before the Parkview Select committee, which consists of residents and hospital employees.

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Copyright (c) 2008, The News-Sentinel, Fort Wayne, Ind.

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